AmericanHort Connect February 2020

An AmericanHort Member Benefit

2020:February

A KNOWLEDGE RESOURCE FOR OUR INDUSTRY

IN THIS ISSUE

Welcome to 2020 “Like rings on a tree or the deepening lines on my forehead, we mark our time on this earth by the years and decades behind us and in front of us.

The future is always intriguing and exciting. At AmericanHort our staff and Board of Directors have been working hard to build the capabilities and programs that will help our members navigate the challenges of the next decade so our industry can perform better, improve faster, and be prepared of the future ahead of us.”

—Ken Fisher, President & CEO, AmericanHort

FEATURES Welcome to 2020

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HRI & ADVOCACY UPDATES

Marketing Mindset: What is SEO?

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Member Spotlight: Saunders Brothers

Four Students Named Beneficiaries of HRI Scholarship

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The Lay of the Land on Trucking

UPCOMING EVENTS

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Cultivate’20

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New Retail Webinar Series

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WELCOME TO 2020

Welcome to 2020

By Ken Fisher, President and CEO, AmericanHort, KenF@AmericanHort.org

Welcome to 2020—a New Year and a New Decade which promise great accomplishment and progress for our industry, our world…and ourselves!

Like rings on a tree or the deepening lines on my forehead, we mark our time on this earth by the years and decades behind us and in front of us. The future is always intriguing and exciting. At AmericanHort our staff and Board of Directors have been working hard to build the capabilities and programs that will help our members navigate the challenges of the next decade so our industry can perform better, improve faster, and be prepared of the future ahead of us.

“Will we be ready?”

We live in a period of extended economic prosperity. The 2010’s marked the first time ever, the U.S. started and ended a decade without a recession. We can debate the strength of the economy, continued economic inequality, policies that have helped or hurt the economy, difficulty in finding good workers—but we start 2020 in an enviable economic position. What will the economy do, and will we be ready?

This year’s presidential election, and probably the other two in this decade, will be marked by greater partisan divide than we’ve experienced in the recent past and growing rhetoric and policy split among our 2 | AmericanHort.org

major candidates. President Trump has only been tweeter-in-chief for three years—and how we view politics and politicians has changed. How will these elections and politics shape our world and our industry, and will we be ready?

Consumers continue to drive our economy and our industry. Their buying patterns, evolving channels of product distribution, changing preferences for new products and services, and desire for personalized content delivered at an ever-increasing rate are creating an inflection point in consumer products and services. Amazon Prime, Netflix, and grocery delivery will impact our society, consumers, and ultimately our industry. They are reshaping consumer preferences and expectations. Garden Retail, Big Box, Online—what will happen to brickand-mortar retail and front door logistics and will we be ready?

Because of the strength and stability of the economy, many of us have been able to focus not only on running our businesses, but also the organization and our people. At AmericanHort, a new HR Peer Sharing Group has been formed to tackle tough organizational issues. Our industry is beginning to appreciate the value of investing in culture to strengthen

our businesses and retain talent. And as the industry generational transfer marches along, we have renewed focus on the many facets of succession planning and an orderly transition of our industry. The industry will look different in the next ten years. Will we be ready?

If you’re not finding ways to keep up with technology, the next decade might be a challenge. The official terms are cloudbased, automatic speech recognition, and natural language understanding.

We know that smart devices are getting smarter with the help of Siri, Alexa, and their voice-activated friends. Appliances, plugs, switches, cameras, cars, and about every other piece of consumer gadgetry will have these technologies embedded and at your command. Can we harness this power—and other artificial intelligence and virtual reality—to benefit our industry and companies? Will we be ready?

In the last decade we were introduced to Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, and Instagram (TikTok anyone?). Growth and influence of these social media platforms has transformed our entire society. From consumerism, to fashion, to entertainment, to politics, to global affairs—like it or not social media impacts your world. It is almost unimaginable how this platform might be used for good and evil in this decade. Will it benefit our industry, and will we be ready?

The Farm Bill that passed in 2018 ushered in legalized hemp, and our industry is abuzz with the promise of new markets and goldrush riches. This year and the new decade will separate the successful from the rest as many are already finding the challenges and pitfalls of a new product, underdeveloped markets, and an immature industry to be a difficult path. But a new market for horticulture capacity and resources, with new potentially strong product sales and margins, with cash-rich outside investors, and attractive look to the next generation?

