Purely Organic Lawn Care in Portsmouth was started in 2003 when owner Jay Palladino made an unfortunate connection between his golden retriever getting sick and the newly-applied fertilizer on the lawn at his Kensington home.
“I was an early investor in the organic fertilizer company Cockadoodle Doo but hadn’t thought much about the chemicals on my lawn until my six-week-old puppy passed out on the kitchen floor,” Palladino says.
While organic lawn care clicked as a business model, Palladino admits he was in unchartered territory. “I knew nothing about using organics and growing grass,” he says. While his small company struggled to find its footing, Palladino attributes early challenges to a marketplace unprepared for their brand and not fully ready to embrace sustainability. “We were ahead of our time,” he adds. “Most people preferred using chemicals and didn’t give much thought to what it was doing to the water supply or the health of their family.”
But consumer awareness about chemicals on lawns has changed dramatically in the past few years. Palladino said the shift has led to major growth spurts in residential and commercial demand for safer and greener lawn care. “We have 20 large commercial clients and more than 400 residential clients. Last year was our best year ever,” he says.
And the 2014 summer lawn season has proven to be the busiest yet. With licenses to operate in NH, Maine and Ma., the company handles a range of regional lawn care and landscaping assignments – from ticks and mosquitos, to grubs and snow in the winter. They also offers weed and crabgrass management, aeration, soil enhancement and soil testing as well as lime applications; all of it done with an eye on minimal environmental impact.
The organic lawn care movement is anything but a passing fad as more states and municipalities demand fewer chemicals in fertilizers due to increased concern about run-off into the water table or fragile aquatic ecosystems. Maryland passed a Lawn Fertilizer Law last fall with the goal of protecting Chesapeake Bay from excessive nutrient runoff in the way of phosphorus and nitrogen. The law has a number of chemical use restrictions. More locally, New Castle is looking to restrict fertilizer use on lawns in shoreland and wetland zones.
Purely Organic is a member of the Green Alliance; the Portsmouth organization that connects green-driven consumers with more than 100 green-minded businesses. The company offers free estimates for potential clients to determine what treatments will work best for a property and how to maintain the turf over time. Last year, Purely Organic introduced a hybrid solution to their treatments after finding that there is not always an organic solution to every lawn issue.
“What the hybrid program does is allows us to use traditional control products only when we feel it absolutely necessary,” said Jason Lefebvre of Purely Organic. “We have people sign off on that and they can trust us to use those measures sparingly.”
Even when using the hybrid program, Purely Organic maintains its initial goal of keeping the environmental risks to a minimum. The hybrid program is still 75 percent natural/organic. And once a property starts to return to a satisfactory state, treatments can be switched from the hybrid program to the organic program.
Purely Organic has survived lean times and a premature expansion to reach a solid plateau of service and sustainability. Palladino decided a few years ago, to make it an employee-owned operation giving ownership stakes to employees as recognition for their contributions. In particular, Palladino is proud that almost all their new customers come from word-of-mouth referrals, a testament to the fact that the times have caught up to Purely Organic’s mission.
“We educate potential customers about realistic expectations from each of the programs we offer, which people appreciate.” Palladino says. “The result is a lawn safer and more beautiful than before they went organic.”
For more information, visit www.purelyorganiclawncare.com.
Current Issue - April 2024