Operating analysis · Document 04

Job margin, contract pricing and overtime

Aspire records price and actual cost on every work ticket, so delivered margin per job is computable — and nothing in the platform computes it. This does. It also examines how consistently the price book is applied, and what overtime the system actually records.

Priced tickets: 582,826
Revenue examined: $391,292,255
Blended margin: 45.4%
Negative-margin work: $19,849,535
Recorded overtime: 585,829.2 h
Period: Jan – Aug 2026

By region

Region	Tenants	Priced tickets	Revenue	Blended margin	Below cost	Value below cost
Central	7	183,580	$83,376k	49.6%	5.6%	$2,261k
West	8	199,709	$127,178k	52.3%	9.1%	$3,192k
East	9	199,537	$180,738k	38.5%	10.1%	$14,397k

Blended margin is value-weighted across each region's operating companies, never averaged. It is an upper bound: overtime recorded as straight time leaves TotalCostAct understating labor, and Signature records almost no overtime despite the longest shifts in the group — so Central's margin is flattered relative to the others. Document 05 carries the full regional cut.

Headline

$19,849,535 of work was delivered below cost

Revenue examined

$391,292,255

582,826 tickets carrying both a price and an actual cost — about 73% of all tickets.

Delivered below cost

$19,849,535

5.1% of revenue examined. Two operating companies account for four fifths of it.

Blended gross margin

45.4%

Ranges 27.6% to 67.8% between operating companies.

Price overridden

14.7–92.8%

Share of services where pricing departs from the book. Minimum-price application is near zero everywhere.

Job margin

Where margin is lost, and on what size of job

Gross margin is Price less TotalCostAct per ticket. The column that matters most is drag — blended margin minus the median. Blended is value-weighted, the median is count-weighted, so a negative drag means the large jobs carry worse margin than the typical one. That distinction decides where to look.

Tickets with both a price and an actual cost. Drag = blended minus median, in points.
Tenant	Tickets	Revenue	Blended	Median	Drag	p10	Negative	Loss
Agrow Pro, LLC	879	$1,695,722	67.8%	73.1%	-5.3	11.7%	6.9%	$54,394
Merkle Lawncare Company, LLC	6,194	$2,716,316	62.8%	57.5%	+5.3	11.8%	6.1%	$20,730
Cutting Edge Serivces, LLC	48,687	$18,412,915	59.4%	52.1%	+7.3	14.5%	5.8%	$259,811
Total Environment Inc	29,249	$13,954,690	57.3%	57.7%	-0.4	12.8%	6.5%	$200,092
Wyoming Landscape Companies	5,433	$6,636,788	56.5%	66.8%	-10.3	-34.1%	14%	$460,884
Keesen	42,599	$27,893,296	55.5%	50.9%	+4.6	-8.4%	11.6%	$898,542
Top Care Landscape, LLC	13,856	$4,544,383	55.2%	55.3%	-0.1	14.1%	6%	$61,749
Signature	70,407	$27,210,718	52.8%	52.3%	+0.5	25.9%	4%	$258,674
Perficut \| Quality Care	40,293	$16,751,687	49.8%	57.8%	-8	17%	5.2%	$403,466
Heartland AZ	28,893	$33,705,408	48.4%	46.8%	+1.6	-13.3%	12.6%	$586,266
Columbia Landcare, LLC	24,015	$5,601,798	48.2%	53.2%	-5	14.2%	6.9%	$175,854
HearLand TX	22,429	$15,517,528	47.5%	47.4%	+0.1	14.9%	6.5%	$200,074
LCM	19,265	$17,907,062	47%	47.1%	-0.1	12.1%	6.6%	$537,851
JML	27,318	$18,051,411	46.3%	44.5%	+1.8	16.8%	4.7%	$176,396
VerdeGo	10,533	$24,014,822	46%	50.8%	-4.8	18.9%	5.8%	$349,826
LSI	30,174	$31,244,096	45.4%	46.6%	-1.2	13.9%	6.1%	$745,041
John Shorb Landscaping Inc	20,515	$13,061,647	44.4%	52.4%	-8	16.2%	6.4%	$1,135,196
Cutting Edge Utah	5,130	$3,159,278	42.9%	46.8%	-3.9	-83.2%	20.1%	$196,275
Roark Landscaping Company	17,289	$7,898,186	42.4%	39%	+3.4	1.8%	9.2%	$389,969
Schultz Lawnscapes	16,527	$9,243,164	41.7%	45.2%	-3.5	-45.7%	17.8%	$663,292
Landscape Services Group	7,696	$6,397,924	40.8%	47.2%	-6.4	2.5%	9.4%	$383,411
HLM	9,550	$8,644,453	38.3%	46.6%	-8.3	-21.6%	13.5%	$802,762
Heartland NE	59,338	$48,256,625	30.4%	40.1%	-9.7	-15.9%	13.3%	$6,262,739
Heritage Landscape Services	26,557	$28,772,341	27.6%	44.3%	-16.7	-22.3%	13.2%	$4,626,243

