With supply chain challenges and even just in general, finding plant materials for your landscape projects can take a lot of time. But today's podcast guest has created an online marketplace that saves both landscape contractors and suppliers a ton of time and money. Check out today's podcast interview with LandscapeHub to see how the green industry is evolving in a digital direction, how their product integrates with other business softwares in the green industry and proposal processes, and how you can use digital media and social media to build and maintain your business relationships.
Hey, everyone, Jack Jostes here, and welcome to the Landscaper's Guide Podcast. This show is all about inspiring the snow and landscape industry to run a better business with sales, marketing, and leadership ideas. A lot of times that involves technology and software and digital communication, and I'm excited to share today's interview with LandscapeHub because they've got a really cool thing going on and just an interesting perspective about the role digital and email and social media plays ultimately in a relationship industry like the green industry. And speaking of relationships and the green industry, I love having events, seeing you all, meeting you. We've got a lot of cool things coming up, so be sure to check out landscapersguide.com so you don't miss out on our upcoming events.
Hey, everyone, welcome back to the Landscaper's Guide. Today, I'm excited to have LandscapeHub on the show. I've been following them on social media. I've been seeing them at shows for years. And today, we have Joe Juricic, he's the territory manager of wholesale, and Will Haverkamp, the senior manager of supply. So Will, Joe, thanks so much for coming on the show today.
Joe Juricic:
Thank you, Jack. Thanks for having us.
Jack Jostes:
It's good to have you both here. First of all, what is LandscapeHub? Will, why don't you tell us?
What Is LandscapeHub?
Will Haverkamp:
Certainly. So Landscape Hub is the premier marketplace for the landscape and green industry for... Basically, it's for buying and selling wholesale landscape materials. We were buying actually from a number of... goodness, anywhere from 300 to 400 different, the actual growers, greenhouses, just different folks across the country and bringing material in. And one of the things that was very evident is that the supply chain is completely fragmented. A lot of lack of connectivity between those suppliers, what they physically have in inventory, and understanding at any given point in real time what you could grab and actually buy from them, bring it in, and just having visibility into that without having it being very time consuming.
So the idea was to create a marketplace to where there's complete and full transparency. You can understand what a supplier at any given moment is carrying and their availability, what they have on the ground and what they can send you at that very given moment, and understand the actual price of it. So that was really kind of the idea, was to create a spot where anyone in the industry could go search for a product, find it quickly, and figure out a way to get it to them with little or less hassle than what we currently are experiencing today.
Jack Jostes:
Joe, were you going to add anything?
Joe Juricic:
No, yeah, you hit the nail on the head. The one thing I'll add is we're 100% transparent. Buyer and supplier know who each other are, which is kind of cool, kind of help growing and fostering relationships.
Digitizing Relationships In The Green Industry
Jack Jostes:
One of the things that we talked about and, to me, one of the coolest parts about the green industry, the landscape industry, is the relationship aspect of it, though. We were talking about digitizing relationships in the green industry and how many people see that as a positive. "Oh, this makes it easier. It's enhancing my relationship." And some people feel maybe even threatened by that, or they don't like it, or they've been doing it this way for 30 years. Can you talk to me a little bit about the relationship side of this and how does LandscapeHub digitize the relationship, and is that a good or a bad thing?
Joe Juricic:
Yeah, I'll go ahead on this one. So what we're doing is we're providing these growers, nurseries, wholesalers, distributors, providing them an outlet to reach existing and new people. And what we've determined in our five years of business is building your own e-commerce site is pricey, and you have to market it. You have to maintain it. And like you said, some people are looking to that, and that's going to be the future. But the old way of doing business, making phone calls... Sometimes you'd make 30 phone calls, like Will said earlier, for five plants. And sure, you're calling all of these people you've been doing business with forever.
When you start to move things online, people get a little hesitant. They're like, "Oh, why don't you call me anymore?" And it's like, well, in the current world we live in, everyone's short labored. I mean, that's a common theme across both landscapers and nurseries. Everyone's looking for labor. It's nice to have those conversations. It's nice that you get to catch up with those people, but being able to do business online helps make the day-to-day of both sides much easier. And you're not really losing that relationship. You're using technology for some of the nitty-gritty work. I've been at nurseries where I've been on a tour, and a nursery man's taken a phone call, written down an order, gets out, and the truck door was open, and the order flies out the window into a puddle. I mean, it's-
Will Haverkamp:
A true story.
Joe Juricic:
Or spills coffee on it as we hit a bump in the field. Then he was like, "Oh, man, I've got to call that guy back." Think about if you were able just to have that digitized. You're not losing that relationship. You're still a very good friend of that person. Maybe you're in his wedding. That's not going away. You're just using technology for capturing the nitty-gritty part of it, the day-to-day operations. So we run into it, where people are like, "Well, if I start buying online, I'm going to lose that relationship." It's like, no, that's not the case at all.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I see the internet as part of the relationship. And what I like about the green industry is I run this podcast, I'm pretty active on LinkedIn and Instagram, and I've made connections with people. And then when I meet them in person at iLandscape or Equip or the GIE+Expo or what... yeah, Equip now-
Joe Juricic:
Equip, yeah.
