March / April 2011
Vol. V No. 2
Serving Soil, Mulch, Compost, & Biofuel Professionals
NEWS
Attention Readers ! Are you looking for Products, Equipment or Services for your business? If so, please check out these leading companies advertised in this issue:
Bagging Systems
Amadas Industries – pg 12 Hamer LLC – pg 5 PremierTech Chronos – pg 18 Rethceif Packaging – pg 16
Compost Cover Compostex – pg 4 ClearSpan – pg 7
Compost, Mulch & Wood Waste For Sale Giorgi Mushroom – pg 11 Litco International – pg 17
Compost Software
Aschl Management Systems – pg 15
Compost Turners
HCL Machine Works – pg 21 Midwest BioSystems – pg 16
Light Material Buckets Hageman Earth Cycle – pg 21
Mulch Coloring Equipment/ Colorants Colorbiotics – pg 9 Nature’s Reflections – pg 8 T.H. Glennon – pg 7
Plastic Removal System Airlift Separator – pg 8
Shredders, Grinders, Chippers & Screening Systems
Mulch Manufacturers See Bright Colorful Future By P.J. Heller
M
ulch manufacturers who are hoping to make more “green” may want to look at making more reds, browns, blacks and lots of other colors as well. That’s because, according to some mulch industry experts, the demand for colored mulch is a thriving and lucrative business in most parts of the U.S., affecting everyone from mulch manufacturers to lawn and garden supply stores and big box outlets who resell their products to individual landscapers and homeowners. “Any company in the mulch production business is either considering, or has considered, or is going to make colored mulch,” says John Spencer, chief executive officer of Mulch Manufacturing in Reynoldsburg, Ohio, and a pioneer in the colored mulch market. “They about have to. It’s a broad enough business that
Allu Group Inc – pg 17 Doppstadt – pg 19 EarthSaver Equipment – pg 13 Morbark Inc. – pg 2 Orbit Screens – pg 13 Peterson – pg 10 REMU – pg 24 (back cover) Screen Machine Industries – pg 22 Screen USA – pg 14 West Salem Machinery – pg 11 Wildcat/Vermeer – pg 23
Transport Trailers Travis Trailers – pg 6
Photo courtesy of Mulch Manufacturing.
Photo courtesy of Colorbiotics.
if you’re not making colored products, then you’re missing a big opportunity.” About 25 percent of total mulch sales for Mulch Manufacturing, one of the largest mulch producers in the nation, are the colored variety, according to Spencer. The company also sells its Nature’s Reflections colorant and its line of Cheetah coloring systems. At Foster Brothers Wood Products in Auxvasse, Mo., company president and coowner Jay Foster says sales of colored mulches have increased by at least 5 percent every year over the last five or six years. That amounts to about 3,100 tractor-trailer loads of colored mulch this year, about 35 percent of all materials sold“The first year we did it, we probably only sold 200 loads of colored material,” Foster says. “The growth of the mulch industry has been helped by colorant being added to the mulch, making the mulch more attractive to the consumer,” notes Kriem Michel, national sales manager for T.H. Glennon Co. “Homeowners trying to sell their home are using this colored mulch to improve curb appeal.” T.H. Glennon, a colorant and equipment manufacturer based in Salisbury, Mass., reports major increases each year in sales of its Colorfast colorant. Some two dozen colors are offered, including reds, browns and gold to black, blue Continued on page 3