Heartland NE and Heritage are the finding. Together they carry $10,888,982 of the $19,849,535. Both show a drag of ten points or more — blended margin far below their own median — meaning the loss is concentrated in large jobs rather than spread across a long tail of small ones. That is the tractable version of this problem: a limited number of individually identifiable jobs. By contrast LCM's blended and median are within a tenth of a point, so its margin is uniform across job sizes and there is no concentration to find.

Job margin

Lowest-margin branches

Branches with at least 50 priced tickets, ranked by blended margin.
Branch	Tenant	Tickets	Revenue	Margin	Negative	Loss
OLNEY	Heritage Landscape Services	2,895	$2,631,309	3.3%	19.6%	$854,816
J. Downend - Kennett Square	Heartland NE	622	$1,176,831	4.4%	12.7%	$439,750
Sharp's - Philadelphia	Heartland NE	6,068	$4,831,124	15%	8.3%	$1,294,667
STAFFORD	Heritage Landscape Services	1,016	$1,072,268	16.3%	15.9%	$307,884
BURTONSVILLE	Heritage Landscape Services	4,235	$3,641,586	21.2%	16.4%	$776,899
Merit NE - Pennsylvania	Heartland NE	2,695	$1,271,055	22.7%	9.3%	$170,084
J. Downend - Ridley	Heartland NE	3,644	$4,161,870	27.8%	14.5%	$624,522
Rockville	John Shorb Landscaping Inc	5,915	$6,383,175	28.8%	15.2%	$957,225
PRINCE WILLIAM	Heritage Landscape Services	5,865	$5,677,233	29.3%	11.4%	$870,594
Wilcox - Corporate	Heartland NE	11,522	$6,716,049	30%	24.7%	$1,254,900
THE FARM	Heritage Landscape Services	3,461	$6,757,311	31%	9.1%	$883,912
STERLING	Heritage Landscape Services	3,889	$5,160,369	32.1%	11.8%	$620,951

