Maryland Landscape Contractors Weather Tough Conditions

Through the years, Maryland’s landscape contractors have learned to cope with trying conditions such as drought, housing slumps and high fuel costs, says Vanessa Finney.
 
Those lessons are being applied again.

Typically, the industry reacts to swings in construction and the economy by diversifying, said Finney, executive director of the Maryland Nursery and Landscape Association in Brooklandville.

Landscape contractors rely more on planting varieties that tolerate dry conditions, focusing more on maintenance and commercial services, and even making sure their lawn mowers are tuned up to trim fuel expenses.

‘‘The diversity of services now offered by landscape companies has helped them stay at a level equal to or better than they had last year,” she said.

Annual industry sales in Maryland have held steady at about $360 million since 2004, with floral and nursery crops the state’s leading agricultural product, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data.

Despite the housing slowdown, homeowners continue to pay for professional landscaping because when the market eventually picks up, the investment will pay off, Finney said.

Smaller landscape contractors are more challenged by the housing slump, but many landscapers and garden centers have turned to providing ‘‘hardscaping” services for patios and other garden structures, especially for high-end homeowners, she said.

Brickman Group Ltd. of Gaithersburg, one of the nation’s largest commercial landscaping companies, is negotiating with longtime client Marriott International of Bethesda to provide more environmentally friendly landscaping. And last week, Brickman announced that it will acquire Bozzuto Landscaping, a division of The Bozzuto Group of Greenbelt on Dec. 31.

After a construction industry slowdown in the late 1980s and early ’90s, Brickman converted almost exclusively to maintenance services, said spokeswoman Margie Holly.

‘‘We’re not worried about the economy,” Holly said. ‘‘That was the reason we turned to maintenance. We were into installation [of gardens], but we found that whether growth is booming or not, properties need to be maintained.”

As a result, Brickman anticipates reaching $700 million in revenues next year, growing from just $100 million in 1998, and outpacing the industry average of 11 percent per year.

The company now has 145 offices in 27 states and is one of Montgomery County’s largest employers.

Many of Brickman’s offices that operate in areas of drought, including Maryland, have relied more on xeriscaping — planting drought-tolerant species — and adding native plants and more perennials in garden settings.

At Ruppert Nurseries Inc. in Laytonsville, the drought ‘‘has presented a challenge for our guys in the field,” in keeping new plantings watered, said Chris Davitt, president. Plus, drought-weakened plants are more susceptible to disease and insect damage, he said.

But as the fall tree-planting season arrived, irrigation from the company’s pond has prevented such problems at the company’s 475-acre wholesale tree nursery. Ruppert also has offices in Forestville, Philadelphia, Atlanta and Gainesville, Va.

While the number of U.S. farms has declined over the last two decades, the number of nursery and greenhouse farms has increased, according to the USDA.

Before some rains in the last part of October, tree wholesalers in the mid-Atlantic region had shifted to selling more to the north of Maryland, where there had been more rain, Finney said.

‘‘We did not have a really bad drought like we had in ’03, though,” she said.

Watering is key, said Don Smedberg, vice president of sales and marketing for wholesaler Shemin’s Nurseries in Burtonsville.

‘‘We have course corrected” with more Treegator slow-drip watering systems in sales yards, Smedberg said.

However, across the spectrum, from wholesale to landscapers, the drought has hurt ‘‘a bit,” Finney acknowledged.

Landscaping is last to feel slowdown

In 2006, Ruppert’s revenues grew 30 percent from 2005, following two successive years of 100 percent growth. But now Davitt is wary of the housing slump and an uncertain economy.

‘‘We focus on installation in the spring and maintenance in the fall. I still look for healthy growth,” he said. ‘‘But we are being very cautious not to have excess growth, if the economy gets hit.”

Landscaping is the last sector of construction to feel a slump, Davitt said, and ‘‘often a commercial construction slowdown follows a slowdown in residential construction.”

Smedberg said Shemin’s has relied on feedback from its customer core of 5,000 landscapers, property managers, groundskeepers and golf course managers to avoid overstocking its inventory.

‘‘We have seen a shift to commercial construction and that has happened,” Smedberg said.

Higher fuel prices have forced landscape companies to operate more efficiently.

‘‘Well, we make sure our mowers are in top shape,” said Brickman’s Holly. ‘‘And we have switched to Wright Express cards” to help track and control costs.

Wright is a national company that provides payment processing and information management services to the commercial and government vehicle fleet industries. Brickman managers now carry two separate Wright Express cards — one to fuel their trucks and one for off-road machinery, Holly said.

The company has also started forums for its offices to share information across the country, including ways to deal with drought in different regions. ‘‘Our national footprint helps us out with cross training,” Holly said.