WHERE ARE THEY NOW?
By Gregg Wartgow
Patience & Proficiency
PAY OFF Phillips|Creasey doubled sales in 2016 by establishing a traveling crew, breaking into bioretention systems, and continuing to grow its core business with a focus on being the best, not the biggest.
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n the fall of 2015, when Phillips|Creasey was originally featured in Green Industry Pros, the company was on the verge of landing a couple of lucrative commercial installation jobs for a wellknown national retailer. The jobs came through, were completed in splendid fashion, and have since led to numerous other projects throughout the South. In fact, the company has now formed a “traveling crew” to tackle this steady stream of work. Those two original jobs were near Phillips|Creasey’s home base of Chattanooga, TN. The developer then asked if the company could travel around the region to landscape some other projects they were doing. That led to work in Knoxville, TN (100 miles away); Athens (170 miles), Augusta (260 miles) and Valdosta (340 miles) GA; and most recently a large project even further south in Lake City, FL, roughly 400 miles from Chattanooga. The Lake City project just took place in January. “Now we’re looking at more work in Tampa, FL, Savannah, GA, and also in South Carolina,” says Phillips, who is overseeing the traveling crew while partner, John Creasey, keeps an eye on things back in Chattanooga.
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MARCH 2017
Since Lake City is about an hour and a half from Valdosta, GA, Phillips says he was able to secure ma ny of the same materials vendors. Materials management has been among the most challenging aspects of this traveling work. Phillips relies as much as possible on SiteOne John Creasey (left) and Michael Phillips first appeared in the September/October 2015 edition of Green Industry Pros. Landscape Supply, a huge distributor with outlets all over the country. itself, Phillips and Creasey presented it But sometimes he must source other as an opportunity to employees—an suppliers and growers. Furthermore, he opportunity to gain some valuable expehas to get a feel for pricing. “It seems rience and also make more money (i.e. like a lot of things are priced a bit lower per diems for time away from home). As down here (North Florida), and I don’t expected, a couple of employees weren’t want to be pricing and bidding too interested, choosing to simply continue high,” Phillips points out. working at the home base. But many Labor can be another challenging employees were eager to volunteer for aspect when expanding your geographic the traveling crew. Regardless, Phillips footprint. Fortunately for Phillips and and Creasey wanted it to be a choice. Creasey, it hasn’t proved to be much of “The real key to all of this is having an obstacle. When the opportunity to enough good managers in your company establish a traveling crew first presented so you have people you can rely on as
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greenindustrypros.com
2/27/17 12:46 PM