Contract pricing

The price book is advisory

Per tenant. Comparable services are those surviving the plausibility filter described below.
Tenant	Services	Price overridden	Minimum applied	Comparable	Excluded
Agrow Pro, LLC	2,883	92.8%	0%	2,236	449
Heartland NE	193,294	89.2%	0%	122,409	31,727
Merkle Lawncare Company, LLC	4,301	86.4%	1.4%	2,959	986
Roark Landscaping Company	51,305	85.9%	0.2%	35,757	882
Total Environment Inc	123,476	84.4%	1.6%	100,907	10,681
Perficut \| Quality Care	317,241	84.3%	14.2%	241,967	20,626
Columbia Landcare, LLC	174,619	83.7%	1.5%	122,316	6,177
Signature	594,763	80.1%	0.6%	431,282	36,709
Keesen	468,582	80%	0.5%	298,935	7,467
John Shorb Landscaping Inc	118,042	79.6%	3.2%	95,612	5,153
Heartland AZ	86,329	78.5%	0.1%	71,085	3,291
Landscape Services Group	18,164	74.5%	0.3%	15,975	263
LCM	146,326	74.3%	0%	124,149	4,702
HLM	57,400	72.8%	0.6%	35,046	4,355
Schultz Lawnscapes	28,701	71.4%	1.5%	22,005	708
Cutting Edge Serivces, LLC	200,898	69.6%	2.7%	142,350	8,816
Heritage Landscape Services	236,576	65%	1.7%	138,218	36,210
JML	109,703	64.5%	0%	93,585	10,965
Top Care Landscape, LLC	20,811	59.8%	0.1%	18,991	668
HearLand TX	55,032	56.9%	0%	39,502	1,706
Wyoming Landscape Companies	20,829	55.1%	2.7%	14,214	1,592
LSI	264,135	47.1%	0.4%	138,608	3,690
Cutting Edge Utah	42,638	42.9%	2.2%	30,406	1,461
VerdeGo	49,398	14.7%	0%	22,840	1,083

Between 14.7% and 92.8% of services carry an overridden price, and minimum-price application is effectively unused. At the top of that range nearly nine services in ten depart from the book. This needs no filtering or interpretation: as a systematic control on pricing, the price book is not functioning.

Same service, different rate

Price per service-hour for recurring services with 30+ instances, widest interquartile spread.
Service	Tenant	Instances	p25	Median	p75	p75/p25
Sprinkler Repairs	Signature	37	$36.44	$131.26	$453.87	12.46×
Brine	Wyoming Landscape Companies	34	$32.87	$241.33	$335	10.19×
Seasonal DeIce Walks	Signature	271	$38.76	$369.87	$379.85	9.8×
Perimeter Treatment	Total Environment Inc	39	$23.71	$155.12	$165.44	6.98×
Growth Regulatory Tree	HearLand TX	37	$37.15	$38.41	$257.26	6.93×
DeIce Walks	Signature	46	$57.44	$199.36	$371.45	6.47×
GSA - Planting Preparation	John Shorb Landscaping Inc	73	$19.49	$55.57	$122.64	6.29×
EN - Firewood Delivery	Total Environment Inc	32	$56.38	$247.5	$316.25	5.61×
Irrigation System Audit	LSI	303	$16.67	$85.44	$91.77	5.51×
Gypsum Application Lawn	Total Environment Inc	98	$65.87	$263.55	$330.69	5.02×

An earlier version of this table was wrong

Unfiltered, it showed spreads up to 141× with a 90th-percentile rate of $10,112 per hour. That was not a pricing signal but a near-zero hours figure dividing into a whole-job price. Four exclusions now apply, all counted rather than silent: as-needed time-and-materials services, which are legitimately variable; services with under a quarter-hour of planned time; implied rates outside $5–$500 per hour; and services with fewer than 30 instances. The headline ratio is p75/p25 rather than p90/p10, because the tails of this field are dominated by data quality, not pricing decisions.

Filtered, the widest genuine spreads are three to seven times — still substantial for the same service, but a "review the lower quartile" finding rather than a dramatic one. Note also that most entries are chemical applications and plant replacement, where cost sits in product rather than labor, so price per hour is a weak unit for them in the first place.