What could go wrong?

I could play this game all day long. Plant health and genetics, tariffs and taxes, plant-based burgers, environmental trends, etc. I am intrigued, energized, and excited about this new decade—and you should be too. At AmericanHort, we are looking at every one of these issues to find programming and solutions to

AmericanHort Board of Directors Nominations Now Being Accepted until February 21.

Voting will be open March 9–April 3.

AmericanHort is seeking individuals that are dedicated to the horticulture industry and passionate about moving it forward to provide guidance, support, and leadership while serving on the AmericanHort Board of Directors. Nominate an industry leader*, or submit your own application, at AmericanHort.org/Elections. * B oard of Directors must be current AmericanHort members to be elected.

help our industry Perform Better, Grow Faster, and Prepare for a new decade.

Our advocacy team is leading the way on issues and influence to protect and advance our industry in D.C. and in key states.

Cultivate’20 promises to be the best yet with an entire educational track dedicated to hemp, a new HR workshop to help you recruit, develop, and retain your best employees, and a culture worship to give you the tools to build the organization you need to be prepared for whatever the future holds. We are planning new events for the fall to include new educational conferences, leading industry tours, webinars, and exciting ways to grow and improve your business. These are just the first installments on a decade of industry investment from AmericanHort.

As an AmericanHort member, I appreciate the support and engagement with your industry association. What we do together matters, and we’ll work together to ensure the industry is ready for the future.

Happy New Year!

2020:February | 3

MARKETING MINDSET Meta Data

Content Marketing

Marketing Mindset: What is SEO?

By Nicolas Leas, Digital Web Manager, AmericanHort, NicolasL@AmericanHort.org

SEO is an acronym that stands for search engine optimization, which is the process of optimizing your website to get organic, or un-paid, traffic from the search engine results page. In other words, SEO involves making certain changes to your website design and content that make your site more attractive to a search engine such as Google. You do this in hopes that the search engine will display your website as a top result on the search engine results page.

SEO is the process that organizations go through to help make sure that their site ranks high in the search engines for relevant keywords and phrases. There are many benefits of SEO for your business.

By improving your SEO, you can work to expand your visibility on the search engines. This helps you reach and engage more potential customers. By creating more engaging and effective SEO-focused content, you can increase your chances of bringing in more targeted organic traffic.

Factors that Impact SEO Basic SEO can be broken down into three parts: on-site SEO, off-site SEO, and content marketing.

On-site SEO The on-page SEO factors are those elements that happen on your website. These are the things that you have complete control over, including metadata, internal site linking, and sub-headings. Improving these on-site

factors can have a significant impact on improving your overall site SEO. Ensuring that these are correct and consistent should be the priority for any business that is looking to improve their search engine visibility.

Meta data is a commonly used industry term that includes title tags, meta description, and image name and ALT tags. This data is often the content that search engines, like Google, will display in their search results. It is important to have unique and informative meta data to help search engines better match your pages with user search results.

Site structure and internal linking plays a pivotal role on how search engines index your website. Creating a proper page hierarchy and internal site linking plan allows you to emphasize which page on your website is the most important. This gives you leverage on how your website should be indexed and shows the search engines which page/service matters to you the most.

Site Structure

Link Building

Search Engine Optimization

Social Media

Trust Building

Off-site SEO

Content Marketing

Off-site SEO can be broken down into 3 parts: trust, links, and social. These are areas as a business you should have complete control over, and overtime can be a very powerful method to increasing your site’s overall search rankings. It is important that, unlike on-site SEO, these factors require planning and time because if not properly planned, they could have a negative effect.

Content marketing is the process of creating new and relevant content for users through your website or social media profiles. It shows search engines that your site is active, and you are creating relevant content for the industry you represent. The more relevant and quality content material you create on your website, the higher the likelihood of users coming back to your site, but it also increases visibility and search rankings. Content marketing encompasses blog posts, articles, social media content, how-to guides, videos, and other visual content.

Trust is an off-site SEO factor that is becoming increasingly more important to search engines. As more and more businesses enter an industry, it is Google’s job to display what they believe is the best and most trustworthy result based on the user’s search criteria. Building trust can be achieved by building a network of quality backlinks from sites that are established and have authority.

