Better by Nature

Who wants to listen to an old man?

A young man, I hope!

I was one of the founders of LCC—the Landscape Contractors of Colorado.  In 1959, a large group of us were invited to a meeting at the botanic gardens by Bob Cannon.  The quest was to create an association for the landscape industry in Colorado.  Only a handful of men chose to attend the second meeting. 

We set a goal to start an organization to seek a way to upgrade ourselves and our competition.  This was our dream.  We worked very hard to make this a success.  Our LCC became the successful Associated Landscape Contractors of Colorado and I have benefitted beyond my wildest dreams. 

A year after I graduated from North High School in Denver, I started SaBell’s Hillside Gardens in 1948.  Participating in this association of landscape contractors was my education. 

I became a president a few years after we began.  And I worked my way through the committee path in the national organization to become the president of the Associated Landscape Contractors of America in 1980. 

Temptation will lean on the doorbell many times – but opportunity will knock only once!  Don’t miss the calling, join and benefit.

Wally SaBell
ALCC President, 1969-1970
SaBell's Enterprises, Arvada, CO

Editor’s note:
LCC’s first membership roster listed 20 members in 1960. 
It wasn’t until 1979 that membership topped 100 firms.
Today, ALCC has nearly 700 members in six chapters statewide.

Wordless week. Enjoy the gift of winter.

Thanks guys!

Not long ago, I got to spend some time with the guys who are responsible for my livelihood.

No, it wasn’t the person who hired me or the 8 guys who interviewed me around the conference table some 12 years ago. It was several from that group of contractors who had a vision more than 50 years ago to start a landscape organization that we know today as ALCC.

They had stories . . . like how they met early on in a motel room along I-25 and spread out their papers across the bed. They talked about when Colorado Green magazine was just a few years old and the publishers were losing money, so they were giving it up. One of the guys loaned ALCC “five grand I didn’t really have” to keep the magazine going.

A few years later, the magazine lost $1,000 that fiscal year and another one of the group spoke up at the board table with all the reasons to keep it in print. Today, I get to work with our Colorado Green editorial team because they had a dream they wouldn’t let go.

Being with this group reminded me that oftentimes we don't know what the long-range results of a vision for something bigger than ourselves can be. Today, I’m thankful, of course, for a job I love – but also for the ongoing legacy of this small group that has brought great things to our state, our industry and countless people who are out every day doing a better job of planting trees, fixing sprinklers and running the equipment that gets the job done and keeps customers happy.

Hats off to: (back row) Wally SaBell, Roy Canfield, Lew Hammer, (front row, left) Jim Wagner and (far right) Bob Zoeteway—and your slightly younger co-horts, (seated) Carl Anderson and Stanley Brown, Jr.

We’re living your dream!

Water, water everywhere, er, nowhere?

Lots in the media yesterday and today about the (lack of) snowpack. A headline today says that except for skiers, nobody’s noticing. Might be true – my family and I nixed a January 1 ski day because there’s been nothing on the slopes –except holiday tourists – for a couple of weeks. But I know that bad skiing could be bad for business come April.

 

One thing is for sure: the landscape industry is watching the snow pack and what will become the runoff. The drought of 2002-03 certainly classifies as “interesting times” as the Chinese curse says. As an industry we learned a lot, and we’re better for it now. Some member businesses boomed in those dry years and it feels to me that since 2002, the green industry has operated as if we have been in a drought every year. Consumers have too – as evidenced by the dramatic reductions in water use since the drought that have not climbed back to pre-drought levels even though we’ve had ample supply. Our member pros continue to help their customers save water (and money) and still have gorgeous outdoor living spaces.

 

What I don’t know is whether getting to customers and educating them will be easier this time around. Seems like with social media, everyone’s Facebook page will be full of indoor and outdoor water conservation advice. We have connection tools that we didn’t have even just 10 years ago. It would be really terrific if the landscape industry were going into their client consultations this spring talking about how drought is a real possibility and provide solid counsel to their clients about landscaping in a drought and that it actually IS possible. Let’s lead the way.

A lesson in public policy

I had the honor last week of having dinner with Senator Michael Bennet.

