Before my opening story, a Happy Good Friday to all who celebrate and a Happy Friday to everyone else. May your food and your weather be great

There are nuances to growing up in a family business—especially a nursery business. There’s the security of working for family, but that same security can often hold you back from becoming the best leader or owner you can be if you aren’t careful. You face double the scrutiny of your peers: some say you were handed everything, while at the same time you’re getting passes or promotions faster than you would in the outside world. Then there are the benefits. You’ve been trained for this your whole life. You know the work it requires because you’ve seen your family go through it. You get an accelerated degree on the job. You have been given a plant education your entire life.

I’ll never forget my first week. I was put on the landscape crew. I had never officially landscaped. I had planted a ton of plants and trees, but not design and build. I was young and strong and had at least been around plants as a kid. I knew what hard work looked like but it had been a number of years since hard work and I had talked. The crew didn’t really talk to me and treated me like a snitch for the first few weeks. I’m a friendly, talkative person, so I knew I’d break through—and I eventually did. I turned myself from a snitch into someone who could get the crew the tools they needed and be a voice to upper management on how to be more productive and profitable. I also carried my weight. I didn’t know how to landscape, so I did the grunt work—hauling materials to the backyard with a wheelbarrow. All day, every day. They installed, and I made sure they had the product to install. Eventually, I did small sections of the job and practiced. That’s all it took—practice. That’s how every job works in the beginning. You show up, participate the best you can, and little by little you engrain yourself and build your skills.

When it came to working with my family, I probably had the best setup: go out, be away from them all day, and only see them in the morning and evening. Keeps everyone out of each other’s hair. For months I was reminded I was "Dad’s boy," and some didn’t expect me to stick around. I remember there were company coffee cups in the kitchen, made by someone in the crew, and I didn’t have one. Apparently, they were earned. A few months in, when I knew plants were what I wanted to do for a living, I made my own cup and put it with the rest. I don’t think anyone knew how much it bothered me not to have one, but I’ll always remember how that felt. Since then, I’ve made it my goal to make sure new team members never feel that way. I want them to know they joined a company that’s glad to have them.

I lived every cliché of a “nepo baby.” I got things I didn’t deserve. I got passes on things that would’ve brought more serious consequences for others. But what I never lacked was work ethic. I put in the time and the effort. To this day, I get up and run 7–10 miles every day for no reason other than that’s what it takes to stay healthy enough to do the things I want to do. Growing plants, landscaping, retail—it’s hard work. Not just physically, but mentally. Plenty of people know what physical exhaustion feels like. Even more know mental exhaustion. Very few people have to be both physically and mentally sharp every day. Garden center and nursery owners do. It’s a rare day of unloading trucks, helping customers, and running the business. True nepo babies go out of business when their parent leaves. Slowly or quickly—but nepotism is a buffer, not a wall.

So, after reading all this, you might ask: Does he want his kid to be the sixth generation? How do you get your kid to want to do what you do for a living?

Easy answer.

If you want your kid to follow in your footsteps, give them a happy life. Be present. Show up to their events. Let them see that you love their Mom or Dad. That’s all your kid really wants—to be loved and to see love. If they see that your work adds to a great life, they’ll want it. If they see that your work takes you away from them, exhausts you, or makes you miss everything important—they’ll run from it. I’d rate myself a 5 out of 10. I think my daughter saw that I loved my job, but she also saw me working retail 6 or 7 days a week in spring, heading out late to plow snow, working holidays because no one else would. I knew I knocked the retail part out of her.

She still loves plants and will do that for a living—but not on the retail side. Growing plants is 24/7 care. Retail is 24/7 because you're open when everyone else isn’t working. I’m not upset that I won’t carry on the tradition through her. That tradition lives in the business itself. It was a nursery before we bought it, and it will be a nursery after I pass. I’m not sad that I won’t get to watch her grow the business—I’m happy I got to watch her grow up there.

5 Random Gardening Thoughts and Ideas

Instagram Is Like An Order from Temu

The price is right but the quality can be rough and some things can be a little dangerous.

