Company sees growth in midst of downturn

It would make sense to hear that businesses doing landscaping for homeowners associations and strip malls would be hurting these days.

But that's not the case at Mainscape, an Indiana-based landscape services company with a Florida headquarters in Naples. In fact, the company is in the midst of a Sunshine State growth spurt. It recently opened an office in Orlando and plans to open its fifth office in the state in the Tampa-St. Pete area by the end of the year. Mainscape has offices in Naples, Fort Myers and Sarasota.

In addition to geographical growth, Mainscape is growing in terms of people and revenues. On the former, the company hired five sales people in just the last month, says Dan Rooney, head of business development for Mainscape in Florida.

Meanwhile, Rooney says the company expects to be at $12 million in statewide annual revenues by the end of 2010, 20% more than the $10 million in Florida in 2009. “Until people start using Astroturf,” says Rooney, “we will still be a service people have to have.”

More than a necessity, however, Rooney and Sarasota-based account manager Heather Van Wie credit the recent success to a key recession-survival tactic: Price cuts.

“Our margins aren't as good as they were three or four years ago,” Van Wie tells Coffee Talk, “but that is an ebb and flow.”