Agriculture · Leading & Selling
Landscape contractor: what the job actually is
Running the crews, quotes and schedules that keep other people's properties looking good, and being blamed when rain wrecks the week.
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The work
What this job actually is
- Supervising or owning a crew that installs and maintains gardens, lawns, hardscape and grounds. The work is half people and half scheduling.
- You quote jobs, order materials, assign crews, check the finished work and talk to clients. The shovel is still involved but it is not the main tool.
- Weather runs your calendar. A week of rain moves every job after it, and clients do not care.
- Many contractors run a second business in winter, usually snow clearing. Job Bank lists self-employment as a main employer, and that fits what the trade looks like.
- Job Bank says experience as a landscape or horticulture supervisor or technician is usually required, along with experience in the type of work you are supervising. You do not start here; you work up to it.
A Tuesday
What a normal day looks like
Not a good day or a bad one. The ordinary version, which is what you would actually be living.
- 6:00 — Phone already buzzing. A client wants today moved, a crew member is sick, and one truck has a flat.
- 6:45 — Yard. Fuel, load, assign crews, hand each leader the day's jobs and the one thing that cannot go wrong on each.
- 7:30 — Drive to a quote. Walk the property, measure, ask the client what they actually want versus what they said on the phone.
- 9:00 — Check the install site. Grading looks off by a few centimetres; you have them redo it now rather than hear about it in a year.
- 10:30 — Supplier call. Stone is late, so you rearrange the next three days.
- 12:00 — Lunch standing up in a client's driveway, reading an email asking for a discount.
- 13:00 — Write three quotes. Underprice one and you will lose money; overprice one and you lose the job.
- 15:00 — Rain forecast. Move tomorrow's crews, text four clients, absorb two unhappy replies.
- 17:00 — Back at the yard. Check equipment, check hours, check the invoices that have not been paid.
- 19:00 — Evening, writing up next week. Nobody mentioned the evening part when you started.
Honestly
Who loves this, and who should not do it
The second list is the useful one. Nearly every careers page leaves it out, which is why nearly every careers page reads like an advert.
- You like being responsible for other people's work and don't mind the paperwork that comes with it.
- You are comfortable telling a customer what something will cost and then holding to it.
- You can stay calm when the plan changes three times by noon.
- You want to be able to run your own business without a degree.
- You enjoy outdoor, physical work and also like the planning side of it.
- You want the hours to stay the same. Crew leaders and owners work long days in season, plus evenings.
- You dislike conflict. Clients argue about invoices and crew members quit without notice.
- Money stress bothers you. A rainy month or one unpaid invoice can hit a small operation hard.
- The outlook worries you. Job Bank rates Ontario's outlook for this group as Limited and expects some positions to be lost, so competition is real.
- You dislike being responsible for injuries. Equipment, trenches and heavy materials make safety a real, daily duty.
The route in
How you actually get there in Ontario
Work on a crew first
Nobody sensible hires a supervisor with no field experience, and clients can tell. Spend seasons on a crew learning every task you will later be pricing.Add a credential that matches the work
Job Bank says a college diploma, specialised courses or industry training and certification in landscaping and horticulture are usually required for this group. The Horticultural Technician apprenticeship (trade code 441C, non-compulsory, Red Seal) is the trade route; a college landscape or horticulture programme is the other.Move up the crew
Crew member, crew leader, supervisor. Your pay, and your ability to quote, grow with the number of jobs you have actually run.Licences and the business side
Job Bank notes that a provincial licence to apply chemical fertilizers or pesticides may be required. If you go out on your own you also need insurance and a way to quote and invoice properly, and a few years under a good boss pays for itself.
Where this comes from: Job Bank — Ontario requirements for landscaping contractors and supervisors · Skilled Trades Ontario — Horticultural Technician (441C) · Ontario — Start an apprenticeship
The money
What it pays in Ontario
Job Bank's own figures, quoted rather than summarised, with the period they describe — so you can tell how old they are and go and check them.
