Whether a business with a large Latino workforce succeeds or fails usually comes down to one thing: culture, says Pam Berrios, president of Alexandria Landscapes in Alexandria, Va. Berrios, past president of the board of directors for the National Hispanic Landscape Alliance, also operates her own training and consulting company where she sees firsthand when diversity within a workplace is... read more
Ed Wallace, owner of Midwest Landscaping in Long Beach, Calif., is active within associations representing the landscape industry. He was the first African American president of the Orange County chapter of the California Landscape Contractors Association. He’s proud of the diversity within his own chapter, noting that diversity ripples out into the association at the state level. “Gaining and retaining... read more
Maurice Dowell, co-owner of Dowco Enterprises, in St. Louis, Mo., says the cost of H-2B labor has started to get him to rethink his approach to staffing. “We’re blessed to have a facility almost adjacent to our clientele,” he says. “The problem is it’s not adjacent to the talent that we need to build our clientele.” H-2B labor isn’t cheap,... read more
“Getting work has never been an issue,” says Trina Julian, owner of Country Girl Gardens in Hayden, Idaho. But embarking in the landscape industry as a woman wasn’t an easy road at first. When Julian started the business about 10 years ago, she struggled to be taken seriously by other landscape businesses when she needed some assistance hiring subcontractors for... read more
It’s difficult to recruit employees for snow removal services. The hours can be long and unpredictable; plus, it’s no surprise employees will be working in the cold. “It’s hard to recruit in the winter months because it’s seasonal on call,” says Bruce Vander Vennen, president of Jack’s Lawn Service and Snowplowing in Grand Rapids, Mich. “So, employees may only work for... read more
Get out there and make yourself known. That’s the advice Gail Reinhart, recruitment and personnel specialist at Hidden Creek Landscaping in Hilliard, Ohio, gives to any landscape contractor who is having trouble finding qualified employees. The company has 150 employees and provides 40 percent landscape maintenance and snow removal and 60 percent design/build services to a 55 percent commercial and... read more