Link building is an a very popular SEO practice that needs to be approached carefully. Best practices states that link building should be done over periods of time and be carefully planned to maximize each backlink. You do not want to spam sites with your links as this could result in being banned by search engines.

Lastly, social media has become a major part of any off-site SEO campaign. It is important to keep in mind that social media should be a tool to extend the reach of your business and that you should be posting relevant and meaningful content to your business profiles and drive engagement back to your website.

Final Thoughts SEO is an essential part of a successful online marketing strategy and can greatly increase visibility and traffic to your website.

Carefully planning your SEO strategy by ensuring your on-site SEO signals are consistent and having regularly scheduled content published on your site can be the difference that sets you apart from your competition.

2020 :Feb

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HRI & ADV UPDATE OCACY S Four Stud ents Nam Beneficia ed ries of HRI Scholarsh ip The Lay of the Land on Trucking

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UPCOM ING EVE NTS Cultivate ’20 New Reta il Webinar Series

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Member

2020:February | 5

TRY

CULTIVATE’20

By Katie Gustafson, Marketing Communication Specialist, AmericanHort, KatieG@AmericanHort.org

Being proactive now can ensure that you capitalize on some of the most favorable tax and estate rates we have seen in more than 30 years (as set by the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act).

At AmericanHort, we are always focused on bringing you timely and relevant news and education to help your business perform better, grow faster, and prepare for the future. We’ve heard your requests and are excited to present new education and networking opportunities at Cultivate’20 to meet the needs of your business and our industry.

In particular, there are several tax codes that are set to expire (sunset) or could be at risk for significant changes—ultimately, eliminating some of the advantageous tax opportunities that are available to you currently.

Hemp Education Track

Landscape Zoo Tour

AmericanHort will be providing an entirely new education track at Cultivate’20, providing research and support for hemp growers in the horticulture industry. For AmericanHort's official statement on hemp, visit AmericanHort.org/Positions_Policies.

Landscapers and horticulture enthusiasts will join us for a guided tour at the Columbus Zoo to explore and ask questions about the challenge of maintaining and improving extensive, high-management landscape in a public space as well as in and around animal exhibits.

Your advantage: All-time low for businesses results in maximum benefits and savings.

Women in Horticulture Event Join us for this new educational networking event for women in the green industry.

Leslie Halleck will facilitate a panel discussion with accomplished women in the green industry who will share lessons they’ve learned as they’ve navigated their career path.

A portion of all tickets purchased will go to support an HRI horticulture scholarship.

For more information or to register for any of these events, visit:

CultivateEvent.org/ Experiences

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Embrace the Lowest Corporate Tax Rates

Evaluate Income Tax Brackets Your advantage: Understanding your tax bracket can help maximize financial decisions and create potential strategies to bring taxable income down.

Building a Positive Culture Workshop

Maximize Estate and Gifting Exemptions (for a limited time)

Great businesses actively work to create a positive culture and communicate it through their everyday actions. This workshop is full of examples and exercises where we will talk about building and maintaining a positive organizational culture, and you will learn tools to teach, define, live, measure, and reward what’s important in your own company.

Your advantage: Minimize transfer taxes and protect wealth. The federal gift, estate, and generation-skipping transfer

Moss Wall Workshop Creating moss walls is an integral design technique used in the interior plantscape industry. This new, hands-on workshop will teach attendees the fundamentals of building moss walls and design best practices.

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What’s New at Cultivate’20?

American businesses are on the threshold of the next presidential election year, and the uncertainty of what’s to come and who assumes office is prompting businesses to ensure they are taking every advantage of the lowest tax rates and highest exemptions available under the current tax code.

D

How to Leverage Available Tax Benefits for Your Business In each issue of Connect, we’ll be “hiding” a new small graphic. When you find it, email us at ConnectSeekAndFind@AmericanHort.org, and tell us where you found it.

For this February issue, respond by March 1.

Karl Losely Herman Losely and Son, Inc Perry, OH ————— Karl is an AmericanHort member who found November/December’s SEEK & FIND and is the winner of our drawing.

exemptions are almost doubled from prior TCJA and will sunset at the end of 2025.