- $21.68
- Low (hourly)
- $30.00
- Median (hourly)
- $42.00
- High (hourly)
Ontario, NOC 82031. Reference period 2023-2024, last updated by Job Bank on 19 November 2025. Wages vary a lot by region inside Ontario and by how long you have been doing it — the low figure is roughly where you start, not what the job is worth.
Where it is heading
The outlook for the next three years
Job Bank publishes a three-year outlook for every job in every province. It is the closest thing to an honest forecast, and it moves, so read it as a weather report rather than a verdict.
Limited2 out of 5 stars
- Employment decline will lead to the loss of some positions.
- Not many positions will become available due to retirements.
- There are a moderate number of unemployed workers with recent experience in this occupation.
What that rating means: how many openings Job Bank expects in Ontario for this kind of work against how many people are likely to be looking — not whether it is a good job. A “limited” rating means more competition for each opening; it does not close the door, and it can change before you are ready to walk through it.
What is changing in this work
- Although healthy levels of residential and non-residential construction should add to the stock of facilities that require landscaping services, job prospects may be impacted by weaker consumer demand and increased competition in the industry
- Large operations in greenhouse, nursery and floriculture production in Ontario
Who hires for it
- Majority are in companies that provide landscape and maintenance services to buildings and residences
- Self-employment
- 11,150
- people work in this job in Ontario
- 11%
- are women (48% across all jobs)
Source: Job Bank — Contractors and supervisors, landscaping, grounds maintenance and horticulture services job prospects in Ontario (NOC 82031). Outlook updated by Job Bank on 10 December 2025; read by us on 5 October 2026.
Before you leave school
Things you can do now
- Take a business, entrepreneurship or technology course. Quoting and invoicing is half of this job and it is not taught in a shovel.
- Start a small lawn or yard business in summer if your family allows it. You will learn pricing and reliability faster than in any class.
- Ask about co-op with a local landscape company, and OYAP if the apprenticeship route interests you.
- Notice how landscapers in your area run their jobs: crew size, trucks, the order of work. It is free to observe.
Test it
Do this before you decide anything
Reading about a job tells you almost nothing. This is designed to be done alone, this week, for free.
Price a yard job like a contractor would
About 90 minutes- Pick a yard on your street, with the owner's permission or just from the sidewalk. Write a list of every task a crew would do to tidy it: mow, edge, prune, mulch, haul away.
- Estimate the time each task takes for two people and add them up. Add travel time, loading, unloading and a margin for things going wrong.
- Look up the hourly cost of renting or owning a mower, trimmer and truck, and write down how you would cover them.
- Write the quote as a short paragraph a client could read. Notice how many of the numbers you had to guess.
What it tells you. If guessing the numbers was interesting and you wanted to check them against a real job, you have the business brain this role needs. If you found it tedious, or the guessing made you uncomfortable, then supervising or owning is probably not your path, and a crew or technician role may suit you better.
Better than any article
Questions for somebody who does this job
Most people say yes to a teenager who asks good questions. These are the ones that get real answers rather than encouragement.
- “How do you decide what to charge, and how often are you wrong?”
- “What do you do between November and March?”
- “How many crew members do you lose in a season and why?”
- “What is the worst mistake a new contractor makes in the first year?”
- “How do you handle a client who will not pay?”
- “What would you do differently if you were starting now?”
Could you own one of these?
The part other career sites never mention
Yes. This is one of the most common routes to self-employment and Job Bank lists self-employment as a main employer for this group. Start small, learn from a company first, watch cash flow through the slow months, and get proper insurance before the first job.
Not sure this is the right list to be reading
Start from yourself, not from the job.
Future Finder is free, takes about ten minutes, needs no account and stores nothing. It will tell you which kinds of work you lean toward, and which of these pages are worth your time.
Parent of a teenager weighing this up? Career coaching for teens gets them talking to people who do the work, anywhere in Ontario.
If this appeals, look at these too
horticulture technician business owner greenhouse grower
Read next
The Ontario pathway, 12 to 39 Apprenticeships in Ontario What to do after high school All careers guides
Wages and training requirements change. Every figure on this page is linked to the body that publishes it, and the review date above says when we last checked. If you find something out of date, tell us and we will fix it.