Free route-economics tool · no signup
Compare two route-cycle scenarios using your own numbers. See route hours, revenue, modeled cost, remainder, margin, and the cost-based price floor per stop as allocated drive time changes.
01 · Your route-cycle assumptions
A route cycle is one repeatable group of stops over the same period, such as one route day. Use the same period and cost allocation in both scenarios. Starting values are examples, not industry averages. Blank means missing; 0 is an explicit cost assumption.
02 · Scenario comparison
Change in modeled route-cycle remainder
+$48.00
alternate minus current · at the same customer prices
Less allocated overhead does not eliminate fixed bills. Released owner time is not automatically cash saved. Direct costs and fees stay unchanged in this travel-time-only comparison; no mileage savings are assumed.
Floor targets 22% margin, rounded up to cents. It is an average—not a guarantee that each individual stop meets that margin.
Floor targets 22% margin, rounded up to cents. It is an average—not a guarantee that each individual stop meets that margin.
Totals use unrounded calculations; displayed components can differ by a cent when added. Results include only entered costs. They are not take-home pay, accounting profit, a tax calculation, or guaranteed cash savings. Update direct costs separately if actual mileage or equipment use changes. Percentage fees apply to pre-tax revenue; account for other charged amounts in the effective rate.
Use averages from stops that are genuinely serviced together. Do not mix a weekly route’s revenue with monthly costs or allocate the same drive leg to several stops.
For Combined field-pay cost, enter the owner’s valued working hour plus each employee’s fully burdened hourly cost. This combined rate is applied to all modeled route hours. If people work different intervals, use a documented effective rate for those hours or calculate comparable crew arrangements separately. Do not enter a whole crew’s combined rate and multiply the on-site elapsed minutes by crew size again.
For one individual stop, use the free lawn care pricing calculator. This route tool uses average stop inputs; it cannot reveal differences between individual properties that those averages conceal.
The calculator opens with ten illustrative recurring stops at $60 each. Each stop uses 35 on-site minutes, 4 setup minutes, and 8 allocated drive minutes in the current scenario. Labor or owner field pay is entered at $38 per route hour, direct cost at $6 per stop, and overhead at $10 per route hour. Payment fees are zero in this example and the target margin is 22%.
With only allocated drive time changed from 8 to 2 minutes per stop, the alternate scenario saves 1.00 route hour and changes modeled route-cycle remainder by $48: $38 less valued field time plus $10 less allocated overhead. Fixed overhead bills do not fall merely because the route is shorter. This is an arithmetic example—not a forecast, benchmark, or recommended price. Floors round upward to payable cents and describe an average stop, not every individual job.
The cost base includes route-hour labor or owner field pay, direct cost per stop, allocated overhead, and fixed payment fees. Percentage fees are excluded from that base and included in the denominator. For the complete method, read the cost-based lawn care pricing guide and the margin-versus-markup guide.
In the written formula, percentages are decimals: an illustrative 3% fee is 0.03 and a 22% margin is 0.22, leaving a denominator of 0.75. Enter 3 and 22 in the calculator’s percentage fields, not the decimal forms. These are arithmetic examples, not suggested rates. Fees plus target margin must be below 100%, and the modeled cost base must be positive, to produce a usable target. Otherwise the calculator asks you to review the inputs.
Windshield minutes consume the same finite route capacity as mowing minutes. A recurring stop that adds eight allocated drive minutes can carry a higher time cost than an otherwise similar stop that adds two. The comparison isolates that difference without presenting it as an automatic price recommendation.
Read the route-density worked example →“Modeled remainder” is the revenue left after only the costs entered in this calculator. It is not an accounting profit statement, cash forecast, tax calculation, local market rate, or promise that a customer will accept a price. Missing or double-counted costs change the result.
The tool does not map customers, choose an efficient stop order, or account for weather, cancellations, taxes, and irregular work unless those effects are represented in the inputs. See Quoturf’s methodology and limitations and privacy explanation.
It compares two sets of route-cycle assumptions and estimates route hours, revenue, the costs entered, modeled remainder, modeled margin, and a cost-based price floor per stop. It is a planning model, not an accounting profit statement or forecast.
A route cycle is one repeatable group of stops measured over the same period, such as one route day. Stop count, average price, time, and costs should use the same period in both scenarios.
Route density describes how efficiently recurring stops fit together. A denser route generally requires less allocated drive time per stop, but geography, access, scheduling, and route order still matter.
Include an owner field-pay target or the crew’s combined fully burdened labor cost, visit-specific vehicle, equipment, fuel, material, and payment costs, plus an allocated share of overhead. Count each cost once.
The target margin changes the cost-based price floor, not the current customer price. Current revenue, entered costs, modeled remainder, and current margin stay the same when only the target margin changes. A goal is not an observed business result.
No. The calculator compares two sets of time and cost assumptions. It does not create directions, map customers, reorder stops, or predict an optimal route.
No. A lower-cost scenario can reduce the modeled price floor, but it is not a recommended discount. Customer value, demand, risk, and the operator’s business decisions remain separate.