The Grounds Guys franchise unit economics

How much does a Grounds Guys franchise make?

The average Grounds Guys unit reported $671,405 of revenue in the 2026 FDD. The brand’s disclosure document discloses revenue and not profit, so what an owner keeps depends on the cost structure set out below. Fees come off the top first, at about 9.2% of sales across royalty, brand fund and the rest of the stack. Revenue is not income. Rent, wages, cost of goods and the franchise fees all come out before an owner is paid. The figures for the highest-selling and lowest-selling businesses are below.

Top performers

What separates the top Grounds Guys performers

What three years is worth

Gross sales by time in operation, 2025

Counts, averages, medians, ranges and attainment are as the brand reported it across the 161 businesses that reported at least nine months. The final column and the closing row are marked *.

The median business past three years bills $533,092. That is 65.0% of its own group average *, and 37 of 105 reach that average. So the mature group is carried by a long upper tail running to $3,588,439.

The young group’s median is 75.1% of its average. That compares with 65.0% in the mature group *, so new businesses cluster and the range opens up as they age.

Attainment is identical in both groups at about 35%. That is 37 of 105 and 20 of 56, so two businesses in three sit below their own group average whatever their age. The maturity gain is a gain in the level.

The highest-selling mature business bills 4.37 times its own group average. That is $3,588,439 against $820,392 *, and 84 times the lowest-selling in the same group, which is the widest internal range on this page.

Blending the two groups gives $671,405 across the 161 reporting businesses*. That figure weights the $820,392 average of the 105 businesses open three years and over and the $392,054 average of the 56 open under three years. It is the figure to carry forward, because The Grounds Guys states the two groups separately.

Fees and the season

Brand and marketing fees at each level

The rates and minimums are as the brand reported it and every dollar figure is marked. The license minimum is taken at the $180 weekly rate that applies from week 157.

The license scale runs 6%, 5.5% and 5% on $750,000 and $1,750,000 of prior-year sales. It is set on the previous calendar year and charged against every week of the next. So each threshold is a cliff worth half a percent of itself, $3,750 and $8,750 *.

The local marketing requirement is the greater of $20,000 or 5% of prior-year sales. It sits on top of the 2% brand fund, and at the mature average 5% is $41,020 a year *.

5% overtakes the $20,000 minimum at $400,000. The young group averages $392,054 *, just under it, so a business in its first three years is usually paying the flat minimum. Growth up to $400,000 dilutes that charge without adding to it.

The first two years each have $25,000 of local marketing, and $15,000 of it must fall in high season. That is the fee schedule acknowledging what the trade already knows. The money has to be spent when the work is available.

The license minimum is charged at one rate from April to November and another from December to March. It runs $90 a week, rising to $180 by week 157, which is $9,360 a year at full years open *, and 6% overtakes it at $156,000 of sales.

Fixed software and call handling run about $10,253 a year. That is $654.45 a month for the software stack and $199.99 for the call center *, plus $15 for each appointment booked, which is 1.2% of the mature average and 2.6% of the young one.

The terminations

Outlets opened and terminated, 2023 to 2025

Every figure is as the brand reported it apart from the net column. That is marked *, and company-owned outlets stood at zero in all three years.

Another 19 businesses were terminated in the first quarter of 2026. That is as many in three months as in the whole of 2025. The franchisor states plainly that it is disclosing them because of the high number, a brand volunteering that figure is telling an owner something the outlet table leaves out.

Openings fell by 72% in two years. They went 43, then 31, then 12 *, and the projection for the next year is 21 new outlets against 19 agreements already signed with the outlet still to open.

Across three years 86 opened and 78 left. The departures were 58 terminations, 5 non-renewals and 15 that ceased for other reasons. The Grounds Guys ended 2025 with 219 franchised businesses, 8 more than the 211 it started 2023 with.

Twenty businesses closed during 2025, one of them inside its first twelve months. Their figures sit outside the tables on this page, so the averages describe the businesses that were still trading at the end of the year.

Territory and opening

Territory pricing

Territory is priced at exactly 35 cents a head, whatever the size. $43,750 covers 125,000 people and each further 1,000 costs $350, so a 500,000-population territory costs $175,000 *. The maximum is generally 500,000, which is four times the base.

Opening costs $107,650 to $252,850. That is 13.1% to 30.8% of a mature year’s sales *. The business runs from home or from premises, and the printed advertising line caps at $15,000 against a first-year requirement of $25,000.

Snow and ice work sits alongside the grounds calendar. Property maintenance, landscaping, hardscaping, arboriculture, turf care, irrigation and lighting fill the warm months and snow fills the cold ones. That is why one business in five still trades under nine months and why the fee calendar splits at April and December.

Key account work has its own charge. It is up to a further 5% on sales made through the brand’s key accounts program, on top of the license fee and the brand fund. So national contract revenue arrives at a lower margin than work you win yourself.

A local marketing group may take up to 3% more. Contributions count toward the required local spend, so the group absorbs the requirement. At the mature average that is up to $24,612 of the $41,020 already committed *.

Questions we get asked

Questions an owner asks