How to get government contracts in landscaping and grounds maintenance

Landscaping is one of the cleaner entry points into federal contracting. Agencies own a lot of land. Military bases, VA campuses, national cemeteries, federal courthouses, and Forest Service sites all need mowing, irrigation, tree work, snow removal, and seasonal cleanup on recurring schedules. That demand is steady, the work is bid in plain language, and most of it gets set aside for small businesses. If you already run crews in the private sector, the gap between where you are and a federal contract is mostly paperwork and patience.

Here's the real path.

The NAICS code and the size standard that decide everything

Federal landscaping work runs almost entirely through NAICS code 561730, Landscaping Services. That single code covers lawn care, mowing, tree and shrub maintenance, irrigation, and landscape installation. When an agency posts a grounds maintenance solicitation, 561730 is the code attached to it, and the contracting officer uses it to decide who counts as "small."

The SBA size standard for 561730 is $10 million in average annual receipts, measured over the firm's most recent five completed fiscal years. That standard took effect in March 2023. If your five-year average revenue is under $10 million, you are a small business for this work and you qualify for every small-business set-aside in the program. Most landscaping firms clear that bar easily, which is part of why this NAICS code is friendly to newcomers. Verify the current number at sba.gov/size-standards before you bid, since the SBA revises standards on a rolling basis.

One code, one size test. That simplicity is rare in govcon, and it works in your favor.

Which agencies actually buy this

Grounds maintenance is one of the most distributed buys in the federal government because almost every agency holds real estate. The recurring buyers worth targeting:

• Department of Veterans Affairs for medical center campuses and the national cemeteries, where mowing and headstone-area care run on tight standards.
• Department of Defense, especially Army and Air Force installations, which bid large multi-year base grounds contracts.
• General Services Administration, which manages federal buildings and courthouses.
• Department of the Interior and USDA Forest Service for parks, trails, and public lands.

State and local governments buy the same services under the same NAICS logic. School districts, county facilities, and municipal parks departments post grounds contracts year-round, and they are often a softer first win than federal work because the competition is local and the bids are smaller.

The set-asides that apply to landscaping

This is where certification turns into a real advantage. A set-aside is a contract the government reserves for a specific category of small business, which shrinks the field you compete against. Landscaping solicitations regularly run as:

• Small business set-asides — open to any firm under the $10M standard.
• 8(a) Business Development — for socially and economically disadvantaged owners; agencies can sole-source or limit-compete these.
• WOSB / EDWOSB — the Women-Owned Small Business program. NAICS 561730 is on the list of codes eligible for WOSB set-asides, which matters because grounds work is one of the few service categories where the WOSB designation directly applies.
• SDVOSB — service-disabled veteran-owned, with strong demand at the VA specifically.
• HUBZone — for firms headquartered in a Historically Underutilized Business Zone, which often fits landscaping companies based in rural or economically distressed areas.

If you hold one of these certifications, you can bid solicitations that competitors without it simply cannot touch. If you're not sure which one you qualify for, our certification guides walk through the eligibility rules for each. And if you want help preparing and submitting the applications across agencies, that's what CertifyAll handles.

Where the opportunities live

Two places, and you need both.

SAM.gov is the mandatory starting point. You must register your business there before you can win any federal award, and registration is free. During setup you attach NAICS 561730 to your profile so your firm shows up when contracting officers search the registry. SAM.gov is also the official posting site for federal solicitations, so you'll search it daily for open grounds maintenance bids and read the full statements of work there.

The GSA Multiple Award Schedule (MAS) is the longer play. A Schedule contract puts your pre-negotiated pricing on a government-wide menu, so agencies can order from you without running a full open competition. A Schedule does not hand you sales. You still have to market, respond to requests for quotation, and keep your pricing and compliance current. For a landscaping firm, GSA MAS makes sense once you've proven you can deliver on a couple of direct contracts and want repeatable, lower-friction reorders.

Search both. Track every recurring contract in your region and note when each one is up for recompete, because the incumbent's expiration date is your opening.

How certification actually changes the math

A certification does two things. It unlocks set-aside bids you otherwise can't see the inside of, and it raises your visibility to contracting officers searching the registry for diverse and small firms to meet their goals. Agencies carry small-business and socially-disadvantaged spending targets, and a certified firm that can do the work is genuinely useful to a contracting officer trying to hit those numbers. That's leverage you bring to every conversation.

The prime and subcontract route

Going straight for a prime contract on a large base grounds package is hard when you have no federal past performance. The faster route is subcontracting under a company that already holds the prime.

Large prime contractors carry subcontracting goals: they're often required to direct a share of their contract dollars to small and diverse businesses, including in services like grounds maintenance. That obligation makes them want to find you. A subcontract gets you onto a federal job site, builds the past-performance record that prime bids demand, and creates a relationship you can lean on for the next opportunity.

To find primes already working in your area and service line, start with our subcontract finder. It surfaces the companies holding relevant contracts so you can approach them with a specific ask instead of a cold pitch.

Get your bid materials ready before you need them

Whether you go prime or sub, you'll be asked for the same things, so build them once. A strong landscaping proposal spells out the operational details a contracting officer actually scores: a weekly maintenance schedule, supervision and crew oversight, emergency and storm-response protocols, proper pesticide handling and licensing, and erosion control. Vague bids lose. Specific ones win.

You'll also need a tight capability statement — the one-page document that summarizes your firm, your NAICS codes, your certifications, and your past performance. Primes and contracting officers ask for it constantly. Build yours with our capability statement builder so it's ready the moment an opportunity opens.

A reasonable first step

You don't have to do this in order, but a sensible sequence is: register on SAM.gov with NAICS 561730, confirm which set-aside you qualify for, and find one prime already running grounds contracts near you. That last step is the one most owners skip, and it's usually the fastest path to a first federal job.

When you're ready, run your service line and region through the subcontract finder and see which primes you could be working under this season.