 

This wasn’t in a packed room where the best way to actually see the Senator was on screens hanging from the ceiling. Instead, this was a small group – just one table – talking about immigration and all of its facets, including perceptions, misconceptions and realities.

 

What impressed me most was the Senator’s grasp of the issue and how it matters to Colorado. He asked the most intelligent questions of any policymaker in my experience with the issues.  He listened intently to what each one of us around that small table had to say.  And he articulated the problems he sees programmatically and politically, in an intelligent, solution-minded way. 

 

That evening, I re-learned a good lesson: as exhausting as it is to keep pounding an issue, it matters.

 

Yesterday’s Denver Post highlighted Bennet’s visa bill introduced just this week – a great step in what many of us hope will continue into the whole immigration system. To me, it was more evidence that legislators will listen and get behind an issue as long as we keep bringing it to them. 

Keep the good customers

I recently came very close to breaking up with the one of my favorite clothing stores (yes, a clothing store).  I had an experience that was somewhat unpleasant that was exacerbated by a terrible customer service response.  You know the standard response: they say something like, “we apologize for the inconvenience, we appreciate your feedback.”  That is the response that nearly ended our relationship.  I replied thanks, but no thanks.  Lo and behold, they replied with a better answer: “we’re sorry and this is how we are fixing it”.  So the relationship is restored.  My point is, this could be a story to all of my friends about a terrible experience with the store.  But,  instead not only will I continue to buy from them, I can now tell friends and family about how they helped me resolve an issue AND I can keep shopping at one of my favorite stores.

Are clients breaking up with you?  Or, are you doing the best you can to make your clients happy so that they can tell their friends and family about how you made a negative experience into a positive?  True enough, sometimes it is best to let a customer go.  But sometimes, you are better off turning a bad experience into a lifetime customer just by simply avoiding the common response and doing just a little something to make things right.

~Cynthia

But does it really DO anything?

Monday and Tuesday of this week, 6 industry volunteers members joined me at PLANET’s legislative conference.  I forgot my pedometer, but I’m betting that our coverage of three House buildings, two Senate buildings, and treks on the subway got us close to a 2 mile walk.  Between those strolls back and forth across Capitol Hill, we had a chance to visit with all nine offices of Colorado’s Congressional delegation, including Congressmen Polis, Tipton and Gardner.  We asked them to intervene on the disastrous DOL rules on the H-2B program, not support an EPA authorization bill until the 40% turf limitation is removed from the WaterSense new home specification, and help move the NPDES permit bill to the Senate floor as soon as possible, as it keeps FIFRA as the standard for pesticide applications.  Every time I return from Washington, someone (my husband, a board member, our leasing agent, and as soon as my 20 month old can talk, him too) asks me if the visits were successful, and more importantly, if going to Washington really does anything, especially now when Washington is mired down in the debt ceiling issue.  After thinking about it most of today, I stand by the answer I gave last night to my plane seatmate:  Yes. Yes it does.  The staffs we met with asked for us to send them more information, statistics on our industry, previous letters written, and to let them know when some key Dear Colleague letters were published.  They were able to engage with us what was important to our industry, and I think we've got some metrics on the visits going forward, though results are likely going to be slower than we'd like.  Our job as constituents and industry experts, is to be a resource for them, and to assure them they can trust us to help them understand the details of how a bill or regulation impacts us. Our volunteers did just that -- and did it well. And that really does DO something.

You can have your chicken--and eat its egg, too

It happened! If you live in Denver, you are now good to go to have chickens in your yard thanks to the June 20 ruling by the Denver City Council.

Some say, it’s a third-world value getting a stronghold. Many think it will create a nuisance—smell, noise, general disruption in the neighborhood. One tongue-in-cheek guy on the radio said it’s the beginning of new urban terrorism because you can mix chicken poop with diesel fuel and make an explosive.

Others say they are grateful they can collect their own eggs and have chicks scratching around in the yard eating up insects and weeds. Long-time gardeners say chickens pecking at the soil actually rototill the garden and their waste creates fertilizer. Maybe having a few chickens around isn’t so bad after all?

