In 1989, Scot Morrow decided to purchase an existing business and gave root to what would become Frederick Landscaping.
Professional landscaping design had become popular in the early part of the 1900s, but by the beginning of the 1990s, more people were paying attention to the yards around their homes. Their do-it-yourself projects gave rise to Home Depot and Lowes. However, those creative projects took time and life started getting much busier. Scot’s timing was great.
DIY Meets Do-It-For-Me
The interest in attractive and welcoming home exteriors hadn’t faded. The time that homeowners had to devote to maintaining them did. In addition to the existing commercial grounds maintenance, the demand for home services grew. Frederick Landscaping grew as well.
Now, they serve a broad range of clients from homeowners to commercial property managers, builders, municipalities and government agencies.
Although Scot stepped away in 2019, his son, Peter, had started working in the business at the age of 18. His youngest son, Jacob, began at 14. They continued their father’s work.
How do brothers manage to share a company once owned by only one person? “We focus on staying in our lanes,” Jacob said. “while still coordinating the work and the overall company commitments. Jacob manages landscaping and maintenance, as well as landscape design. Peter does all the hardscaping designs and projects.
New Ideas. New Trends.
To stay up to date with the trends, products, and regulations, etc., Jacob attends the National Association of Landscape Professional trade shows. Every year brings new ideas. Different colors of bedding plants become popular. Outdoor living products improve. “Growers usually introduce new plants to the professionals first,” Jacob said. “The hardscape companies, however, do direct to consumer advertising. The trends in that area are more rapidly requested by customers.”
Living Outside
In recent years, there’s been increased focus on updating outside living spaces beyond landscaped lawns and gardens. “More products are now readily available to the general public, rather than being custom orders,” Jacob stated. “Folks are adding fancy lights, gas stoves, refrigeration, sound, televisions, even wine coolers,” he added. “It’s not just a gas grill on a fancy patio anymore.”
Go Natural
Some old ideas are replaced by trends. Some last forever. Dry-laid stone walls are one of those age old ideas. You can find 600 year old dry stone walls in many places in England and Europe. While Frederick County residents may not plan to stay in their homes quite that long, dry stone walls add more than longevity. They fit the ongoing move toward more natural elements in our homes.
Peter regularly attends training and certification with the Dry Stone Conservatory. He’s trained to not only build dry stone walls but also preserve and repair them. Those skills are a perfect fit with the rock resources in Frederick County.
What’s Coming
Robots have expanded beyond factories and rolling house vacuums. Robotic mowers can be “trained” to a homeowners yard. Currently, they have limitations; one of which is requiring wires to set their boundaries. The wires can get cut or damaged. The size of lawn a robot can manage is limited, too, because they run on batteries. Plus, robotic lawnmowers need some attention and supervision.
“Despite the robotics, professional lawn maintenance will always have its place,” Jacob commented. “So many other elements need attention. Clean-up, pruning, trimming, planting, fertilizing, edge maintenance and just general beautification are still required for healthy, attractive home and commercial properties,” he said. “Frederick Landscape will always remain focused on managing the overall client needs.”
Serving client needs is a solid aspect of their company culture according to Jacob. As in nearly every other business, communication is key. Especially communication with their employees.
“We have three principles,” Jacob said. “Be professional. Do what we say. Be better tomorrow than we are today.” He then added, “I think the last one wraps our beliefs together. Always strive to be better.”
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