Jack Jostes:
... or Elevate, whatever show. Anyways, when I finally meet these people in person, I've already kind of built up a lot of the relationship, so that way when I meet them, we really have a great conversation. Or when I meet people in person, keeping in touch with them on social media afterwards just continues that relationship, and that's allowed me to refer people. It's helped me get referrals, and I just see it as part of the relationship. And I can't imagine for many of your clients, the people who use LandscapeHub, that it ends there, right? They're going to probably meet at some point.
Joe Juricic:
Oh yeah, everyone loves a good customer dinner where you can sit and you can talk about your family and how things have been going, so the technology aspect. And to your point before, people are embracing it, and they're loving it. They're rolling with it. They're like, "What more can we do with LandscapeHub?" That's a big question that we get too. And it goes to show that there are people looking to move into kind of the next part of this industry, which is the technology side.
Jack Jostes:
So most of the people who listen to the Landscaper's Guide are landscape contractors. They run landscape companies. And one of the challenges that they're having is finding plant materials, things like that. Are there any other ways that landscape contractors in particular can use LandscapeHub to improve their business that we haven't already talked about?
Plant Materials For Your Landscape Projects
Will Haverkamp:
Yeah, no, I'm like, oh goodness, there's plenty. Besides just being able to have just a really good... We have a huge plant library. We probably have one of the best libraries that you actually... and search functionality too, where you can actually come on and search for things by a common name, a botanic name, and even keyword searches, that sort of thing.
Where we're really trying to put some more tools in a landscaper's hand is really from estimating. And then estimating, it goes and ties into Hub Sheets. Hub Sheets is actually, it's an estimating tool that we're on the verge of actually patenting. And it's essentially where someone can take a... in the commercial side of estimating and actually doing projects, or even if you have plant lists or different things you're trying to search from, say from an Excel file or a CSV or even a JPEG, or even you can take a set of architectural plans and you can crop out the actual plant schedule and the materials list and dump that into Hub Sheets, where it drops you on a page where it's going to give you the path to procurement, or it'll even just give you market pricing. It's going to match it out with each one of those vendors. Who has it, where is it, how much does it cost? And you're working from a central location.
It's something that's pretty killer when it comes to a time savings, even just from the estimating side of things, where you can take a list of materials and quickly get a price, and even then turn it around into a cart, like what you were just talking about earlier, and place an order just as easy. So that's one thing off the top of my head. I don't know if you have anything else to add, Joe.
Joe Juricic:
Yeah, I would say, I mean, leaning into us, we've gone around the country, and we've toured all the nurseries that are on LandscapeHub. So I mean, as a landscape contractor, you've got your what? 10, 15 core group. And with the past years with the increased demand, it's wavered the supply a bit. And some of the contractors are looking for material further out than their normal core group of people. They can lean into LandscapeHub knowing that a trained LandscapeHub person... like, I'm boots on the ground. I'm from the nursery industry. That we've been there, and we've checked it for quality. Of course, everyone's got a lemon in the field, but that's okay. But you can trust that when you're searching on LandscapeHub, the nurseries you're dealing with are reputable. They're A+. They have IPM programs, that you're going to get a quality material. Contractors now sometimes, they'll start at Google, and then you're having to do all of your own research, or you're starting to... You have to make all those phone calls. We do all that for you.
Jack Jostes:
Talk to me a little bit about integration. So if I'm using something like LMN or SingleOps or Aspire or Service Autopilot, some of these programs, how does that... What would my workflow be like if I go out, I'm meeting with a customer, I'm creating an estimate for them, I'm at the phase where we're starting to look at material? How does that tie in with LandscapeHub, or how do you collaborate really with those other estimating programs?
Will Haverkamp:
We have a number of integrations in flight. When I say in flight there, we're just getting started with a few of them. There are ones that are in place today, such as DynaScape. We're working with Arborgold. We're within Aspire also, to where it's really kind of... Gosh, we were even talking with a group today, but I won't say who they are, but it's more of a... It's kind of an example of... I know that a lot of these softwares and systems have a lot of estimating tools, and when it comes to... They have to actually manually load plant lists as well as pricing and unit pricing so they can have accurate estimates, but they can only have the ability to plug into one catalog.
Where we see a future of this is they're plugged in directly with LandscapeHub for real-time pricing, real-time sourcing, to where... We're trying to work this towards where they can live within their software. It maybe takes them to a joint page between LandscapeHub and that software, and they could finish the procurement process. And then also, we kick back information to them, so they have accurate job costing, all that kind of cool bells and whistles. Joe, I'll let you add into that.
