Market Trends: Jan. 2001

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) won the removal of another pesticide from the lawn and landscape contractor control arsenal as part of its compliance with the Food Quality Protection Act of 1996 (FQPA).

Syngenta Crop Protection, recently created from the merger of Novartis Crop Protection and Astra Zeneca, coordinated its voluntary phase-out of the diazinon insecticide business with the EPA. Under this agreement, diazinon will be banned for indoor use and will be phased out over a four-year period for outdoor lawn and garden applications to allow for a smooth transition from that market. In July 2000, Novartis Crop Protection voluntarily discontinued support of indoor uses for diazinon in an effort to allocate more funds to protect outdoor uses of the product.

Syngenta maintains that diazinon poses no health threat with normal application rates as instructed on product packages, and the EPA, which considers it less risky than other banned organophosphate-classed products, will continue to allow some commercial crop uses. But Syngenta officials said they couldn’t

justify paying for extensive tests needed to prove the product safe under FQPA, so they agreed to phase-out the product.

The extended nature of the EPA’s phase-out agreement for diazinon “confirms the value and safety of this product,” Syngenta’s Eileen Watson said.

Diazinon is the last widely used insect-control product made from the organophosphate chemical class, which is linked to health risks for children, according to the EPA. Diazinon is commonly found under the trade names Ortho, Spectracide and Real-Kill. The process affecting diazinon also affected chlorpyrifos (Dursban) in June 2000 with the discontinuation of most of that product’s uses.

ON THE WEB
Grub Control Tips LIVE

Two industry entomologists shared their expertise on present and future grub control strategies during a live Web cast at www.grubfree.com.

CyberSummit 2000, sponsored by MACH 2, Lawn & Landscape and Golf Course News, was an hour-long televised seminar that included 15-minute presentations by Dan Potter, University of Kentucky, and David Shetlar, The Ohio State University, and a question-and-answer segment that allowed online viewers to ask specific questions about grub control strategies and solutions.

More than 70 individuals logged on for the live event, and the program, which can be seen through Feb. 13 at www.grubfree.com, has been watched by more than 210 people via the Web site as of press time.

Contractors with specific questions pertaining to grub control that were not answered during the live show received personal answers via e-mail from Shetlar or Potter, and additional questions still can be submitted though the February deadline. E-mail responses will be sent within two to four weeks of the query.

A video of Cleveland, Ohio-based lawn care operator Phil Fogarty’s marketing strategies for grub control services accompanies the rebroadcast of the seminar.

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS
Toro Buys Goossen, Announces Earnings

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. - The Toro Co. continued rounding out its product line with the December acquisition of Goossen Industries, Beatrice, Neb. The acquisition provides Toro with a debris management product line, such as sweepers, vacuums, chippers and blowers.

Goossen’s 64,000-square-foot Nebraska manufacturing plant is adjacent to the Toro-owned Exmark Manufacturing production facilities, and the facility now will be used to expand Exmark’s production capabilities.

Toro also announced record sales and profits for its fiscal year 2000, which ended Oct. 31, 2000. The company finished the year with sales of more than $1.3 billion (up nearly 5 percent from fiscal year 1999) and earnings of $45.3 million. “Overall, most of our markets had a good year for sales and profitability, and we are taking aggressive action to fix those areas that struggled,” noted Ken Melrose, Toro’s chairman and chief executive officer.

The professional portion of Toro’s business provided much of its sales growth, increasing by 7.6 percent in 2000, although this area of business was 12 percent off 1999’s earnings. “The landscaping, golf and grounds markets continue to be robust for equipment sales,” the company noted. “[For 2001], Toro expects to achieve revenue growth in the range of 8 to 10 percent.”

While Melrose reported that profitability was up for the company, “lower sales levels of irrigation’s higher product lines” held overall profitability down somewhat.

MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS
Consolidation Trend Continues

In addition to recent manufacturer unions, including the purchase of Goossen by Toro (page 10) and Great Dane by John Deere (page 19), several other industry players recently announced acquisitions:

• Environmental Industries Inc., Calabasas, Calif., acquired North Haven Gardens, a Dallas, Texas-based, $17 million, full-service landscape company. The merger follows the February 2000 EII acquisition of STM Landscape Services, Oakton, Va., which increased EII’s presence in the Mid-Atlantic region.

• Simplicity Manufacturing, Port Washington, Wis., acquired Giant-Vac just one year after purchasing Ferris Industries, Munnsville, N.Y., to increase its presence and sales in outdoor power equipment.

  The purchase of Connecticut-based Giant-Vac adds commercial and residential outdoor debris management equipment to Simplicity’s product line.

• e-Greenbiz.com, Boulder, Colo., and Growzone, Englewood, Colo., became the first two “dot-com” companies to consolidate in the industry’s cyberspace segment when they signed a letter of intent to merge their assets.

  Under the proposed agreement, eGreenbiz.com will provide technology and customer relationship management for both companies and will integrate existing Growzone customers into its site.

IN THE NEWS
ServiceMaster Earnings Slip

DOWNERS GROVE, Ill. - ServiceMaster, the parent company for TruGreen-ChemLawn and TruGreen LandCare, reported third quarter revenues that were 3 percent higher than in the third quarter of 1999, although operating income was down 19 percent in 2000 and margins dropped from 8.4 to 6.8 percent.

The company places much of the responsibility for the declining performance on the shoulders of its landscape business, and it noted that operating income in the Consumer and Commercial Services division, which includes the TruGreen companies, fell 11 percent for the quarter. This decrease reflects “the integration issues in the landscape operations and higher fuel and other labor-related costs in most of its business units. TruGreen-ChemLawn … reported modest revenue increases reflecting higher customer counts, increased productivity and price increases with slightly reduced profitability resulting from higher labor-related costs.”

“We are beginning to see some improvement in the operations of our landscape business,” noted C. William Pollard, ServiceMaster chairman and chief executive officer. “The leadership and major organizational changes have been implemented. The system conversion issues should be behind us.”

Pollard also announced a new initiative to pursue high-end residential landscape customers. Introducing landscape services to the many TruGreen-ChemLawn customers seems logical, but the company focused its acquisition attention on landscape companies serving the commercial market.

“The integration of our lawn care business with our landscape business ... will enhance our sales effort for a combined lawn care and landscape offering to our growing commercial customer base,” Pollard added. “Bringing these two businesses together into one organization is taking more time than we anticipated, but it is the right step.”

IN THE NEWS
NTEP Announces Good News

BELTSVILLE, Md. - Turfgrass users and suppliers should be excited to hear that the 2001 Agriculture Appropriations Bill includes a significant increase in federal funding for the turf seed industry. The bill even provides the dollars needed to create a new turfgrass scientist position within the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) this year, which will represent the first full-time USDA turfgrass research position since 1988.

According to Kevin Morris, executive director of the National Turfgrass Evaluation Program (NTEP), the new scientist will work on improving genetic stocks of new and promising turfgrass species as well as currently utilized species. This scientist will conduct long-term research to find unique plants with improved heat, cold, insect, disease and wear tolerance, Morris explained.

Although Morris said end users of turfgrass aren’t likely to enjoy benefits of this new position for seven to 10 years, he expects a number of turf seed suppliers to introduce improved varieties as a result of this research. “More important will be the contribution of unique germplasm that will be incorporated into other public and private plant breeding systems,” he noted. “I believe this is what is needed to solve problems such as brown patch on tall fescue, gray leaf spot in perennial ryegrass and compaction tolerance in many grasses.”