Starting Out Small Leads to Big Attractions
16 Dec, 2008 By: Catherine Evans Get GrowingIn just a generation gardening has gone from a favorite past time to something many don’t have time or space to do. Generation X and Y are living in large cities, while the Baby Boomer Generation is moving into smaller homes or condos as they become empty nesters.
All of this would seem to put landscapers at a disadvantage. Surprisingly, small space gardening has become quite the trend in the last few years within city dwellings and smaller homes. Customers who have small yards, porches, rooftops, or even window boxes still want their places filled with flowers and shrubs. Just because a client lives in a small townhouse in the city, doesn’t mean it can’t be a $100,000 project. While not all of the jobs will be that pocket filling, you just might end up with a client for life.
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Small Challenges
Landscapers in both New York and Chicago, the top small space residential locations in the country, say the biggest part of working with smaller spaces is trying to get a great look with the right materials.
“Understanding landscaping in small spaces is a hard animal to work with because of the light and shade factors, depending on the properties,” says Will Spiegelberg, CLP, president of Spiegelberg Landscape Design, Inc., Chicago, IL. “If you’re lucky, you have a southern or western exposure. If not, you have to deal with homes that have a shady side and sunny side and try to make it look cohesive. In order to do that, you basically have to integrate the landscape to the architecture of the home.”
When you have such a small space to work with, these are the times that you really need to work with your customers, find out what they want and evaluate what they can actually have depending on their type of space. All customers have something in mind when they hire you, but the reality depends on space, light requirements, soil types and more.
Richard Heller, CLP, CLT, chief executive of the design-build firm, Greener By Design in Pelham, NY, says his company keeps small-space design interesting by focusing on three factors:
1. What will that specific environment support?
2. What is the architecture of the structure we are working in and what are the surroundings of the area like?
3. What is the taste of the client?
“Understanding the space ‑ realizing we’ve got small space here and we’ve got this many features in a yard ‑ prioritizing which of these wants are the most critical. Basically, which of the client’s wants can go by the wayside if needed? It’s also important to be able to maximize the space by being smart with the plant selection, knowing how big a certain plant will grow and knowing exactly the parameters of each plant,” says Spiegelberg.
Educating the client as well as your staff is the best way to have a great client relationship, a beautiful landscape to share and potentially more jobs in the future.
“The thing that we are known for is doing quality work and communicating with our clients throughout the whole process by keeping them in the loop of what is going on and putting a lot of resource and time into education,” said Spiegelberg. “I love to learn, and I feel the more I know the better product I can give my clients.”
The Bottom Line
One way to make small-space landscaping profitable is to add a few extra services. Many companies don’t just work with the plant materials, but the overall experience. These companies offer unique hardscaping ideas and materials, softscapes, water features, set up irrigation systems, ambiance night lighting and more.
“We do hardscaping, irrigation, lighting, we’re working with all kinds of materials. We try to do as many things as we can within the exterior landscaping niche but we don’t want to become a construction company,” says Heller.
Without having these types of extras, small spaces can still add to the bottom line by setting up a contract where the design is changed out each season.
Everyone deserves a beautiful place to live, whether it is in the city, the suburbs or a farm. Just because the space is smaller than average doesn’t mean it can’t be designed to the fullest.
“The fundamentals of our small space gardening involves working with the most vertical spaces possible to try to make it bigger than it is, not only using the vertical element going up but, going down also helps,” says Heller.
“When people meet me I don’t tell them I’m a landscaper. I tell them I create great outdoor spaces,” says Spiegelberg. Those spaces can be in a large landscape or a small patio.
Catherine Evans is a Chicago-based freelance horticultural writer. She can be reached at cateevans@yahoo.com.
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