CONTRACTOR PROFILE By Gregg Wartgow
A butterfly garden the company installed at one of the senior living centers it maintains
Personal Touch Draws Value-Minded Clients
Senior living communities have become an integral part of NewLawn and Landscape’s diverse commercial portfolio. Now the Oklahoma company sees growth opportunity in high-end residential.
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teve Nessler isn’t new to landscaping, and neither is his company. Serving the greater Tulsa market, NewLawn and Landscape in Broken Arrow, OK, has been operating since 2003. The maintenancedriven company has steadily grown over the years, now generating well over half a million dollars in annual revenue. L a s t ye a r w a s it s b e s t e ve r. Maintenance contracts held steady—as they seem to do year after year—and landscaping/enhancement work was up. “We’d picked up a couple of really nice landscaping jobs, and our maintenance customers spent more on flowers and other enhancements,” says Lisa Nessler,
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Steve’s wife and business partner. Nothing like closing the year strong. That’s a trend the Nesslers are optimistic will continue throughout 2017. The company has been very careful to avoid chasing too much sales growth in any given year. Rather, they and their team members have focused on quality work, close customer care, renewing contracts, and allowing sales to grow naturally at a controlled pace. That could change a bit this year. “We are going to do some advertising for the first time,” Steve points out. “We’d like to pick up some more high-end residential accounts. We’re targeting a specific part of Tulsa. We’re looking to do some
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2017
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ads in one of the Tulsa magazines that is widely circulated in that area. We’ll see how it works.”
Strategically selective
Steve says his three maintenance crews have the capacity to take on a handful of additional accounts—so long as they are the right kind of accounts. Steve has always been a bit selective when it comes to clientele, a philosophy he has developed over his 35-plus years in the business (he’d worked for a couple of other companies before starting his own). “We’re looking for clients who value quality and are seeking a long-term relationship with their contractor,” Steve
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1/27/17 10:04 AM