Facing Colorado River shortage, 30 urban suppliers pledge to target decorative grasses, native plants and more
The Western Slope offers a wealth of decorative landscapes for the home and office, and the Colorado River region has an abundance of native plants and grasses for landscaping.
But where can you find it all in a single property? There is a lot of ground to cover and nowhere in the Denver metro area is it more challenging than in southern Fort Collins, where most of the region’s outdoor landscaping landscape is located.
“We get a lot of requests from clients who have been frustrated with trying to find landscaped landscapes with the right plants,” said Jason Eley, co-owner of the Eley Group and president of the Western Slope Landscape and Landscape Maintenance (WSLLM) of Colorado. “They can’t find it in their city. The problem is when you go into a city, you’re not going to find what you are looking for. But if you’re at a ranch or a farm, chances are you’ll find what you are looking for.”
Eley has the answer.
For the past six years, the Eley Group has been making a steady transition from building its own landscapes into buying and operating them on the open market, according to co-owner Scott Eley.
“We are now fully in the business of landscape contracting. It’s a much bigger operation now,” he said. “My wife, a third of our business is landscaping. I’m in charge of buying and managing the land on behalf of the clients.”
The transition from building and contracting to buying and operating has changed the organization’s landscape contracting.
“It’s no longer about building a landscape that will be successful with a single client, but now it is about working with multiple clients and multiple projects across multiple locations,” he said. “So we really have a lot less of ‘we’ll build it in three months and it will be good,’ and it has to meet a certain standard. But now we’re doing more of a service with each project and our business is really growing.”
While the organization has remained small, with a single sales representative, the transition to landscape contracting has allowed members to take on more projects, according to Eley.
“Before, we have one job, we