Golf’s U.S. Open was in Pebble Beach, CA. Bill Davids, president of Clarence Davids & Co., and his team hopped on a plane and headed west. They didn’t go to watch professionals play the famed golf shrine. Davids and his team were there to landscape the corporate hospitality area, the main entrance promenade and the merchandise pavilion. “The U.S. Open... read more
Remember what it was like to possess unbridled honesty? For many of us adults, it’s been decades. Unbridled honesty is what made “Liar, Liar” — the 1997 comedy in which Jim Carrey played an attorney who can’t help but speak his mind and tell the truth at every turn — so appealing at the box office. On a daily basis,... read more
Your clients may not know the difference between herbaceous perennials and woody ornamentals, but they know what they want. Creating educated landscape customers is a worthy goal, but don’t forget to listen and learn from them as well. “Landscapers shouldn’t be lumping everything into plant categories, like trees, shrubs and perennials,” says Debbie Lonnee, planning and administration manager at Bailey... read more
Maintenance contractors have faced — and will continue to face — competitive invasion of their base contracts in what remains a “take away” environment. Until new construction rebounds, the competition remains fierce as contractors try to protect their existing contract base and grow by taking others’ work. Prices are down significantly over the last two seasons as price-conscious buyers take... read more
Andre J. “Frenchy” Rheault is the only landscaper we know who has had a frozen dessert named in his honor. During a 20-year career as a U.S. Air Force Master Sergeant air traffic controller, and after taking over a landscape business from a friend who got orders to go to Germany, Frenchy began a lifelong campaign supporting veterans affairs and... read more
We talk a lot about strategic plans, but rarely about strategy. A successful strategy increases enterprise value. Enterprise value is the financial worth of your business. It is calculated by multiplying earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) by an EBITDA multiple. Therefore, your strategy must address a simple mathematical truth: Increase both EBITDA and the multiple. So far,... read more