An Instagram account called GardenaryCo—with 1.2 million followers—recently posted about why she doesn’t use mulch. She’s a great promoter, more of a garden influencer than a grower, but I’ll always support anyone who spreads love for gardening. That said, this post was... misinformed.

She claimed mulch is bad because it can rob plants of nitrogen, causing yellowing. She’s not wrong if you’re using fresh wood chips. But aged mulch—especially quality hardwood—has a much lower risk. And even then, we add nitrogen to balance it out. That’s Gardening 101.

She said instead of mulch, she just fills in all the space with plants. Here's where it all goes wrong for us seasoned gardeners

1. Plants compete for nutrients way more than mulch ever will. They fight for water, sunlight, and food. Mulch does none of that.

2. Overcrowding causes disease. Tightly packed plants = poor airflow, more pests, and weaker growth.

3. It’s insanely expensive. Using fancy plants as ground cover is like using $20 bills as napkins. Mulch is supposed to save you money and work.

4. Spacing is important. You space plants for a reason. To give them room to grow. You have to show patience and give them room to grow and flourish. You have to get past the dread of empty space knowing that in time it will be full and lush

I get it—it was a post for clicks. And here I am, clicking and talking about it. But when someone has the trust of millions, I just wish they'd spread info that helps gardeners grow, not confuse them.

Mulch isn’t the enemy. Misleading advice is.

Think tulip festivals are just a Netherlands thing? Think again.

My friend Rachel went to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival in Washington State, and the photos she sent were every bit as stunning as anything you’d see in Europe. Fifty acres of tulips in every shape and color—it looked like something out of a magazine or a travel blog.

I’d never even heard of it, and I know that Holland, Michigan puts on an equally colorful show but never seen it or seen pictures. I already love the little patches of daffodils and tulips around town, so I can’t wait to see acres of them in bloom.

It’s going to be the same with the dahlia fields—I’ve already got a few trips planned this summer to go see those too.

Honestly surprised my Instagram friend above wasn’t already there taking photos!

Not Your Grandma’s Geranium

With all the amazing annuals out there, I never understood why people still love geraniums. But then again, I say the same thing about Facebook.

That said, there’s one geranium I do love: Mrs. Pollock (pictured above). The foliage is incredible—so bright you can see it from the street. It’s grown mostly for the foliage, but it throws out red or salmon flowers as a little bonus.

You’re probably starting to realize—I love great foliage. It makes such a strong statement in any planter.

All the Great New Colors of Creeping Phlox Start the Party

Over the last 10 years, the range of colors in creeping phlox has expanded dramatically. Creeping phlox is one of the toughest groundcovers out there—heat-tolerant, cold-hardy, and thrives in dry conditions. It’s also one of the first things to bloom in spring, creating a literal carpet of flowers.

It used to come in just pink, periwinkle, and white. Now you can find every shade in between. The blues are getting bluer, the reds are getting deeper—and it's absolutely a must-have in any garden.

The bloom time is short, and it’s a little “meh” the rest of the year, but it earns its keep in April. A great garden is all about timing—and phlox is what starts the clock.

My Little Secret

I’ve been happily married for 30 years now. For some reason, I’ve never been allowed a girlfriend or to remarry. My wife has some pretty reasonable rules for me and those two are on the list. But I do kind of have a girlfriend. For the last 25 years she has been waiting for me naked in the park every morning. She’s a big woman. Around 8 feet tall so she’s hard to miss when I come around the corner. Don’t know her name or where she’s from ,but I know she loves plants and the prairie because every time I see her she’s staring over the fields. Always there before I get there, and always there when I leave. I’ve always wondered if she gets cold standing there naked in the winter but I’ve been too shy to ask

A Picture is Worth a few Hundred Words

“A real gardener has a box to carry their plants.”

If you don’t have dirt in the back of your car, you can’t call yourself a gardener.

I fill that thing to standing room only—then still manage to spill plants in every corner of the car. Consistently. So consistently, I could probably grow something in the dirt caked inside my shop vac.

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