GROW! sees record audience

DAYTON, Ohio – Some 300 landscape professionals traveled from near and far to attend Marty Grunder! Inc.’s (MGI) annual GROW! Conference, held Feb. 8–10 in Dayton, Ohio, this year. Undeterred by the winter weather, participants gathered for the rare opportunity to learn directly from green-industry leaders how best to grow their businesses and achieve their dreams.

“We were just amazed by the breadth and caliber of the turnout for the event this year,” said Marty Grunder, president and CEO of MGI and the Grunder Landscaping Company (GLC). “To see so many landscape pros eager to advance both their companies and the profession as a whole—and to learn and grow from our industry’s best, as well as from each other—was unbelievably inspiring.”

Participants hailed from 31 states and Canada and represented 136 companies, with a combined annual revenue of $500 million and nearly 6,000 employees between them.

MGI’s GROW! Conference, now in its 22nd year and held in a different city each year, combines presentations and panel discussions led by landscaping’s leading lights together with an in-depth tour and critique of a local landscaping company. Holding the conference in Dayton this year enabled participants to tour and critique GLC.

“Imagine inviting 300 people over to your house, letting them rifle through your things, and then asking them to let you know if they found any dust,” Grunder said, describing what it was like having attendees tour GLC headquarters and then critique what they could do better. “My staff did an incredible job showing participants how we do things, and participants did an equally incredible job telling us just how we could do better. But that’s how we all learn and grow, and that’s exactly what this event is for.”

For the presentations and panel discussions, Grunder was joined on stage by some of the green industry’s biggest names: Scott Jamieson, vice president, Bartlett Tree Experts; Frank Mariani, CEO, Mariani Landscape; Jim McCutcheon, CEO, HighGrove Partners; Todd Pugh, founder and CEO, Enviroscapes; and Mike Rorie, president, GroundSystems.

Jim Cali and Jason New, experts at growing landscape-maintenance companies and the newest additions to the MGI team, shared their unique insight into systems, culture, branding and leadership. MGI Vice President Vince Torchia delivered one of the conference’s most popular talks, providing concrete tactics for hiring and motivating millennials to work for you.

While the presenters shared a wide range of perspectives on the most effective strategies for growing a landscaping business, they were united in their energy and enthusiasm for the power of the event itself to change careers and change lives. “This is what it’s all about,” said Mariani. “Camaraderie, open and honest advice, learning from each other – it doesn’t get any better than GROW!”

In another display of this camaraderie, presenters and participants contributed $110,000 to the National Association of Landscape Professionals (NALP) through a spirited auction held on the second day of the conference. “We were all completely blown away by the generosity of the group,” said McCutcheon, co-chair of NALP’s Public Affairs Council. “NALP has a comprehensive strategy to help attract great workers into our industry, and this money will go directly to those efforts. Thank you to all who donated! You helped our industry and yourself.”

Intent on building on the success of this year’s event, MGI is already at work planning GROW! 2018, which will take place next winter in Tampa, Florida, and include a tour of Ameriscape Services.