Business Boosters
Turning industry strength into business resilience
By The Coffee Shops®. With horticulture holding onto much of its recent growth, businesses now face the challenge of protecting margins and remaining valuable to customers. Building a stronger green industry requires collective action, but it also requires individual businesses to make disciplined decisions. During the State of the Industry presentation at Cultivate ...
Protecting the value of software investments
By Jesse Sanchez. Sustaining software value requires continued attention to adoption, ownership and manageable change. Buying software is only part of the equation. At Ingage, the conversation around software value extends beyond implementation to what happens as teams, priorities and the people responsible for championing the technology change. Ingage CEO, Dean Curtis ...
Estimating is more than measuring materials
By Cotney Consulting Group. A complete estimate creates the labor plan, material plan, equipment plan and risk position that operations will be expected to deliver. Many contractors begin estimating by measuring quantities. Those numbers matter, but they are only the starting point. A profitable estimate must account for the complete ...
Handoff meeting 101
By Cotney Consulting Group. Learn about where successful projects really begin. A project does not truly begin when the contract is signed. It begins when the people responsible for producing the work understand what was sold, how it was priced, what the customer expects and where the risks are.That is the ...
Financial metrics that can sharpen business performance
By Jesse Sanchez. A fractional chief financial officer can help business owners turn familiar financial data into clearer decisions about cash flow, profitability and growth. Business owners often have access to the financial data they need, but turning those numbers into useful decisions can be another challenge. Fox & Partners ...
Good project managers think three weeks ahead
By John Kenney, Cotney Consulting Group. Exceptional project management isn't about staying busy. It's about staying ahead. One of the biggest differences I've noticed between average project managers and exceptional ones has very little to do with experience, personality or technical knowledge. It has everything to do with where ...
The job was profitable when you sold it — So where did the margin go?
By Cotney Consulting Group. Margin is not protected at closeout. It is protected one decision at a time throughout the project. The estimate looked profitable. The price covered labor, materials, equipment, overhead and profit. Then the job closed, the numbers were reviewed and much of the margin was gone. ...
AI will not fix a broken process
By Cotney Consulting Group. Fix the process. Standardize the work. Define ownership. Then use AI. Artificial intelligence can help contractors work faster, organize information and reduce administrative effort. What it cannot do is repair a business process that was never clearly defined in the first place. A contractor with ...
Building a more engaged workforce starts with better conversations
By Emma Peterson. Through humor, business insights and real-world experience, Garrison Wynn showed Cultivate attendees how stronger communication can improve retention, performance and team alignment. Back in the second week of July (Saturday, July 11 – Tuesday, July 14, 2026 to be specific), AmericanHort brought thousands of horticulture, outdoor living ...
Leveling up irrigation with precise automation
By The Coffee Shops™. Modern automated block irrigation is playing a key role in improving water management, labor efficiency and crop performance. For specialty crop growers, irrigation decisions are a big deal. Take vineyards as an example. Irrigation must be perfectly balanced as overwatering can dilute Brix (sugar) levels and ...
UP TO THE MINUTE
