Most pest control owners start off as technicians. That’s how I started too. The problem is, many people stay in that mindset when they launch their company. They price themselves low, brand themselves like everyone else, and end up struggling to grow.

If you want to scale, you need to position your company as a premium brand from day one. That shift in thinking is what helped Pest Badger grow into a multi-million dollar business, and it’s what I want to walk you through here.

Technicians Think Differently Than CEOs

Most guys who go out on their own do it because they’ve worked a route and seen the revenue. They think, if the company’s making this much, I can just do it myself and keep more of it. That part makes sense. But what they miss is this: they were thinking like a technician, not like a CEO.

As a technician, you know the work inside and out. You know the value of your service. But when you start your own company, you start competing on price because that’s what you’ve seen. You undercut the market, call yourself something like “Affordable Pest,” and hope to get customers.

That might get you some early business, but it’s not a strategy for long-term growth. You’re not building a brand, and you’re not creating room for profit.

You Can’t Scale If You Can’t Charge More

Most unprofitable companies are stuck because they’re working with low-margin customers. The customers who only care about getting the cheapest price are usually the hardest to work with. You go above and beyond, deal with more callbacks, and make less money.

On the other hand, customers who are willing to pay for a premium service just want peace of mind. If they believe their kids, pets, and home are safe, they’re happy. They don’t nitpick, and they don’t create problems. They just want it done right.

We raise our prices every year, and we expect to lose the bottom 10 to 20 percent of customers. That’s fine. Those aren’t the people we’re trying to serve. We’re focused on the ones who stay with us for years without complaints and value what we offer.

Profit Gives You Options

When you start off solo, it feels like you’re making money. You have no payroll, no overhead, and it seems like your margins are solid. But when you try to hire your first tech, add a truck, or pay for real systems, you realize you were just covering labor, not building a business.

Hiring people, paying taxes, buying products, maintaining vehicles, running a CRM — all of that requires real margins. If your prices don’t allow for that, growth becomes impossible.

Look at any major company in your market. Whether it’s pest control, HVAC, plumbing, or lawn care, the best companies are also charging the most. That’s not a coincidence. They have better trucks, better techs, better systems, and they can afford to invest in their brand.

Your Brand Is a Reflection of Your Position

Customers care about how your company shows up. They don’t want a pest control truck in their driveway to begin with. But if there has to be one, they want it to look professional. They want it to reflect well on them in front of their neighbors.

That’s part of why we invest heavily in how we present ourselves. Our wraps look great. Our technicians are uniformed. Our website matches our brand voice and feels approachable. It all works together.

Positioning Is a Full-System Game

Branding isn’t just a logo or a name. It’s how everything connects. Dan Antonelli says your brand is the hubcap, and everything else — trucks, website, messaging, uniforms — is a spoke.

I love that analogy. It reminds me that you need every piece of your marketing to support the same story. It’s not enough to have a great truck or just a good website. You need all of it to be aligned and working together if you want momentum.

When it clicks, it feels like pushing a boulder downhill. It takes a ton of work at first, but once the momentum is there, it becomes hard to stop.

What’s Non-Negotiable for Us

There are a few must-haves if you want to position as a premium company:

• A clean, brand-aligned website

• Strong truck wraps with personality

• A consistent, easy-to-remember tagline

• Messaging that feels like your company’s voice

We made our brand fun and family-friendly. Our mascot, Buggy the Badger, is on everything. Our tagline, “Have a pest free day,” is used across every channel — phone calls, emails, text messages, you name it. It makes people smile, and it makes us memorable.

Funny enough, the tagline didn’t come from me. One of our team members, Tyler, put it on his truck, and I immediately said, we’re using that. It was the perfect fit for our voice and culture. Now, every CSR, every tech, and every piece of marketing uses that phrase. It’s who we are.

Final Thoughts

If you want to build a pest control company that lasts, stop trying to be the cheapest. Stop blending in. Think about the company you want to become and position yourself that way from the start.

Your brand is more than colors and logos. It’s the story you tell, the customers you attract, and the prices you’re able to charge.

If you can align all of those things, you’ll build something that actually scales. That’s when the business gets fun.