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Understanding the Landscape Trade
| Jeff Gibson
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>> Published Date: 4/15/2010
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 Selling to the landscape trade is no “cakewalk.” Many try, few are successful. Ball Horticultural Companys’ recent assessment of grower sales to the landscape trade shows this. The landscape trade in North America is roughly a $3.5 billion dollar business. Granted, most of this amount is in design/build and maintenance. The majority of maintenance is broken down into lawn and tree care, mulching, irrigation installation and seasonal color. Roughly 25% of the $3.5 billion is the sales and installation of “green goods,” with a smaller percentage dedicated to the installation of seasonal color, ornamentals and perennials. Hard to pin down a number exactly, but 1% to 2% of a $3.5 billion is still enough cabbage to keep our green industry in Carhartt for a few years longer!
Who are they?
Just like major retail, the landscape trade divides nicely along small- to mid-sized Mom and Pops, and the top 20% “biggies.” There is a striking amount of similarity to mid-sized growers and growers serving the mass retailers, but there are other very different dynamics in selling to them. The average landscape contractor has 400 customers, 56 of whom are design/build/installation, and the rest are maintenance clients. Not surprisingly, the fastest-growing service from 2009-2010 is mowing/maintenance. The maintenance category is where seasonal color installation lies.
Landscape clients of seasonal color growers run along similar lines. Cort Smith, of Walnut Springs Nursery in Baltimore, Maryland, is typical of a large landscape grower. Cort noted that the percentage of landscape customers making up their sales has increased every year since they started more than 25 years ago. Cort notes that sales now are primarily to large, multi-branch operations, with a “significant amount” of the business in the small- to mid-sized accounts.
The landscape segment has been rocked by the softening economy. The slowdown in building, both commercial and residential, has stopped a great deal of the design/build landscape business, with government and institutional being the exception. The residential sector, at least at the very high end, continues to move along. Both the commercial and residential portions of the landscape trade have jumped headlong into maintenance, inspiring an unprecedented level of competitive bidding, but maintaining purchases of seasonal and perennial color to flower growers. Of the eight North American growers responding to our survey, most agreed that sales in 2009 were flat, not down. Many anticipated the downturn and reduced the amount of speculation they were growing for landscapers. Areas where landscapers rely on the resort trade or centrally managed residential properties were hardest hit as tourism fell, credit tightened and homeowners began defaulting on loans.
Why sell to them—and how?
Given all that, one would wonder how and why sell to this market. As noted, the market is huge. The economy will recover, and the average consumer is likely to go back to hiring professional services, like yard care. Commercial properties, especially in a tight economy, compete for tenants. The exterior landscape is a not-so-subtle statement to the world that, “We’re okay; house your business here!”
Ray Greenstreet of Greenstreet Growers, Maryland, notes that commercial properties that are well-planted always inspire competing properties to follow suit with the installation of color. Ray appreciates one of the more commonly noted benefits of selling to this trade—volume.
The ability to sell significant volume to a few key accounts is typical of the landscape trade. Dan Hutton, sales manager for Wenke/Sunbelt Greenhouses in Michigan, agrees. A significant percentage of Wenke’s landscape business is pre-booked between December and May. Dan notes that none of his IGC customers pre-book. Tim Babikow of Babikow Greenhouses, Maryland, notes that, “Landscapers order less items, but more units. Pulling large orders is very simple.”
Narrow and deep doesn’t only apply to mass retailers. Wenke’s Dan Hutton highlighted one often overlooked advantage to selling to the landscape trade: “The landscape trade will take the product, despite the weather.” Garden centers depend on sunny weekends to bring out the customers. Landscapers plant, rain or shine.
Challenges to selling
The consistent refrain these landscape growers shared with us was the inability to predict and project production. The risk of selling this channel lies entirely with the grower. Growers look to the landscapers to pre-book. Some do, typically at a low percentage of the overall business, but as with most things, there is always someone “higher in the food chain.” As Ray Greenstreet puts it, the landscapers’ commercial clients lack any clear understanding of color production and installation timelines, yet more and more of them are getting more personally involved in the selection process—slowing the whole process, and delaying orders.
Bruce Knox of Knox Nursery, Orlando, Florida, agrees: “Lack of pre-booking and all that goes with it, like dominoes falling” is a definite challenge to this market. Kube-Pak Growers’ Bill Swanekamp in New Jersey notes the landscape trade’s high service levels, demand for value pricing (they are typically in a low-bid competition with other landscapers), and general lack of knowledge of appropriate varieties are some of the critical challenges a landscape grower will face. Steve Zylstra, Zylstra Greenhouses, Michigan, characterizes it as an issue of education. When a landscaper isn’t educated on the importance of genetics, plant quality “freshness,” and the importance of pre-booking to get what they want, they “default to price.”
Current trends in selling landscape
In the short term, economy-driven trends in selling to the landscape contractor can be seen with a return to smaller planting units in some markets. In other markets it’s a change from pricier, premium items to “basics.” Dan Hutton notes seeing reductions not within a bed, but reduction of beds planted on an overall property. Most landscape growers are seeing more new landscape contractors coming in the door adding to business, but a reduction of volume with larger, especially commercial, maintenance accounts.
Trends in other areas are a move to using perennials over annuals, and the eternal quest for “low maintenance” varieties, typified as varieties that will “survive” despite the client not paying for additional weed/feed/deadhead or even water.
Contractors are under increasing pressure to provide their landscape clients with more sustainable alternatives in the maintenance of properties. Growers are offering recycling of pots and trays, and plantable pots, like Ellepots, are one alternative. This helps reduce the amount of plastic on a contractor’s job site, and the number of costly waste hauls to the dump. Many contractors are succumbing to clients’ concerns to reduce water consumption by removing seasonal color altogether. Turf is typically a much larger water user, but annuals are more highly visible. Smart contractors are reducing mowings, tree trimming and doing irrigation repairs in order to maintain the color. Well-done seasonal color is one of the top reasons a landscape contractor gets client renewals!
Make landscape sales sing
Across the country, landscape growers agree on three fundamentals for serving the landscape trade: Communicate, communicate and communicate! Availability is critical. Job site delivery is a must, and “ready-to-grow product once it hits the ground,” according to Ray Greenstreet, ensures instant color performance and satisfied commercial clients. Kathy Fish, of KFish Color, a Chicago-based seasonal color sourcing expert for landscapers, puts it this way: “Quality, availability and service to the landscaper requires understanding what the contractor needs are from start to finish. Stay current with trends and varieties, and give them the competitive edge. Ultimately, help them save money on the job site, while making their clients’ landscapes shine!” GT
Jeff Gibson is landscape business manager for Ball Horticultural Company. He can be reached at (630) 588-3468, jgibson@ballhort.com or www.BallLandscape.com.
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