Both individuals and business owners can maximize their financial health through comprehensive tax strategies. It’s recommended that businesses meet with advisors to review, analyze, recommend, and implement changes needed to take full advantage of the rates available today, while simultaneously preparing your business’ tax position in the event of future changes.

As the trusted tax and accounting resource for AmericanHort members, K·Coe Isom’s tax experts can help assess tax plans and make the most of the unique tax opportunities available to horticulture businesses. K·Coe can identify and implement a tax strategy with the highest potential now, and for the future.

AmericanHort HR Peer Sharing Group Once a month, the AmericanHort Human Resource Peer Sharing Group brings HR professionals from AmericanHort member companies together to connect. Upcoming meeting topics include: February 19, 3pm EST: Defining job competency and how to tie competency to performance evaluation—an open group discussion

March 11, 3pm EST: Employee appreciation & incentives—presented by Emily Showalter of Willoway Nurseries April 15, 3pm EST: Attendance policies & dealing with absenteeism—an open group discussion Interested in joining the group? Please contact MaryBethC@AmericanHort.org to learn more.

2020:February | 7

HRI UPDATE

Four students named beneficiaries of HRI Spring Meadow–Proven Winners® Scholarship

By Jennifer Gray, Research Programs Administrator, Horticultural Research Institute, JenniferG@AmericanHort.org

Grand Haven’s Spring Meadow Nursery and the Horticultural Research Institute (HRI) are pleased to announce the recipients of 2019-2020 Spring Meadow–Proven Winners® Endowment Fund scholarships.

Dale & Liz Deppe established the Spring Meadow–Proven Winners® Endowment Fund with HRI in 1999 with the belief that bright, well-trained, qualified people are essential to the green industry and that backing motivated students plays a vital role in protecting and growing the industry.

Through HRI, the AmericanHort Foundation acts as the administrator of endowments that help students to obtain the education necessary to successfully pursue horticultural careers.

“Our team has been blessed by this industry and the mentors who’ve helped us along the way.

These scholarships represent our commitment to continue the encouragement of emerging professionals,” said Dale Deppe.

“We are pleased to be able to support these students in such a direct way.”

Horticulture students Mary Tuski, Noah Brown, Amber Lancaster, and Jacklyn Stupienski were each awarded $2500 scholarships for the 2019-2020 granting period, bringing the total amount of awards distributed through the fund to $83,750. The students were chosen from a competitive national applicant pool for their academic achievements, exemplary leadership abilities, and commitment to pursuing careers in horticulture.

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Currently a senior at Michigan State University, Mary Tuski is working toward her bachelor’s degree and plans to pursue a master’s degree in nursery production with a career goal of working in woody and tree production after she graduates. Mary is a member of the Michigan State Student Horticulture Association where she has served as vice president and now is the president of the organization. She has also attended the CareerUp program at Cultivate for three years and has gained hands-on experience in the horticulture industry working as a landscape laborer, a farm intern, and multiple stints as a research assistant in the MSU horticulture lab.

Noah Brown is a junior at North Carolina State University where he is pursuing a Bachelor of Science in agricultural business management.

After graduation, he hopes to study agritourism in the Netherlands and eventually plans to work toward obtaining a management position in the horticulture industry. Noah is a member of the NC State horticulture club and has interned at Greenleaf Nursery Company in Tarboro, NC.

An outstanding student, Amber Lancaster just started her senior year at the University of Arkansas Fayetteville and is especially interested in propagation, breeding, and grafting of fruit trees to find the most disease-resistant cultivars for Northwest Arkansas. She is currently an intern at the University of Arkansas in the Plant Pathology department where she is learning about types of pests and pathogens that can affect the plants in both field and greenhouse production. Amber has been a member of Gamma Beta Phi, Phi Theta Kappa, Baptist Collegiate Ministry, and the on-campus Horticulture Club.

Jacklyn Stupienski is entering her second year of a 2-year horticulture program at Naugatuck Valley Community College in Waterbury, CT. She has received the CT Horticulture Society Scholarship, and a merit scholarship for outstanding GPA and achievement. Jacklyn’s interests include design, propagation, and growing, and last year she was accepted into the summer internship program at Monrovia. After she graduates, she hopes to apply for opportunities that involve growing, propagation, or sales.

A total of 33 Spring Meadow-Proven Winners® endowed scholarships have been awarded to students since 2004.