Could they be just one more practical and sustainable option? Chickens naturally make a lot of reduce, re-use, recycle opportunities out in the yard. And that makes me wonder if the core of this whole issue is really that most of us urbanites and suburbanites aren’t used to the idea yet.

Maybe chickens are like the kitchen garden was just a few years ago. It’s kind of a new concept for city-dwellers, but some of us will catch on to enjoy the benefits and move on to be wary of something else.

Meanwhile, I’ve got to get acquainted with my new neighbors out it the ‘burbs. He’s a pretty normal guy—a savvy young landscape architect who teaches at CU and knows a lot about water conservation and gardening. And he just got a box of baby chicks in the mail to start working over their back yard. After work today, I hope to catch up to the young prof and get a lesson. Maybe I need a chicken coop next to my kitchen garden.

Shovels, really?

 

Ever get irritated, mad, flaming livid--downright furious that the world thinks all we do is work at the business end of a shovel?

When will they get it that putting plants in the ground takes a whole lot more than manual labor? 

We need to invite people to step outside and notice that everything they see that's not pavement, a building or a vehicle has been touched by the green industry.  All those trees, the plants and grass are there because of us.  And they don't show up by accident.

Think about it.  Our real tools are science, math, art, engineering and instinct.  Without knowing plant physiology, calcuations/calibrations, soil science, entomology, the art of design, the hydraulics and engineering of water delivery and a whole lot more, we would't even get around to using a shovel.  It's just the minor detail at the end of a long chain of brain power, know-how and creativity. 
Think it might be time to set people straight on the shovel image?  Yeah, we need to fix the picture!

Wheelbarrows to the rescue as landscape team creates healing garden

April 20, 2011 11:10 AM BILL VOGRIN THE GAZETTE, Colorado Springs, CO

A small army of wheelbarrow-pushing landscapers will celebrate Earth Day on Friday by creating a special place for sick children and their parents at the Memorial Hospital for Children.

They plan to transform a patch of sod into a healing garden with three circular patio areas, tables, benches, a fountain and plants. If, that is, their wheelbarrows hold out. The garden will represent hope, life and healing and offer sick children and their families a place of tranquility and inspiration.

To pull it off, the landscapers will need to haul and assemble 50 tons of dirt, nearly 5 tons of sand, 24 tons of sand/gravel mix, 2.5 tons of drainage rock, plus uncounted tons of flagstone, boulders, pavers, trees, shrubs and more.

All by wheelbarrow.

“This is a very ambitious project,” said Jon Rick, of the Associated Landscape Contractors of Colorado. The ALCC’s southern Colorado chapter is tackling the garden project as part of the Professional Landcare Networks’ third annual National Day of Service.

“The goal is to provide an area for children and their families to relax as they are undergoing treatment,” Rick said. “We’re trying to create a serene place. A relaxing environment.”

So, why wheelbarrows? Why not truck materials in? Use a forklift? Or a crane?

“The space is fairly small and it’s really hard, logistically, to get materials in and out,” Rick said. The gardens will be at the base of the new hospital tower at the bottom of a long circular ramp and the base of a retaining wall along Boulder Street.

Each landscaper and wheelbarrow will travel about 300 feet down the ramp and up a sidewalk to the construction site. In other words, all materials will be hauled the length of a football field before the real work can start.

Rick said his volunteer crews would spend Thursday hauling the donated materials down to the site. On Friday, four crews will rip up the sod, build the patios and plant all the trees, shrubs and flowers. “It’s going to be a long day and it’s going to be tough,” Rick said.

But it will be worth it, Dr. Larry McEvoy, chief executive of Memorial Health Systems said in a prepared statement. “This garden will play an important role in our patients’ emotional and physical well-being.”

Memorial’s Greg Gauna, director of planning, design and construction, said the garden has been planned since the $110 million, seven-story east tower opened in 2007. “The budget for the garden was about $100,000 and we were looking for funding,” Gauna said. “We heard they were looking for a day of service project. It’s pretty incredible. Talk about a gift falling into your lap. We’re very excited.”

Wonder if Memorial has a wing to treat exhausted landscapers?