In a rolling Pennsylvanian valley suburb, 13-year-old Chase Gallagher marched for miles to start his lawn care business in Chester County, advertising his services and delivering thousands of fliers.
Finally, the phone rang after endless hours out pounding doorsteps every night: Mr. Gallagher, you’re hired!
Soon, the teenager’s business sputtered to life like his own ride-on lawn mower and started earning him $35 a pop. With more aggressive leafletting, his business grew. And grew some more.
Now 23, Mr. Gallagher embraces the mindset of being his own boss and the freedom this brings. Today he runs CMG Landscaping, owns several properties and heavy equipment, and employs 9 workers. Getting his hands dirty, he’s among the top 1% of income earners.
“I never would have thought the amount of money that I made today would be possible in my business when I first got started,” Mr. Gallagher told The Epoch Times. “When I was younger, my assumptions were that you had to go to college.”
Many students are wired that way today. According to a Jobber survey, 74% of respondents said there’s “a stigma associated with going to a vocational school over a traditional four-year university.”
Yet more students today are breaking the mold, according to the National Student Clearinghouse. In 2023, an impressive 23% more chose to study construction trades in contrast to the year prior.
His early plans for college were instilled by his teachers and parents, which landed him a spot at Penn State University. His mom helped get his dorm ready and paid his fees, but he was already an competitive trap shooter internationally. All his teammates would also attend.
By now, though, his business had become a passion. His leafletting continued until he had 10 clients, clearing $12,000. He pushed two more years. Eighteen clients. Clearing $20,000. One milestone down. Then the next: his driver’s license. “I was off like a rocket,” he said. His mom let him do high school online. “I was free,” he said. “I could go do estimates anytime I wanted, go work anytime I wanted.”
It took him courage, at 17, to finally stand up and say he wasn’t going to college. “I want to do my business!” he declared. “My mom was upset because she had a lot of work put into this, getting Penn State to accept me.”
It was a bold move but one based on “simple math,” he says. Adding the costs of college at roughly $50,000 per year for four years, it totaled $200,000 in debt and a loss of time he could have spent earning. Now rolling in dough by the sweat of his brow, his own boots on the ground, the matter snapped into perspective.
“I got this money and then slowly but surely, I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m not going to college at all,’” he told the newspaper. “It’s a waste of my time.”
His business went like stepping stones over the years, and he would take a big leap. At 18, he listened to his industry peers and realized there was “no money in mowing;” project-based landscaping was the ticket.
“I sold my lawn-mowing equipment and went down to John Deere and financed a piece of equipment and dump trailer. And that’s when I made a name change from Lawn Care to CMG Landscaping,“ he said. ”I basically just switched my whole business model.”
CMG tackles patios, drainage work, landscaping, lighting, planting, design, concrete installation, and retaining walls, generating over $1 million in revenue last year, Fortune reported.
Gen-Zers like Mr. Gallagher are “possibly the most educated generation in history,” psychologist Tobba Vigfusdottir told Fortune, adding that there “definitely was a taboo against people who went into trades,” but those beliefs have evaporated. More than ever, young people feel “envious” of their peers who are their own boss.
When we spoke to Mr. Gallagher, he was living with his mom but soon moving into his new house—he has three; plus a 32-acre yard for equipment: four dump trucks, tractors, trailers, and hand tools.
A day in the life of Chase Gallagher goes something like this:
Waking at 5:30 a.m., he’s on the phone before hitting the gym and grabbing a coffee to start off. The day involves a bank run, meeting clients, office admin, and checking job sites. He’s stepped back from labor mostly, hiring his former employer, his “buddy Mike,” as project manager. Mr. Gallagher markets on social media and does networking events. Winters, he says, are spent in Florida.
On the horizon, Mr. Gallagher wants to help upstarts scale their business by investing, making his a private equity program. Merging small businesses and raising their value, doubling or tripling their worth, he says, could open the door for buying real estate.
Or, possibly, other assets.
Next, Mr. Gallagher says, he’s saving “to afford a jet.”