Scholarship applications for 2021 will open in April 2020. Individuals who are interested in applying for a scholarship can check out HRIResearch.org or contact Jennifer Gray, HRI Administrator, at (614) 884-1155 for more scholarship application details.

For more information about Spring Meadow Nursery and Proven Winners® ColorChoice® visit ProvenWinners-Shrubs.com and SpringMeadowNursery.com.

HortScholar Application Now Open!

The AmericanHort HortScholars will spend seven, all-expenses-paid days in Columbus, Ohio attending Cultivate'20.

HortScholars are exposed to the breadth of the horticulture industry and its opportunities. They meet leaders of the industry, jumpstart their network, get plugged into fresh ideas, and present on a topic of their own expertise. Oh, and did we mention HortScholars get a free oneyear membership to AmericanHort? The HortScholars program is open to any college student in a horticulture-related program.

Applications are due March 1.

Apply and learn more at AmericanHort.org/Scholars.

! y a d o T ly p p A

The Horticultural Research Institute (HRI), founded in 1962, has provided more than $8 million in student scholarships and research grants for projects covering a broad range of production, environmental, and business issues important to the green industry. Nearly $11 million is committed to the endowment by individuals, corporations, and associations.

2020:February | 9

FROM THE HILL

A D V O C A C Y U P DAT E S

The Lay of the Land on Trucking The trucking sector has undergone several regulatory changes over the past few years. All together, these changes have made shipping green products slightly more complicated. AmericanHort has been on the forefront of this fight, working to make the regulatory environment clearer and easier to navigate for the horticulture industry.

Background on Logs Trucking in the United States is regulated by the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA), a division of the Department of Transportation (DOT).

FMCSA requires drivers to keep logs of their activity (when driving, loading, resting, etc.) to comply with safety limitations on how much work each driver can do per year.

These Hours of Service (HOS) regulations are designed to keep the traveling public safe by ensuring truck drivers don’t endanger motorists by trying to cram too many working hours into the day. Drivers would formerly keep paper logs of every hour the truck was in operation and present them upon demand at a DOT or police inspection of their vehicle.

From Paper to Logging Devices Starting in the 1980s, some drivers began using simple computers known as Automatic Onboard Recording Devices (ABORDs) to record the events formerly logged in these paper books; Engine status, truck speed, miles driven, locations visited, and most importantly the driver’s “duty status.”

In 2012, Congress passed the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act. This law mandated all drivers and fleets adopt more advanced Electronic Logging Devices (ELDs) by December of 2017. These devices would tie directly into the truck’s diagnostic systems and record the identity 10 | AmericanHort.org

of the driver and carrier, the driver’s duty status, the status of the engine and its operating hours, whether the vehicle was in motion, miles driven, locations visited, and any malfunction data. Most importantly, unlike paper logs—the connection to the vehicle meant logs must be kept accurate and current to be presented for inspection upon request.

The Agricultural Commodity Exemption Understanding the agricultural products require more flexibility in transportation due to their perishability and the special handling required to load/unload them from a vehicle, the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration created special rules for individuals shipping these goods.

When transporting a qualified commodity, drivers are exempt from the Hours of Service requirements, so long as they’re transporting the goods to a destination that is within 150 air-miles of the origin. From chrysanthemums to cattle, this exemption ensures that the goods arrive healthy and quickly and that drivers aren’t penalized for the special handling requirements of these products.

With these dual challenges conspiring to affect your bottom line, we’ve been working to clarify that horticulture & floriculture do count as “agricultural commodities” for the purposes of this regulation. Last year, Congressmen Austin Scott (GA-08) and Kurt Schrader (OR-5) introduced the Agricultural Trucking Relief Act (H.R. 1673) which would clarify this position in law. We encouraged Senators David Perdue (GA) and Jeff Merkley (OR) to introduce a companion bill in the Senate (S. 2025) just a few months later.

The House bill boasts 34 cosponsors and the Senate bill 9, so both bills have gained healthy bipartisan support. Our conversations with the Administration have been equally fruitful. Earlier this year, the FMCSA opened a rulemaking seeking to clarify the definition internally.

AmericanHort submitted comments encouraging the agency to properly and clearly define agriculture and eliminate the ambiguity that has caused these issues.

