LANDSCAPES convention sees spike in attendance, auction proceeds

FAIRFAX, Va. - The National Association of Landscape Professionals held its annual convention, LANDSCAPES, in Louisville, Kentucky, from Oct. 16-19.

With a new schedule, LANDSCAPES and the GIE+EXPO trade show started a day earlier and ran through Friday. New educational offerings targeting at a company’s whole staff contributed to a 7% increase in conference attendance with nearly 100 technicians attending the first-ever hands-on technical training workshops.

“It was an incredible week,” says NALP CEO Sabeena Hickman. “We were pleased to welcome so many new faces to the conference, with an increase of 54% more first-time attendees than last year. We had great feedback on the new schedule, the joint keynote address, as well as the education sessions, which were targeted at everyone from CEOs to technicians.”

At an auction on Tuesday night, approximately $100,000 was raised to support the work of the Industry Growth Initiative. Marty Grunder of Grunder Landscaping and Frank Mariani of Mariani Landscape co-hosted the auction, and there was additional fundraising throughout the week., approximately $100,000 was raised to support the work of the Industry Growth Initiative to grow the industry and its workforce.

During its annual awards reception, the Association recognized 161 Awards of Excellence winners, honoring outstanding landscape maintenance, design/build, lawn care, and interiorscape projects.

From the 47 Grand award-winning projects, two projects were selected to receive the highest honor – a Judges’ Award. Designs by Sundown of Littleton Colorado received a Judges’ Award for their Tazi Ranch project in the $100,000 - $500,000 budget category, and Mariani Landscape of Lake Bluff Illinois won a Judges’ Award is for their “Terrace with a View” project in the $100,000 - $ 500,000 budget category.

Award entries for next year will be accepted beginning in late spring of 2019.

LANDSCAPES 2019 will be held in Louisville again next year from Oct. 15-18. The Awards Dinner was sponsored by Caterpillar, and LANDSCAPES 2018 was sponsored by JOHN DEERE (Platinum), Caterpillar (Gold), and Bayer (Silver).