You can’t catch them all

In addition to standardizing product offerings, Richard Bevilacqua, director of landscape operations at Maple Leaf Associates, says the next most vital part of the lawn care industry is education.

Bevilacqua adds that while he strives to educate all Maple Leaf’s customers, sometimes the battle simply cannot be won.

“I think education is something that really is important,” he says. “I see it in two ways. First, with the internet being what it is, people want to do their own research since everything is at their fingertips. But there is a lot of bad information out there about our industry. What I’ve found is that if a client already has a negative perception about what we do, it’s going to be difficult to turn them and change their minds.”

Bevilacqua says combatting the negative perception people occasionally have of lawn care and the chemicals used has always been a challenge. But he’s learning how to fight it effectively.

“I don’t feel like it’s my place to change minds anymore,” he says. “It’s about making sure the people who want our services fully know what they’re getting, and more importantly, what they are not getting.”

Bevilacqua says the people who cause the most headaches for Maple Leaf are the ones who limit their research to a few uncredited websites.

“They go down a rabbit hole on Reddit or to a site that’s going to confirm their biases,” he says. “From there, there isn’t anything we can do. That’s been a challenge.”

What Bevilacqua says he tries to do is share creditable sources of information with all Maple Leaf’s existing and prospective clients.

“For people who are interested — educating them is a lot easier,” he says. “Aside from what we tell them, they can fact-check us. They can go online, or I’ve even sent customers articles from Lawn & Landscape to show they don’t have to just take my word for it… you can put the ball in their court.”