NAICS 561730 · California overview

Landscaping & Tree Care Services in Contra Costa County

Contra Costa County had 355 Landscaping establishments in 2023, ranking 7 of 53 California counties and accounting for 3.8% of the statewide total.

Establishments (2023)
355
Rank 7 of 53 counties
Employees
3,689
Mid-March employment
Annual payroll
$206M
All establishments
Per 10k residents
3.0
1,170,070 residents

More recent reading

BLS QCEW, 2026Q1

The figures above are County Business Patterns, which carries the size distribution but runs about two years behind. The Bureau of Labor Statistics publishes quarterly, so this is the same industry roughly 3 years later. The two count different universes, Census counts establishments with paid employees in the March pay period and BLS counts worksites covered by unemployment insurance during the quarter, so the numbers are not directly comparable and either can be the larger.

Establishments
378
2026Q1
Employment
3,407
Quarter-end level
Average weekly wage
$1,064
Per covered worker
Quarterly trend
+4.4%
2025Q2 to 2026Q1
Concentration vs the national averageBLS, 2026Q1

1.76 location quotient. Landscaping employment in Contra Costa County is about 1.8 times more concentrated than in the United States as a whole.

Computed by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, not derived here. Above 1.0 means the industry is a larger share of local employment than of national employment.

Establishments by size

Employee-count distribution for Landscaping in Contra Costa County. 99 of 355 establishments (28%) employ 10 or more people, the practical floor for most acquisition financing.

EmployeesEstablishmentsShareDistribution
1-420056.3%
5-95515.5%
10-196317.7%
20-49246.8%
50-9972.0%
100-24951.4%

Establishment trend

Year-over-year establishment counts, County Business Patterns. Net growth of 9.2% since 2020.

YearEstablishmentsChange
2020325n/a
2021334+9
2022348+14
2023355+7

How this market compares

Contra Costa County against every other county in California on the same measure. The median excludes places under 2,000 residents, where per-capita figures are arithmetically true but analytically useless.

Typical3.0 per 10,000 residents, against a state median of 2.7

Close to the state median for this industry. Provision is roughly what the population would predict.

Vs state median
+13%
Businesses per resident
Rank by count
#7
of 53 counties
Rank by density
#24
of 53 ranked
Since 2020
+9%
Change in establishments

Density compares landscaping & tree care services provision per resident. It does not measure revenue, profitability or whether a market is worth entering.

Business size mix

Contra Costa is more consolidated than California as a whole: fewer micro-operators and a larger share of businesses with real headcount. Fewer targets, but the ones that exist are more likely to be financeable.

Share of establishmentsContra CostaCaliforniaDifference
Under 5 employeesOwner-operated, often no management layer56.3%61.7%-5.4%
5 to 49 employeesThe range most individual buyers target40.0%33.7%+6.3%
10 or more employeesPractical floor for acquisition financing27.9%20.5%+7.4%

What acquirers look at

Commercial recurring contracts are the prize; residential mow-and-blow routes trade at much lower multiples, and route density drives margin more than revenue does. Tree care is the equipment-heavy end of the category, with real collateral value for SBA lending and durable utility line-clearance contracts.

Cities in Contra Costa

The figures above cover the county as a whole. These are the places within it.

Other industries in Contra Costa

Sources

  1. U.S. Census Bureau, 2023 County Business Patterns. Establishment counts, employment and annual payroll by NAICS. Retrieved 2026-09-08.
  2. U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages (2026Q1). Quarterly establishment counts and employment for employers covered by unemployment insurance. Retrieved 2026-09-08.