Masonry Magazine December 2017 Page. 86
ing and outdoor kitchens up to the mortar. If anything requires mortar, we subcontract it to a mason. There are advantages, however, to doing both. If you do mortar already, then you have a client base which you can tap for landscape design or maintenance services." One of his other challenges is assuring that the homeowner will water the plants. Back to Nature guar�antees its plants for one year from planting with watering instructions carefully spelled out in the contract. And they do get called for a plant that died, believing it had to be a lack of water, but Ulmer focuses intensively on customer satisfaction. "It's much less expensive to keep a client than find a new one," he reveals. To resolve this water issue, his company will offer irrigation installation pack�ages next spring, or customers can sign up for watering services.
So, along with your decision to expand and what landscape services to offer comes the realization that you may be spending lots more of your time interacting with homeowners or property managers. Most of it may be wonderful, some of it cantankerous. The customer is not always right, but having an easy-going personality and problem-solving attitude is imperative.
Amy Volkmann, manager of Nagel's Sod and Landscaping in Medford, Minn., works with a lot of masons in her area. "There are several companies in the region which build retaining walls, then we come in with the plant material. We also do natural stone patios, but not masonry work. In fact, the big thing now is outdoor pizza ovens, and we can't find anyone to build them." Volkmann grew up working in the business started by her mom, Mary Helen Nagel, and her late father, Owen Nagel. Like Ulmer, she subcontracts to masons when mortar is involved.
Two of the challenges Nagel's Sod faces is dirt and pricing. " Plants need good dirt, and on new construc�tion sites, heavy equipment and trucks have driven repeatedly over the ground resulting in major soil compaction," she explains. "No one wants to pay to loosen up the dirt and add whatever it needs to sup�port plants. Sometimes there's still construction debris left behind that needs to be removed before we can render the dirt usable and landscap�ing can begin. I get questioned often on a plant price and remind the client that this represents working the soil, picking up the plants as much as an hour away, delivering them, putting them in the right place, watering and mulching them and then extending a warranty."
LANDSCAPING BUSINESS
So, seeing that landscapers do not handle masonry work may bode well for a stone mason firm looking to expand into some facet of landscape services. Volkmann has a college de�gree in human resource management, which she admits is not very helpful in her line of work. Ulmer holds a degree in horticulture landscape contracting with a minor in business from Virginia Tech, which contributes to the rela�tively fast expansion of his business, but there are many ways to fold a landscape division into the masonry company.
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