In 2015, Brett Gordon bought a $600,000 landscape business in Oklahoma City. He changed the name to Signature Landscape and, in the six years that followed, grew the company’s annual revenue to $4.8 million.
Today, Signature Landscape offers full-service commercial maintenance throughout the city, including irrigation, snow removal, ice mitigation, and installations. In peak season, the company employees 78 people, a number Gordon foresees increasing to 100 in 2020.
Making the switch
When Gordon started Signature Landscape, he had only one employee and was using a different business management platform to run the operation. “I heard about the Aspire platform from a company whose judgment I trust,” said Gordon. “At the time, my company was below the recommended revenue to get started with the system, but I knew we were going to grow quickly and need support soon.”
After seeing a demo in 2017, Gordon was quick to make the switch. “I could see that Aspire was more user-friendly than the other two software products I had previously used. It also seemed easier to implement across the team in a way that would allow everyone to participate rather than relying on a few system administrators.”
The results
Right off the bat, Gordon’s team aligned around shared goals by utilizing Aspire's metrics reporting. “Rather than one person keeping score, now everyone was able to monitor their own performance as well as the performance of the company. The visibility was key to getting buy-in on a shared goal,” explained Gordon. As the company grew exponentially, Gordon introduced a culture of score-keeping to every new hire, continuing to place a high priority on tracking success—and sharing goals—across all functions.
Along the way, Gordon discovered several opportunities for cost savings through the Aspire platform. By more accurately monitoring materials, tracking hours and assessing jobs completed, Signature Landscape was able to generate more precise estimates for its clients. In turn, this helped the company improve margins and refine budgetary forecasts.
In one instance, tracking overtime across all tickets revealed $15,000 a week in cost savings. “It’s easy to think about how many new trucks you could buy with the money you’re saving,” said Gordon.
One of the primary reasons Gordon originally wanted to switch platforms was that he was frustrated with the inaccuracy of financial reports.
“Our QuickBooks financials never matched what the platform was telling me with the old system. And when you’re relying on the platform to generate financial reports, that’s not very inspiring,” said Gordon. He says Aspire is noticeably more accurate in its reporting, which instills in him a sense of confidence, knowing he can make more informed decisions.
Finally, Gordon appreciates the platform’s ease of use. “Aspire runs noticeably faster than the competitors. The dashboard features are rich and the user experience is more fluid, with everything hyperlinked properly in one intuitive place.”
What's next
As Gordon enters his sixth full year with Signature, he says the future is bright. “Every year, things seem to go better than I thought they could, and I don’t see us slowing down any time soon.”
Gordon predicts the company will grow to $6 million in 2020 and up to $10—12 million in the next five years. Along the way, they intend to continue relying on support from Aspire Software.
“We wouldn’t be where we’re at without Aspire. We’d still be a good company, but the support they offer has allowed us to attain the next level of success.”
RESOURCES
The latest articles from Aspire Software
Practical advice and tools to help you run your field service business.
Landscape
June 14, 20233 min readAspire Software
The Greenery, Inc.
Aspirations
Fifty years ago, The Greenery Inc. was a mom-and-pop landscaping company with just two...
The Greenery specializes in large-scale and high-demand projects, such as vacation resort work, roadside...
Landscape Workshop was founded in Birmingham, Alabama in 1984 and sold to McKinney Capital...Lawn and Landscape named it the 38th largest landscaping company in the country.
With that robust growth came increased complexity. Starting in 2014, CEO JT Price and...
Meanwhile, the back office was starting to scramble. With no streamlined systems, they were...
Austin-based Sunscape started in 2004 when CEO, Hank Wilson, was mowing lawns. It took...
Wilson’s leadership style has always been vision-driven with a focus on the strategic as...“To be the first choice to customers and employees in every major market in...
In 2001, at the age of 23, Ben Collinsworth started Native Land Design in...
The pivot was a success. In 2009, Inc. Magazine named Native Land Design one of the Fastest-Growing Private Companies in America. The company now employees 250 people in peak season and exceeds $15 million...
In 2015, Native Land Design became one of the first 30 companies to adopt...