In an industry where the economy, weather and technology are constantly changing, education will play a more critical role with irrigation contractors.
The average irrigation contractor expects his gross revenue to increase 11.4 percent in 2008, according to Lawn & Landscape’s State of the Irrigation Industry research. Education is critical to maintain this growth, says Andy Smith, director of state and affiliate relations for the Irrigation Association. “Many of the sprinklers, sensors and control devices that are common today did not exist 10 years ago,” he says.
The number of contractors affected by water restrictions and regulations has increased 2 percent from previous years, the data says. While a modest increase, contractors are turning to new irrigation practices, such as drip irrigation and evapotranspiration-based (ET) controllers to conserve water. Eight percent of irrigation contactors believe community-based water bans and restrictions will have a positive affect on their business.
Anthony Paola’s biggest challenge is educating clients on smart watering systems.
“We spent a lot of time at meetings with cities, towns and the state introducing them to ET controllers and water rebate programs,” says the owner of Anthony Paola Lawnsprinkler Co./Eclipse Design in Lincoln, R.I. “Finally, a few towns and state offices have implemented rebate programs for customers and are having us install ET controllers on new and existing systems.”
More consumer-oriented education will weed out the inexperienced companies looking to make a fast buck.
“Inexperienced contactors don’t think about spacing and uniformity so there’s a lot of bad systems going in that are wasting a lot of water and are making things difficult for the legitimate contractors until we have standards and licensing,” says Paul Baker, owner of Oasis Irrigation in Brunswick, Ga. “The EPA WaterSense program is going to help.”