Every growing land clearing company hits the same crossroads: you’re getting more work than your current crew and equipment can handle. The jobs are there. The leads are coming in. But you don’t have the capacity to take them all.

You’ve got two options — sub out the extra work to another operator, or buy more equipment and hire more people.

Both are valid. Both can make you money. And both can lose you money if you get the timing wrong.

We work with over 300 land clearing and forestry mulching companies at every stage of growth. Here’s what we’ve seen separate the companies that scale profitably from the ones that either cap out too early or overextend too fast.

The Subcontracting Decision Framework

There’s no universal answer to “should I sub out work?” It depends on where you are in your business, what kind of work you’re turning away, and how much cash you have on hand.

Here’s a framework that simplifies the decision:

Sub Out When:

• The overflow is seasonal or temporary. If you’re slammed from August through November but slow in winter, buying a second machine and hiring a full crew for 4 months of overflow doesn’t make financial sense. Sub it out, keep your margins on the work you do handle, and stay lean.
• The job type is outside your core expertise. A forestry mulching company that gets a request for site grading or tree removal with cranes should sub that out, not try to figure it out on the fly. Your reputation is built on doing YOUR thing well.
• You’re testing a new market or area. Before committing to a new service area 2 hours away, sub a few jobs there first. See if the leads actually close, if the drive time is manageable, and if the market supports your pricing.
• Your cash reserves are thin. A used forestry mulching head costs $30,000-$80,000. A skid steer or track loader adds $50,000-$150,000. If buying equipment means you can’t cover 3 months of expenses, it’s too early to buy.
• You can’t find reliable operators. Equipment without a skilled operator is an expensive lawn ornament. If you can’t hire, sub the work and keep looking. Read our guide on hiring operators →

Buy Equipment When:

• You’re turning away 4+ jobs per month consistently. One busy month isn’t a trend. Three consecutive months of turning away work IS. Track the jobs you can’t take — if it’s 4+ per month for 3 months, that’s $36,000-$120,000 in annual revenue you’re leaving on the table.
• Your subcontractor margins are eating your profit. When you sub out a $15,000 job and pay the sub $10,000-$12,000, you keep $3,000-$5,000 for doing the sales, estimating, and project management. If you owned the equipment, you’d keep $9,000-$12,000. At some volume, the math clearly favors owning.
• You have reliable operators ready or trainable. The equipment is the easy part. The human capital is the bottleneck. If you have a dependable operator (or someone you can promote from a helper role), buying equipment makes sense.
• You can finance without stretching. Equipment financing at 6-8% on a machine that generates $15,000-$30,000/month in revenue is a good trade. But only if losing that machine to a breakdown for 2 weeks wouldn’t bankrupt you.
• Your brand and reputation are at stake. When you sub out work, you lose quality control. If a subcontractor does sloppy work on a job you sold, YOUR name is on it. Once you’re big enough that reputation risk outweighs cost savings, it’s time to control the work yourself.

The Math: Subcontracting vs. Owning

Let’s run real numbers on a common scenario — a company doing $40,000-$60,000/month in revenue that’s turning away $15,000-$20,000/month in additional work.

Scenario A: Sub Out $20,000/Month

Scenario B: Buy Equipment + Hire Operator for $20,000/Month

The difference: $48,000/year in additional profit by owning vs. subbing. But owning requires $50,000-$150,000 upfront (or financing), and the risk if work slows down.

The breakeven point is typically 6-9 months. If you’re confident the work volume will sustain for at least 12 months, owning usually wins. If there’s any doubt, subbing preserves flexibility.

See our full equipment guide for land clearing →

How to Find Good Subcontractors

If you decide to sub, the quality of your subcontractor makes or breaks the strategy. Here’s how to find and vet them:

Where to Find Them

• Facebook groups: Land clearing and forestry mulching groups are full of operators looking for work, especially in slower months. Post what you need — location, job type, volume, pay structure.
• Equipment dealers: The local Cat, Bobcat, or Vermeer dealer knows every operator in a 100-mile radius. Ask who’s good and available.
• Other contractors: Tree service companies, excavation contractors, and general site work companies often have mulching or clearing capabilities and want more work.
• Your own rejected applicants: If you’ve turned down operators because you didn’t need them, they might be perfect subs. They wanted to work with you — now they can, on their own equipment.

