Joe Talamantes was desperate. His main source of income was drying up, and he needed to do something to generate some cash.
So, the owner of Arbor-tech Tree Experts and Talamantes Door Designs did what a lot of landscape company owners are doing these days. He developed new services to open up new markets, and hopefully new sources of income.
“I’m selling and surviving and that’s what is keeping me a float, that little extra money,” Talamantes says.
Instead of just landscaping, Talamantes bought a lumber mill and now takes down trees and makes his own wood. He also rented a piece of land and on weekends he tries to sell the doors and furniture he made from the trees he took down.
“I said, ‘Instead of throwing this trash away, let’s be green,’” he says.
Talamantes even called on his family to help. His family aided him in different aspects of the business, including developing websites to help advertise his new services.
“If there is one buyer, if he’s in Wyoming, by God I want him,” Talamantes says. “If I can make a door for him or whatever he needs, I need to send it to this guy because I need his money just like he needs my door.”
But even with adding new services, revenue isn’t guaranteed. “There is no such thing as main income anymore,” he says. “You’re one week here, one week there.”
From D/B To Maintenance
Like Talamantes, Donnie Garritano also had to diversify his services. As president and CEO of D&K Landscape, he had to switch his focus from the dwindling commercial landscape construction business to residential landscape maintenance.
The company is branding a whole new offering of residential services to try and grab that service market, which doesn’t have a household name attached to it, Garritano says. But, there are still companies that have been in the residential services market much longer than D&K, so it will be a challenge to become recognized in that segment.
Garritano says one of the toughest parts of the transition will be going from dealing with commercial property managers who understand how landscaping works, to homeowners who need to be educated.
“So, it’s how we deal with some of our new customer base in terms of not just selling them a product, but consulting with them, educating them and walking them through this process and helping to grow their expectations of how things work,“ he says.
Because customers don’t always see – or fully appreciate – a lot of the work that is done, such as irrigation or trimming a tree to grow correctly, Garritano and his staff have to be patient with their new customers.
“There’s a lot more hand-holding that goes on with consumers then there is with professionals that understand,” he says.
A Different Approach
Joel Jones, co-owner, along with his wife Jennifer, of The Growing Concern in El Paso Texas, says he hasn’t changed his services and has no plans on doing so for 2011. Jones says he hasn’t raised prices in two years and would rather focus on keeping his current customers than attracting new ones.
“We kind of have a niche market they we operate in,” he says. “We’ve been in business 31 years and that’s worked for us and even though we are kind of at a standstill with regards to growth, I really blame that on the economy. I don’t think we need to change our formula. I think we need to keep the customers we have now and grow slowly.”
Things are slightly different for Joe Markell, principal of Sunrise Landscape + Design in Sterling, Va. While the company hasn’t added any new services for 2010 or 2011, it is staying ready for what services the public might need.
“Whatever the market really is dictating is what we’re focusing on,” he says.
He says the company has been doing a lot of paver repair work and may focus more on lighting in 2011.
“It seems a lot of customers are starting to really realize the benefits of a good system,” Markell says. “They start off with some cheaper system that they kind of like, it’s just not up to par. The fixtures aren’t as sturdy. They just don’t put out the light out they should.”
Markell says when the company does work on someone’s property, crews let the customer know about the lighting options.
“Typically, a lot of what we do is when we design a landscape, we design the lighting whether the customer asks for it or not – just to put it out there to them,” Markell says. “Because a lot of times what we find out is that they never even thought about that aspect of it.”
Markell is also keeping an eye on the regulations put on commercial properties and the standards to which they must maintain retention ponds.
“The maintenance, a lot of people either aren’t doing it or don’t know how to do it,” he says. “And, certain counties and jurisdictions are requiring certain levels of maintenance and people find out that they need to do things they’re not.”
Money In Regulations
The regulations have already meant more business for BT Carawan Lawn Care in Greenville, N.C.
Brian Carawan, owner of the company, says he has gone to a new base of customers informing them of the new regulations regarding retention ponds.
“That’s something that we added that’s doing really well for us,” he says. “Not a lot of people know about it, so there’s actually not a lot of people in the marketplace that know how to deal with those situations.”
The biggest challenge with offering new services is finding dependable employees. He isn’t worried much about their skill level, he says, because he can teach them what they need to know. It’s just getting them to show up that’s a problem – but not big enough to force him to scale back his services.
In 2011, Carawan plans to step-up his residential lawn care because more customers are asking for it.
“What we’re finding out in our region is that homeowners, they might not pay to get their grass cut every week or every two weeks, but they are still willing to get their yard sprayed by a company even though they are cutting the grass,” Carawan says.
The author is associate editor for Lawn & Landscape. Send him an e-mail at bhorn@gie.net.