Horticultural products already qualify as agriculture for taxation, for many workforce and labor programs, and research initiatives throughout the federal government.

Resolving this one ambiguity in the transportation definition is likely to bolster the strength of our industry’s efforts in keeping harmony between definitions of agriculture across the multitude of federal agencies.

This is just one of the ways AmericanHort helps defend your interests in Washington.

Stay tuned for other advocacy primers outlining the other ways our team works to help you Perform Better, Grow Faster, and Prepare for the Future.

AmericanHort Introduces Plant Sentry™ as Newest Affinity Program Partner Providing wholesale, retail and on-line plant sellers with a compliance tool for interstate shipping AmericanHort is pleased to announce the newest addition to its lineup of affinity business program partners, Plant Sentry™ .

Plant Sentry is a software program pioneered by Nature Hills Nursery that provides a comprehensive plant compliance tool designed to ensure that wholesale, retail, and e-commerce vendors grow and ship only plants that are fully compliant with all federal regulations and restrictions and those of all 50 states. AmericanHort members will be eligible for cost savings in using the Plant Sentry program. Savings will vary based on each business’ needs.

To learn more about this affinity partner offer and all the affinity partner programs available to AmericanHort members, contact MemberService@AmericanHort.org or (614) 487-1117.

Tristan Daedalus Director of Advocacy and Policy Communications, AmericanHort TristanD@AmericanHort.org

Our Advocacy When the ELD mandate took effect, AmericanHort began hearing from our members in early 2018 about a few unintended consequences of these changes.

2020:February | 11

MEMBER SPOTLIGHT

“When asked what sets Saunders Brothers apart from the rest of the green industry, Jim Saunders was quick to reply it’s their fantastic people who are smart, innovative, loyal and enthusiastic.”

Saunders Brothers Wholesale Nursery, Orchard and Farm Market Piney River, VA

AmericanHort caught up with Jim Saunders, one of the four Saunders Brothers siblings leading their business, to learn what sets this company apart and how they are preparing the company for future success.

Nestled in the foothills of Virginia’s Blue Ridge Mountains, Saunders Brothers Nursery, Orchard and Farm Market is a multi-generational business rooted in family. Offering an extensive product line of annuals, perennials, container trees, roses, boxwood and many flowering and woody shrubs, Saunders Brothers is long known for meeting the needs of the marketplace.

When asked what sets Saunders Brothers apart from the rest of the green industry, Jim Saunders was quick to reply it’s their fantastic people who are smart, innovative, loyal and enthusiastic. He continued to explain their improved business and growing practices have helped reduce costs and make the company more competitive.

One example is the company’s focus on labor costs. After studying industry data from Charlie Hall, they realized their labor/ sales ratio was too high and reducing labor costs became a company goal. Jim explained that everyone in the company focused on how they could reduce labor costs. Like many in the green industry, having available labor remains a top challenge. Saunders Brothers first started 12 | AmericanHort.org

using the H2A program in 1998. Initially they started small, but now have about 100 H2A workers with 33 of those who have returned to work for more than a decade, some returning for 20 years.

Learning to manage the language and cultural barriers and how to keep up with the ever-changing administrative requirements of the program is key.

Saunders Brothers has ten housing units to accommodate their H2A workers. Jim shared a story about an issue with workers pouring grease down the drains. It was customary for their workers to pour grease down the drain after cooking, which caused issues with the septic system. To avoid such costly repairs, they started using 55-gallon drums located outside the houses to discard grease. To encourage their workers to keep their housing clean, they created the “Golden Broom” award, given out each month to the houses that meet all the maintenance checklist requirements. Every house who meets the checklist requirements also gets a pizza party. Whichever house receives the most Golden Broom awards in a year is awarded a Saunders Brothers jacket. Jim explained how this program has

helped improve overall maintenance, lower maintenance costs of the housing units and strengthened their working relationships.

Issues, such as drippy faucets, are identified early and addressed more quickly.

Saunders Brothers innovation in boxwood production is another source of great pride.

Boxwood have been part of the family tradition at Saunders Brothers for over 60 years. When boxwood blight was first reported in 2011, the threat was taken very seriously, and they started researching the issue. Through trial and error, and collaboration with nearby universities, they identified cultivars that were tolerant to not only boxwood blight, but also to boxwood leafminor, while also creating a “Wow” factor in landscapes. This led to the recent launch of the NewGen™ Boxwood which will be available in the marketplace this year and is receiving great interest in the marketplace.

