From 25 years in finance to a stump grinding business

My background is actually in financial markets. I've spent the last 25 years in the city, and over the last few years I've been trading US equities from home in the afternoons — so I always have plenty of free time during the day.

Last November, I was helping my dad cut down three small trees in his garden, and we needed the stumps removed. I looked into hiring a stump grinder, but the local hire company had gone bust, so we got a local tree surgeon in instead.

He turned up, ground the stumps out in about 40 minutes, and charged £350. I remember thinking:

While we were chatting, I asked him how often he did stump grinding. He said every few weeks — and then admitted he actually hated it.

Most of the time, he'd spend the day cutting trees with the chipper on the truck, then have to drive back to the yard, swap everything over for the stump grinder, and head back out to finish the job.

Driving home, I couldn't stop thinking about it.

I've always been someone who likes testing ideas. So instead of spending £25,000 on a machine and hoping for the best, I bought a cheap Chinese stump grinder from Alibaba for about £2,500.

My thinking was simple.

I started ringing and messaging local tree surgeons — and to my surprise, the phone actually started ringing. Homeowners began finding me through Google as well, and before long I realised there really was a gap in the market.

I'd looked at quite a few machines, but I kept coming back to the Bandit SG40. It felt like the right balance for the sort of work I do — big enough to tackle serious stumps, but still compact enough to get into domestic gardens.

I also liked the Revolution cutter wheel because, let's be honest, you're never just grinding wood. There's usually half a garden hidden underneath the stump!

The other thing that made a difference was dealing with the team at Global Machinery Solutions, especially Dean Embling. This was the biggest investment I'd made in the business, so I asked plenty of questions.

I probably drove him mad with questions. But I never felt pressured into buying anything, and everyone was happy to explain things properly — which is exactly what you want when you're about to spend that kind of money.

Since getting the SG40, the biggest difference has been confidence more than anything else. I don't stand there looking at a big stump, wondering whether I've bitten off more than I can chew. I know the machine is capable, so I can concentrate on doing a good job instead of worrying whether the grinder will cope.

One thing that surprised me is how easy it is to use. With the Chinese grinder, I felt like I was doing half the work myself. The SG40 just gets on with it.

It's also opened more doors with tree surgeons. Turning up with professional equipment gives people confidence their stump work will be finished properly — and that's really important when you're trying to build long-term working relationships.

One job that sticks in my mind was a huge cedar stump. Standing there looking at it, I was very glad I'd upgraded!

If someone asked me whether I'd recommend the SG40, I'd say yes — but I'd also say this:

That's what I did. Once I knew the work was there, buying the Bandit felt like the obvious next step rather than a gamble — which, after 25 years in finance, is really the only way I know how to work.

The same thinking still shapes how I run The Stump Grinding Company today. Stump grinding isn't an add-on to another tree service — it's what I do.

I work directly with homeowners and alongside tree surgeons, with straightforward, transparent pricing and an instant estimate calculator instead of hiding behind “prices on application”. Whether it's a single garden stump or a site full of them, it gets the same attention.

If you'd like to see how that thinking translates into a price and a timescale, these two guides explain it in full:

• Pricing explainedHow much does stump grinding cost?Read the guide
• Timing explainedHow long does stump grinding take?Read the guide