Pioneer Landscape Centers COO Craig Mauk joins Green Builder Media CEO Sara Gutterman to discuss the surge in outdoor living, how water conservation and xeriscaping are driving landscape product demand, and the logistics investments behind Pioneer's delivery fleet.
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Sara Gutterman: I'm here today with Craig Mock, the chief operating officer for Pioneer Landscape Centers. Obviously, we saw outdoor living surge in terms of importance to homeowners during the pandemic, and from our data, we have seen continued interest in things like a seamless indoor outdoor experience in homes and just having enhanced outdoor living spaces. What kind of trends are you seeing at pioneer?
00:00:30:05 - 00:00:56:16
Craig Mauk: Very similar trends that you can see. It's the expansion of your indoor living space to outdoor. Additionally, I mean, it wasn't just Covid that shifted into the inflationary, you know, economy where fuels more expensive, travels more expensive. So that continued to surge, where you invest in staying home, you invest in entertaining your friends at your home. So that's a huge trend that continues to rise.
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Craig Mauk: And I mean, it's a huge portion of the residential housing market to people are looking for that now as they look to buy out.
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Sara Gutterman: People are more interested now in the self-sufficiency of growing their own food, whether that's through gardens or growing food in pots.
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Craig Mauk: We have seen an uprising that as well, sustainability given. I think there's a lot of variety of reasons why that has become a huge trend, but we've seen that as well. I mean, anything sustainable, it's going to become a trend. So we've seen zero scaping, sustainable growth, all that kind of take a trend in math or living space because it's a way you can utilize what used to be a backyard or a side or things like that.
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Craig Mauk: How can you utilize that to occupy time, occupy real estate, and make it beneficial to not only yourself, but the environment and community?
00:01:53:14 - 00:02:12:20
Sara Gutterman: Our data shows that water conservation is actually the number one decision making factor when our readers are making decisions about planning their outdoor living space. But again, are you seeing that purchase driver reflect in enhanced demand for certain products within your portfolio?
00:02:12:22 - 00:02:44:25
Craig Mauk: Yes, we have seen a surge in acknowledgment of zero scaping water conservation. Arizona is kind of ahead of the curve on that one, given they've been dealing with it a lot longer than Colorado has. But things like artificial turf, landscape rock that reduces the amount of water required to keep a, you know, a static, pleasing landscape have definitely taken off in Colorado, you're starting to see more brass bands where there's a limited amount of grass allowed in a landscape.
00:02:44:26 - 00:03:11:23
Craig Mauk: Arizona is almost to the point where they'll acquire zero grass, and I think it's important to understand that people understand what it means to conserve water, because there's still are certain communities and states across the US that still want to require live grass and things, because they don't fully understand what we've been educated on the benefits of artificial turf at zero scaping and what that does.
00:03:11:24 - 00:03:21:21
Craig Mauk: But yes, I mean, as you entertain more, it requires a lot less work to keep it pleasing. And you don't have to do six hours of yard work before you have friends come over.
00:03:21:22 - 00:03:33:29
Sara Gutterman: Another trend that we're seeing is demand for sanctuary spaces, both inside and outside of the home. So what are you seeing with respect to kind of those sanctuary spaces?
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Craig Mauk: I think that's a good point. We get more and more requests on things of that nature, especially in the outdoor living space. I think it ties into, for me psychologically into the economy. Right. We've all heard about the Great Resignation. So with all that tied in, people need a place where they can go decompress. And you don't always want to have to travel or have the time to travel to do that.
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Craig Mauk: Having it in your backyard or in your home is convenient. And I mean, just for mental health wise, it's beneficial.
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Sara Gutterman: What are some of the innovations that you are excited about with respect to landscape products?
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Craig Mauk: Probably some of the most innovations I'm excited about are the zero scape. Given the I mean, the advancements in artificial turf, things that go there, artificial plants, the way that you can deal with erosion control under which is zero scaping underneath the landscape rock, all that is, is pretty exciting to see where it goes, because if you look at artificial turf, you know, 25 years ago and how far it's come now, just how it looks, how it feels, how long it lasts, it's it's crazy to see how far it's coming.
00:04:45:04 - 00:05:06:13
Craig Mauk: And that's really exciting to me because truly, I mean, water conservation, I mean, we see droughts and issues across the US and anything we can do or help provide a solution to prolong any disastrous events is as good. So that's really exciting to see how far a lot of that stuff is going.
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Sara Gutterman: So your is really a distribution and logistics company. So can you tell us a little bit more about what you're doing to streamline your distribution and logistics?
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Craig Mauk: The differentiator for pioneers, what we're really focused on from 2022 and kind of completing things in 2023, is the logistics and distribution portion of our business. That's what sets us apart. We have a fleet of trucks of over 200 delivery trucks across both states. It's important to understand how to efficiently run those, not just for conservation of fuel and inflationary purposes, but to fulfill our promise service.
00:05:42:24 - 00:06:12:27
Craig Mauk: So we designed and built from the ground up logistics system that not only routes the trucks in the most time efficient, fuel efficient, mile efficient manner, but it also gives us the ability to make a promise that will be at a job site a specific time within reason. We fully understand now the routing and efficiencies of our fleet and can uphold our customer problems of doing what we say we need to do well.
00:06:12:27 - 00:06:32:13
Sara Gutterman: And you brought something up, which I think is top of mind for all of us in terms of the housing market for 2023 and outlook. You know, a lot of housing economists are projecting a cooling off of the market and people aren't going to move and by as many new homes, but, you know, they're going to hunker down and they're going to spend more money on their current home.
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Sara Gutterman: So do you forecast that that is indeed the case and that that will translate into continued upgrades to outdoor living areas.
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Craig Mauk: You make the effort to make the house the happy place where you can entertain, and you invest in that, and you decide that, you know, if a market is stabilizing or even going down. Buying a new home or moving doesn't make a whole lot of sense. So indoor, not just the exterior that we provide, but indoor renovations, additions to homes, all that stuff will pick up, I believe, in 2023.
00:07:04:05 - 00:07:19:02
Craig Mauk: That's kind of what I'm seeing happen on a very minimal level already, because it's kind of clear that some sort of economic flatline is coming to where it's not going to. The hockey stick has happened already. Now it'll continue to plateau.