What to Verify

• Insurance: General liability ($1M minimum) and workers’ comp. No exceptions. Get a certificate of insurance naming YOUR company as additionally insured.
• Equipment condition: Visit their shop. Look at their machines. Well-maintained equipment = reliable production. Rust and leaks = delays and callbacks.
• References: Talk to 2-3 previous clients or GCs they’ve worked with. Ask about quality, reliability, and communication — not just price.
• Test job: Start with a small job ($3,000-$5,000). See how they perform before handing them a $25,000 project.

Insurance requirements for land clearing companies →

Structuring the Subcontractor Agreement

Don’t handshake it. Even with guys you trust, put the terms in writing. A simple 1-page agreement should cover:

• Scope of work: What exactly they’re doing (clearing, mulching, hauling, grading)
• Pay structure: Fixed price per job, day rate, or percentage. Be specific.
• Timeline: When the work starts and when it must be complete
• Quality standards: Cut height for mulching, stump height, cleanup expectations, property line boundaries
• Insurance requirement: Must maintain GL and WC, provide certificate before starting
• Liability: Sub is responsible for damage to property, underground utilities, irrigation lines
• No direct solicitation: Sub cannot contact YOUR client directly for future work — protects your customer relationship

The Hybrid Model: What the Best Companies Do

The highest-revenue land clearing companies we work with don’t choose one or the other — they run a hybrid model:

• Core work (80%): Handled by their own crews and equipment. They control quality, margins, and scheduling on the bread-and-butter jobs.
• Overflow and specialty work (20%): Subbed to trusted partners. This handles seasonal spikes, geographic expansion tests, and job types outside their wheelhouse.

This gives them the best of both worlds — high margins on the majority of work, plus the flexibility to never turn down a job.

Companies in the $500K-$1M range typically sub 30-40% of their work. By $1M-$2M, they’ve usually reduced subbing to 10-20% as they’ve added equipment and crew. By $3M+, most work is internal with subs used only for peaks and specialty.

Read our complete scaling guide for land clearing companies →

When Subcontracting Backfires

We’ve seen subcontracting go wrong in predictable ways. Avoid these:

• Subbing your core service permanently. If you’re a forestry mulching company and you sub out ALL your mulching, you don’t have a business — you have a referral service. Sub the overflow, not the core.
• Not checking the work. Visit the job site during and after. One bad job that your sub botches costs you the client relationship, a negative review, and potentially a lawsuit. Quality control is still YOUR responsibility.
• Paying subs before getting paid. Structure payment so you collect from the client first, then pay the sub within 7-14 days. Don’t finance your sub’s cash flow.
• Over-reliance on one sub. If your entire overflow capacity depends on one person and they get hurt, break equipment, or take a better offer, you’re stuck. Have 2-3 reliable subs in your network.
• Not tracking the numbers. You should know EXACTLY what your margin is on subbed work vs. owned work. If subbed work consistently runs below 15% margin, it’s probably not worth the hassle — the sales and management overhead isn’t justified. Track these 5 numbers weekly →

The Decision Checklist

Before your next capacity decision, run through this checklist:

1. Am I turning away 4+ jobs/month for 3+ consecutive months? (If no → sub for now)
2. Do I have a reliable operator ready? (If no → sub and keep recruiting)
3. Can I finance equipment without risking my reserves? (If no → sub until cash is stronger)
4. Is the work type consistent with my core service? (If no → always sub specialty work)
5. Will this volume sustain for 12+ months? (If unsure → sub and track trends)

If you answered “yes” to all five, it’s time to buy. If you answered “no” to even one, subcontracting is the smarter play until that answer changes.

The Bottom Line

Subcontracting isn’t a sign of weakness — it’s a sign of smart growth management. The companies that scale fastest are the ones that say yes to every job, handle what they can internally, and sub the rest to trusted partners until the volume justifies the next equipment purchase.

Never turn away work. Never overextend. Grow into your capacity — don’t guess at it.

Need more jobs to make the buy-vs-sub decision even relevant? We help over 300 land clearing and forestry mulching companies fill their schedules with consistent, high-quality leads. Let’s talk about your growth plan.

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