Overtime

Recorded, material, and wildly inconsistent

Overtime as recorded on time entries.
Tenant	Time entries	With overtime	Share of entries	Overtime hours
LSI	175,714	28,815	16.399%	80,282.2
Heartland NE	307,260	38,981	12.687%	76,248.7
JML	151,388	26,837	17.727%	54,592.8
LCM	142,307	17,561	12.34%	48,321.2
Heritage Landscape Services	225,389	17,630	7.822%	41,625.2
VerdeGo	85,011	11,130	13.092%	30,980.1
Roark Landscaping Company	102,409	18,819	18.376%	29,235.8
Perficut \| Quality Care	154,500	23,115	14.961%	28,425.3
Total Environment Inc	180,847	25,074	13.865%	27,512.9
Cutting Edge Serivces, LLC	191,396	15,285	7.986%	25,174.4
Heartland AZ	227,036	12,608	5.553%	24,697.4
Schultz Lawnscapes	123,527	12,159	9.843%	18,830
HLM	55,744	6,289	11.282%	18,654.4
Columbia Landcare, LLC	101,575	14,326	14.104%	17,142.4
John Shorb Landscaping Inc	127,232	8,642	6.792%	14,891.9
Keesen	203,948	7,052	3.458%	13,736.1
HearLand TX	125,492	5,771	4.599%	10,977.4
Wyoming Landscape Companies	58,844	3,264	5.547%	6,603.4
Landscape Services Group	53,286	3,619	6.792%	5,440.5
Top Care Landscape, LLC	73,587	3,549	4.823%	4,124.4
Cutting Edge Utah	35,420	3,545	10.008%	3,891.9
Merkle Lawncare Company, LLC	32,318	2,024	6.263%	3,546.8
Signature	289,575	219	0.076%	501.6
Agrow Pro, LLC	1,983	163	8.22%	392.4

585,829.2 hours of overtime are recorded across the group. At a half-time premium on a nominal base rate this is comfortably a seven-figure annual cost, though the precise figure needs OTLaborCost, which this pass did not retrieve.

Signature is the anomaly and it matters for every other number here. It records overtime on 0.08% of entries — 471 hours — while running the longest shifts in the group at a 10.96-hour mean, with a majority of person-days past eight hours. Either its overtime is administered outside Aspire, or it is booked as straight time. Whichever it is, Signature's TotalCostAct excludes premium pay that its peers include, so its 52.8% blended margin is flattered relative to theirs. The margin table above should be read with that in mind.

A correction worth recording. An earlier pass concluded from Signature alone that overtime fields were unusable across the estate and that overtime could not be analyzed from Aspire. That was wrong. All 24 instances record it, several substantially — LSI at 80,282 hours and Heartland NE at 76,249 lead the estate. Signature was simply the tenant checked first.

Interpretation

How to read these figures

Margin is an upper bound. Where overtime is real but recorded as straight time, or administered outside Aspire, TotalCostAct understates labor. Actual margin is at or below what is shown.
Drive time sits inside these costs. Crew travel is booked to customer tickets, so properties far from a yard carry their own travel in cost of service. That is correct as accounting but it means dispersed properties look less profitable for a reason within the business's control.
Coverage is 73%. Tickets without both a price and an actual cost are excluded, so these are not whole-book figures. The excluded quarter is not random — it skews toward work that was never costed.
Cross-tenant comparison is weaker than branch comparison. Overtime recording alone differs by two orders of magnitude between tenants. Rank branches within an operating company; treat the tenant table as orientation.
Nothing here is a forecast. A negative-margin ticket may have been priced deliberately, as a loss leader or a first-year concession. The list identifies where to look, not what to change.

Read the largest negative-margin jobs at Heartland NE and Heritage. The drag figures say these are concentrated in big jobs, so a few dozen tickets should account for most of the $10,888,982. They are individually identifiable today.
Pull OTLaborCost and OTLaborBurdenCost so overtime is money rather than hours, and re-cost margin with premium pay included.
Establish why Signature records no overtime — it is either a genuine cost advantage worth copying or a recording gap that makes its numbers incomparable.
Ask what an override means at Heartland NE, where 89% of services carry one. If overriding is the norm, the book is not the control anyone believes it is.
Re-test pricing dispersion on a per-visit basis rather than per hour, for the chemical and plant-replacement services where product dominates cost.

Built from Aspire production data, 1 January to 12 August 2026, 24 tenants. Margin from WorkTicket.Price and TotalCostAct; pricing from OpportunityService; overtime from WorkTicketTime.OTHours. Customer and individual names are excluded throughout.