Joe Juricic:
You hit the nail on the head. I think the goal is to get to a two-click order system. So the systems talk with each other. You can send your list out of your estimating software right to LandscapeHub, assign your favorite suppliers, and boom, your order. That right there alone saves a lot of time, versus them having to start to pick up the phone and start dialing for plants pretty much. So the integrations allow the two systems to really become efficient and take a pain point out of the day-to-day interaction.
Softwares For inventory Management
Jack Jostes:
That's one thing just as a... With my agency, Ramblin Jackson, we're always trying to find ways to streamline our sales process for our customers, and basic stuff like having people fill out the form on the website, and does that integrate into your business software? And you'd be amazed how many business softwares right now can't integrate with a website, and it's like, "Okay, now I need to either download a CSV and upload that into there, or copy and paste it." And I'm just finding the more I work with contractors that they have all these different softwares that they help, but then they create more what I call administrivia, of having to copy and paste this or download this. And my wish for the green industry is that the softwares would play together.
Will Haverkamp:
Just to throw this out there too, I mean we're also looking at the softwares for inventory management systems for the suppliers as well. So making it easy on them. So when a buyer places an order, it dumps into their system, and it pulls directly from their inventory, so it keeps their numbers accurate. Why is that important for a buyer? It's important for them because they know when they're clicking the button for, okay, 40 of these shrubs, you know that that supplier has integrated already so that if any other orders got placed within the last five minutes, you know that that number is real. Data and the accuracy of the availabilities and all that is just super huge for us. But again, it's creating... It's buyer confidence basically. When they go to click a button, they know that it's there, and it's going to happen when they work with LandscapeHub.
How LandscapeHub Can Help You?
Jack Jostes:
Well, tell us... For people who are listening, they're probably curious, "Hey, can you help me?" And we have podcast listeners all over the country. Tell us what's your footprint currently. You have over, I'm looking on your site, over 173,000 site visitors, over 6,400 plant varieties, and you've done over 112 million plants quoted. You're in, it looks like, 33 states.
Will Haverkamp:
Yeah, correct.
Jack Jostes:
Roughly, where are you? We can go to the website and see all of them, but roughly where are you in the US?
Will Haverkamp:
Where our footprint is predominantly... Home base is Illinois, is where we started out of there. We really grew from here from starting back in 2017, where our heaviest footprint is really the mid-Mississippi River and then east. And then you get to the Northeast, down into the Carolinas, and then down into the Southeast regions. We have a handful of suppliers... We're drifting our way west, if you will. We'd love to... We recognize a ton of needs just even in the Iowa markets, Missouri, Colorado. Just a lot of those places are underserved when it comes to really good supply, and we've got a ton of great suppliers that we'd love to connect with folks out there and try to make some things happen.
Again, it's kind of like we can only grow as fast as we can. But we have a couple of suppliers even down into... We have one that's down in Arizona, a couple of them in California. Obviously, up into Oregon is where some of the most beautiful plants come from, and then even over into Utah as well. But like I say, heaviest concentrations are Mississippi to the East Coast and then down to the Southeast.
Jack Jostes:
Well, Will, Joe, I can't wait to meet you all in person and continue actually building a relationship offline, but I'm looking forward to checking out LandscapeHub and connecting online. For people who are listening who want to learn more or connect with you, tell us a little bit about how we can do that.
Will Haverkamp:
The easiest way is to go to landscapehub.com. We try to make this as simple as possible by making it free for the buyer to use this as a tool: search, order, do all the necessary things. We want you to get in there and estimate and, quote, "play around with it." Again, you just go directly to the website. And we couldn't make it easier for a buyer to interact. There's all kinds of different options once you get in there. We offer some great things for contractors and buyers out there. We can offer terms. I don't know anywhere else in the US where you can jump into a site and get credit terms for over 300-plus suppliers in one shot. That's a huge benefit I don't think we talk about enough. But if you wanted to reach out personally, you'd be just as suited, and we'd do whatever we could to connect you. You could reach out to myself. It's Will@landscapehub.com. Joe is Joe@landscapehub.com.
Jack Jostes:
We keep it easy.
Will Haverkamp:
Yeah. So again, also, he and I kind of deal more today with the supply side of things, but we have a team across the country of different folks that would be more than willing to introduce you to LandscapeHub. We offer free demonstrations where we can connect with your team, walk you through the process, show you the website, show you how it works, how it functions, and get you on your way if you're wanting a little bit of help.
Jack Jostes:
Awesome. Well, thanks so much. Landscapehub.com, and I'll put those email addresses you mentioned in the show notes. And thanks so much for coming on the show.
Joe Juricic:
Awesome. Thanks, Jack. We appreciate it.
Will Haverkamp:
We do.
Jack Jostes:
All right, everyone, thanks so much for checking out today's interview with LandscapeHub. And if you haven't already, check out their podcast, In the Field. It's really interesting. They talk to different people throughout the industry. Check it out: In the Field. My name's Jack Jostes. Thank you so much for listening to the Landscaper's Guide Podcast. I look forward to talking to you next week.