This is why people that follow me are lightyears ahead of their competition... You can just build a simple dashboard with AI that pulls in every posted local bid request from your local townships, cities, villages, and counties. Many of these are only ever posted on their local websites and not on bid platforms you have to pay a bunch of money for access to. AI will conglomerate them, then identify which ones you're capable of completing and bidding on, then submit your bid for you. To do this before, you'd have to go to 50+ websites and read through them every day to find the ones relevant to your service. There's literally everything you can imagine on these... Vehicle purchases, equipment, drainage work, clearing work, marketing work, legal work, plumbing, HVAC, landscaping, etc. If you do it, there's a local government near you that wants to buy it. Since very few people scroll through all these websites every day, you can often be the only bid.

Since I implemented this map quoting into Brushworks, we’re getting 15 new leads per day from it. Crazy. Might make this tool profile based so you can embed it into your website to collect leads. Thoughts?

This is what a bad forestry mulching job looks like. New operator, underpowered machine, and put yourself out of business pricing. This ground is not maintainable for their customer. In 6 months it will look like nothing ever happened, the customer will be out $2k, and paying someone with the proper experience and equipment $5k to do it the right way. Saving $3k will cost this customer $7k

Look… I think Cybertrucks are cool. I like Teslas, I owned one. But… I think they’re one of the worst vehicles you can pick to put company graphics on, and it’s becoming common to see. Your company vehicle choice goes beyond what’s cool, what’s needed, or what saves money on fuel. It also needs to align with what a customer expects to see pull in their driveway. Your choice makes a first impression of your business. If you sell high end custom home cinema experiences, sure… get a Cybertruck, but for everyone else… no. I know you can get these relatively affordably now, but most people still see Tesla as a luxury brand. Would you buy a roof from someone who shows up to give you a quote driving a Lamborghini? Probably not. You’d be pretty suspicious of their price. Seems like an extreme example, but to non car people, they know excess and practical. Tesla is still seen as excess. They’re cool trucks, but they don’t match what I’d expect someone to drive who shows up to quote my roof, lawn, or patio.

You lucky bastards. I decided to expand this map to be able to be used for any property service, and I made it free to use. Download the site plan and add it to your quote so you stop looking like an amateur. workwithground.com/map

Amazing how quickly we went from tech bros using AI to make and sell SaaS, to everyone just using it to make their own software for whatever they need instead.

Lots of people interested in using the tool from this ad.

Had a quote recently where the customer demanded we do the job in a way that would leave a very poor finish quality so that he could save money. Doing it properly would require hand cutting low branches on evergreens, then running a low profile Remote controlled mulcher to clean up under the trees. This prevents a machine from marring the trees and splintering branches. It also leaves a much cleaner finish. Doing it any other way would likely kill trees he wants to keep and be dangerous to operators. He demanded instead that we just use a Bobcat and push into the trees. Would it work? Yes, but it would look like shit and I don't want to pay to replace almost 50 old growth evergreens when they inevitably die. I ultimately decided to remove our quote from consideration. It's a job near our HQ and it's a reputation and liability risk to do it in the way he asked. I drove by it yesterday and it looks like he found a competitor to finally do it with the wrong equipment. It looks like shit and he has already killed 2 of the Evergreens. So thanks competitor for taking on that job... I now have a photo of your work to use in marketing that compares what a bad clearing job looks like vs one that's done properly.

After hundreds of forestry mulching companies across the US copied our original pricing model and quote process, we’ve just moved the goalpost again.

Just get the cans they’ve been selling at Rural King for years? They’re $20 and way better than whatever this is.

I thought I spend a lot at Microcenter… Guy behind me ordered 10 fully kitted Mac Studios. “Render Machines” he said. $300k+ 🤯

Every GC uses a different vendor platform, yet they seem to think everybody else uses the same platform they do. I've never once set up an account on a GC vendor platform and used the same account for someone else.

I had to jump on the $50 photo frame hacking. Perfect Birthday gift for the wife. She’s in love with it. Shows local events that are family friendly to take our daughter to, sports teams she follows, household chores, and a pregnancy tracker for baby #2. Since these have touch screens, the pregnancy tracker turns into a button when the baby is born to log feedings and naps. Fun and easy project with Claude to root one of these cheap digital photo frames.

Fun business idea that has become much easier with AI… Sell digital signage to bars, restaurants, and small / mid size businesses. Raspberry PI or mini PC, a TV, and an installer. Sell it as a package. 3D print enclosures with your logo. Vibe code a management platform that can be controlled with an agent. Charge monthly to push updates and manage remotely. Big businesses pay millions per year for their digital signage but you can make a version that’s accessible to small and mid sized businesses for a low start up cost.

My daughter loves airplanes. She always points them out when they’re flying overhead and gets very excited. So I figured you know… I’ll stop at a toy store and get her a toy airplane. I look up “toy store” on Google Maps. No results. Just a few collectible stores. Strange, but okay. So I go to a big box store and head to the toys. There’s two parts. Infant toys and collectible stuff. Star Wars, Marvel, Lego, board games, Hot Wheels, Matchbox, Barbie. There’s no kids in these aisles. It’s like loner looking people in their 20s and 30s looking at Legos and Star Wars stuff. I go through every aisle. Not a single toy airplane in the whole place. Then it hit me… Kids aren’t getting toys anymore. Toy stores are a thing of my childhood, not hers. Toys are for infants who are too young for tablets and gamers who want collectible toys to put on their shelves. Damn…

I made a video on this like a year ago. AI has advanced far beyond this now. Amazing how spread out people are with AI knowledge. I bet this idea has still never reached 99% of SMB owners.

New office reveal! ... and omfg... this entire video was edited with Opus 5.5 on medium. Absolutely insane edit quality.

I’ve been grinding on making the office perfect. Along the way I came up with an incredible idea that worked out far better than I thought it would. So one of the problems with any company that does field service is the disconnect between what’s happening out in the field vs what’s happening in the office. The office can feel isolating and like your work is not making an impact. So I needed a way to connect the office to the rest of the business in a way that feels tangible. I came up with a command center like you’d see in a NOC. The office can see active quotes and jobs, upcoming work, where every machine is and its status, where every truck is, where every employee is, weather radar, and much much more. All done with Claude, a Raspberry Pi, and a TV. What an incredible difference it has made