Rancho Mesa's Alyssa Burley and Vice President of the Landscape Group, Drew Garcia, discuss the ELEVATE conference presented by the National Association of Landscape Professionals, which occurred from September 10 to 13, 2023, in Dallas, Texas. ELEVATE serves as the national conference and expo for landscape and lawn care professionals.

Show Notes: ⁠Subscribe to Rancho Mesa's Newsletter⁠.

Director/Host: ⁠Alyssa Burley⁠

Guest: ⁠Drew Garcia⁠

Producer/Editor: ⁠Lauren Stumpf⁠

Music: "Home" by JHS Pedals, “News Room News” by Spence

© Copyright 2023. Rancho Mesa Insurance Services, Inc. All rights reserved.

Transcript

Alyssa Burley: Hi, this is Alyssa Burley with Rancho Mesa's Media Communications and Client Services Department. Thank you for listening to today's Rancho Mesa News. Brought to you by our Safety and Risk Management Network StudioOne. Welcome back, everyone. My guest is Drew Garcia, Vice President and Landscape Group leader with Rancho Mesa. Today, we're going to talk about the Elevate conference that took place a couple of weeks ago. Drew, welcome to the show.

Drew Garcia: Alyssa, thanks for having me.

AB: Of course, for our listeners who aren't familiar with the annual Elevate conference. Can you give us a glimpse into the event and who typically attends?

DG: Yes, So a lot of people might be familiar with an NALP former event, which was Landscapes, and it was in conjunction with another event called GIE. This was out in Louisville, Kentucky, and it was a really, really big event. It was great there. But last year was the first year that NALP, National Association of Landscape Professionals, decided to have their own event. And it was in Orlando, Florida last year and this year was in Dallas, Texas. But it's basically a three day event where landscape companies come together for networking, education. So there's there's a ton that it has to offer, doesn't just appeal to one certain category of employee, you know, owners or CEOs, CFOs. There are things there for HR, Crew leaders, field employees. So it's really a well-rounded event and I would say I think they had something near 2000 attendees this year. So to give the audience kind of an overall perspective of the capacity.

AB: Wow. So for those of you who haven't actually met Drew, he specializes in risk management for the Landcare industry and he's written articles and hosted webinars and has been interviewed multiple times about best practices for insuring landscape companies along with speaking on safety and he's even put together a mobility and stretch program. So it's no surprise that you'll find him at an event like this. So, Drew, what brings you back to this event every year and why do you think industry professionals should attend?

DG:I think that we all kind of get into our own set ways where for any business, landscape you know, specifically, that's the event that we're talking about today. But you, you know, you kind of are you go through the motions of running your own business and you have your own daily challenges. And maybe you've created hacks to overcome certain challenges or whatever it is. But an event like this is so nice because you're going to meet a network of peers that probably aren't in your direct market. They could be performing the exact same services that you offer, either landscape maintenance, design, build, install, lawn care services, maybe a little bit of tree care. And you can just rub shoulders with these people who are within your your direct industry, but not in your direct market. And now create that level of trust with a peer that you can call on here in the future. I think it's so important for every business to have that network of friends and either vendors or suppliers within the industry that are there for you when you're when you do come up with that issue. So you're not having to try to figure it out with you and your team and struggle through it. There's a lot of people that have been there done that. So I think there's a really key aspect to networking. But overall, the education that NALP puts forward for the event is it's addressing the issues that are happening today. And then it's also really it really has a kind of keen eye on the future and whether that's a change in government affairs on the legal side.H-2B Pesticide, you know, herbicide application and then kind of what's happening with technology within the industry, there's a lot of talk on battery powered and autonomous mowing, so you're going to get a ton of information on that and kind of what's what's cutting edge and how is it playing into the industry today and then into the future.

AB: Yeah, that sounds like such a valuable event to attend. I know it's a couple of days, but it seems like it's well worth it to spend the time to actually meet with industry experts and and collaborate with other companies that are in the same boat as you so that it just makes sense to attend. So, Drew, if listeners have questions about managing their land care business risk, what's the best way to get in touch with you if they don't find you at an event like this?

DG: That’s right. Yeah. Yeah. You can track me down at at most green industry events, but if you don't catch me there, you can email me. It's drewgarcia@ranchomesa.com.

AB: All right. Well, Drew, thank you so much for joining me in StudioOne.

DG: Alyssa, thanks for having me.

AB: This is Alyssa Burley with Rancho Mesa. Thanks for tuning into our latest episode, produced by StudioOne. For more information, visit us at ranchomesa.com and subscribe to our weekly newsletter.