Once a 13-year-old boy with big plans for a local mowing business, Jason Cupp is now president of his own landscaping company. Nearly 17 years after starting a neighborhood lawn care operation, he leads The Kincaide Company in Kansas City, Kansas.
The bright businessman began his landscaping endeavors with a $2,000 loan from a friend – to buy a few commercial walk-behind mowers. The small startup was a hit. Cupp paid off the debt in his first year of business and has found financial success ever since.
“We have never posted negative numbers for any year of business – never less sales than the previous year,” Cupp notes. “In the last four years, our sales have increased more than 10 times – or 1,000 percent. This year we are on target for a 35-40 percent growth rate.”
So what has made this Kansas native so successful? What has he done to see such tremendous growth during the span of his business years?
Ask him, and you may get an assortment of answers – an equation of many suggestions, all rolled into one package.
For Cupp, it comes down to things like caring for customers, fortifying frailties, keeping your company connected, being bold and planning properly.
Caring for Customers. The Kincaide Company is a customer-savvy group. The growing business puts customer relationships and customer service atop its list of business priorities. Cupp and others pride themselves in developing customer relationships that extend far beyond landscaping and grounds care needs. The company makes concerted efforts to be aware of people’s lives – not just their properties.
“We have been involved in charity events with customers, done work out of town for some, been to personal holiday parties, graduations and work celebrations,” he explains. “So we strive to create appropriate, personal relationships with customers outside of our business relationships with them”
And when it’s time to do business, the company extends the same people-oriented hand. Among other things, The Kincaide Company has “stringent communication guidelines” for its interactions with customers.
“We return calls as quickly as possible – usually the same day, but no later than the next day,” Cupp notes. “And the same thing goes for customer e-mails.”
Cupp’s group sends out regular letters, informing customers about new services and policy changes. The company also makes its managers accessible by giving their direct mobile numbers to all of its largest customers.
Fortifying Frailties. Cupp will be the first to admit his personal weaknesses – and the shortcomings of his business. In fact, the contractor often shares those flaws with employees, competitors and, yes, even customers. But he says that recognizing the holes in a company’s foundation – and filling them in – is a step toward triumph.
Starting out at as a teen with little sense of the business world, Cupp found direction in the advice of a mentor. This successful businessman, not attached to the green industry, walked Cupp through good and bad times from a business perspective. As a result, Cupp gained a clear understanding of sound business practices.
Specifically, he learned the importance of being aware of things a company can improve.
“In any business, you have to look at your strengths and weaknesses and be honest about them,” he reflects. And to remedy the weaknesses in his own business, he has looked to others who are set to handle those challenges.
“I have been quick to consult with professionals when the information needed is outside of my scope of knowledge. I learned in our rapid growth that I had to surround myself with people whose strengths were my weaknesses,” he describes, reflecting on a time he hired a designer with a degree in landscape architecture a few years back because he (Cupp) is not a designer himself.
Keeping Your Company Connected. Cupp is a major advocate of staying clued into the green industry via conferences, trade shows and association memberships. He is involved with the Associated Landscape Contractors of America and is interested in being involved with the association’s certification at a leadership level in the future. He has been attending conferences for the past five years and likes to take his management team along too.
Cupp earned the designation of Certified Landscape Professional through ALCA, a title he says has greatly impacted business. Becoming certified, he says, raises the bar of professionalism in the industry.
“There are only three other CLPs in the Kansas City market, and they all work for one company,” Cupp adds. “So, it is a designation that we have marketed heavily to prospective and current customers. And it has certainly paid off.”
Cupp also “gives back” to the industry by doing a little mentoring of his own. He is currently mentoring ADKI Lawn and Landscape, an entity found in his same market.
Being Bold. “Don’t be afraid to go after any job, any size, anywhere,” Cupp advises, recalling his early days that began with only a few mowers. Although Cupp originally delved into the green industry with sole devotion to mowing, his small business gradually added landscape installation and design, irrigation installation, and design/build services. Now the company tackles a wide range of jobs – and he tries not to turn down any possibilities.
At present, 90 percent of The Kincaide Company’s work is construction – irrigation, landscape and design/build jobs. The remaining 10 percent of its business comes from maintenance – mowing, chemicals and landscape maintenance.
Clearly, the company’s specialty is the construction realm of the industry. “We are known in the high-end market as being able to accomplish any and all projects that a customer would ask us to do,” he expounds.
Cupp admits there are a few customers who have contributed significantly to The Kincaide Company’s current success. A particular client, he shares, is a successful Kansas City businessman who has patronized Cupp’s lawn care operation since 1989.
“He ‘invested’ in me by letting me do a project at his house when I didn’t have one landscape project on my resume. As a result of that project, our landscape division was built,” Cupp says, adding that the customer spent $125,000 on landscaping for his estate and has become Kincaide’s pinnacle high-end customer.
Planning Properly. Looking ahead and making preparations for increased success is also key, Cupp insists. He is constantly looking for ways to build his business and increase customer satisfaction.
With a fresh year speedily approaching, Cupp sees many opportunities for The Kincaide Company. Tossing out a few words of preview about pending plans for “new and unprecedented marketing,” Cupp pauses – he doesn’t want to spoil the surprise. But he will tell you that his company aims to consolidate operations, cross-train crews to do both irrigation and landscape installation and add a satellite facility. Other plans include a quarterly four-color customer newsletter and some job restructuring.
And Cupp is confident these plans, combined with the many successes The Kincaide Company has already discovered, will keep the green business moving along its uphill climb for years to come.
The author is Assistant Editor – Internet for Lawn & Landscape magazine and can be reached at aanderson@lawnandlandscape.com.