Saunders Brothers takes their Boxwood Blight sanitation practices seriously. Not only are they keeping a constant eye out on where the latest occurrence of reported disease, they also instilled procedures to keep their nursery disease free. Nurseries are gated providing a physical barrier. No one is permitted to drive their personal cars into the nurseries. To walk through the nurseries, visitors must get suited up from head to toe. When you move from one segment to another you must disinfect boots and wash

up at the wash stations and change suits.

Clippers and pruning equipment are cleaned after use. These measures are put in place to prevent the occurrence of disease and prevent anything from spreading from one area to another. Foot baths are used when going in and out of the office or lunchroom.

To further control exposure, only one person does boxwood order selection and the customer pickup area is separate from the nursery.

Growing practices are not the only formalized systems at Saunders Brothers.

The management team is working hard to ensure the company lasts for another 100 years. Four years ago, the siblings started meeting with a consultant to study how the company is managed and where they can improve. Jim describes the future a being very bright. The next generation of the family has become involved in the business and the commitment to the future of the company is evident.

Mary Beth Cowardin Vice President of Marketing and Member Engagement, AmericanHort MaryBethC@AmericanHort.org

2020:February | 13

KEY DAT ES

About AmericanHort

WITH US

Let ’s Get Connected !

We want to get to know you better.

Help us do so by joining us on Social Media—our way of connecting with our members and community.

@AmericanHort

@American_Hort

@YourAmericanHort

@AmericanHort

AmericanHort is the national association of horticulture businesses and professionals across the spectrum of the industry. Without you there is no us, so AmericanHort undertakes the critical task of protecting, preserving, and promoting the national horticulture industry so that people like you can do what you love in an industry that thrives.

Perform better, grow stronger, and prepare for the future as a member of AmericanHort, the green industry’s leading association.

Learn more at AmericanHort.org.

Welcome New Members!

AmericanHort represents the entire horticulture industry.

Plus Members

Basic Members

Kaitlyn Rhue Onset, MA

Mike Gardner Coosa Tree & Shrub Farm LLC, AL

No matter your specialty, we have the resources you need to cultivate a successful business.

Paul Lofgren Horta-Craft Ltd, ON Chris Hansen Garden Solutions, MI

Araceli Macias Teton Trees LLC, ID

William Ford The GrowBiz, CA

Peter Jesgarz Shelby County Community Services, IL

Matt Gentry Blue Mountain Nursery LLC, OR

Greg Turner Oberer's Flowers, OH

David Stewart Imerys, GA

Nicholas Rousseau ByNature, British Columbia

Nick Hall Servisoft of Middlefield LLC, OH

Jon Flanders Botanico Inc., TN

Brad Williams DPM, NE

Academic Members

Elliott Duemler Taylor Creek Restoration Nurseries, WI Jim Peterson Jet Harvest Solutions, FL June Yuvimonchai hai Plastic Net Co. Ltd, Thailand

Roberto Lopez Michigan State University, MI Lee Markowsky Columbus State Community College, OH Student Member George St Onge TN

Business Plus

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Generation Next

Nursery

Research

Webinar New Retail Webinar Series!

Presented by Dr. Bridget Behe, this webinar series is for retailers looking to enhance their signage, displays, and merchandising skills.

Part 1: Enhancing Retail Signage for Improved Sales Recording now available in the AmericanHort Knowledge Center.

Part 2: Creating More Compelling Retail Display Tuesday, February 25, 11 AM, EST Part 3: Shopping from the Consumers Perspective Thursday, March 26, 2 PM, EST Register for Part 2 & 3 at AmericanHort.org/Webinar.

Save-the-Date for the largest all-industry trade show and conference for the horticulture industry.

It is the industry event that brings the entire professional community together to make an even greater impact.

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Learn more at CultivateEvent.org.

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Each year, the IGCA Congress is hosted in a different country and this year we are traveling to South Africa! The 2020 IGCA Congress will included a concentrated business tour of garden centres and excellent social programing while exploring South Africa.

18-23 SOU T H A FR I C A

Register at IGCA2020.co.za.

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Contact Amanda Holton at (614) 884-1153.

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