Today we’d like to introduce you to Ben Fisher.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I have always loved trees. As a kid growing up in San Francisco, I lived on a steep hill and had a good-sized Sequoia sempervirens, or Coastal Redwood, in my backyard. I used to climb up to within 10 or 15 feet of the top if it wasn’t too windy and look way down on my house and all the way to downtown.
My mom was an educator and my Dad was an Executive Director at an NGO. They raised me to spend my life doing something I feel matters.
My path back up to the top of the trees has been longer than an observer of my life might have expected. After graduating from UCSB, I spent 10 years working desk jobs mostly within the field of aerospace. As a volunteer for a few community groups over the past few years I’ve gotten a taste of things I felt mattered, but my primary energy was always in the service of my so-called fiduciary duty to shareholders.
After 5 years of volunteering at various farms and projects, working for a local arborist and on my own garden, I decided to step out into the wild unknown beyond the cubicle. At first, I worked for a great local business, Earth Steward Ecology, but found myself consistently drawn to the trees more than their primary function as restorers of micro-climate-appropriate landscapes. At the same time, I was occasionally working for a local arborist as well as volunteering at the University of California’s Agriculture and Natural Resources Orchard in Irvine and the Growing Experience Farm in North Long Beach. I was then hired for seasonal work at Route 1 Farm’s Orchards in Santa Cruz and came back ready to start my own business.
The jump into sole proprietorship has been interesting. Managing the operations and producing quality work have gone very well. I have been very pleased with the responses of my clients. The challenge has been building new relationships in a very different domain than I worked within previously. I have just now started to get repeat business from clients as well as referrals, which is a great feeling.
I would say that my primary challenge is appreciating what each day brings as a gift. There are days where I give 100% and can feel it waking up the next day and there are days where I have free time to think about expanding my network, furthering my education and enjoying a nap. I’m a bit of a graph geek, part nature and part nurture, so I have a chart which shows my progress on a rolling 4 and 6 week timeframes. That’s what I look to when I’m wondering if I’m on the right path. So far, it’s going in the right direction.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
My primary challenge is patience. As a relatively young business, growth is my primary challenge. I have structured the business in such a way that growing isn’t tremendously painful, so my growing pains aren’t as much operational as they are relational. I have been utilizing various means to reach new clients, including advertising, developing an online presence, door knocking and making sure people within my existing network know what I’m doing.
As someone who highly values their own privacy and the sanctity of the home, it’s been an uncomfortable feeling to knock on doors. Each time out I make it to 20-30 doors of homes containing my targeted range of trees and get a mixed response. I try to come home and focus on those folks who were very receptive and enthusiastic as well as my historic ability to capture new work through face time with clients.
On the flip side of that coin is the tremendous confidence boost I have gotten from people stepping out of their homes and sometimes literally asking “What do you know?” and me giving them the right answer. It’s not a comfortable feeling, but that’s actually how I met one of my favorite clients.
Managing the inconsistency of a new business and the urgent needs of clients are very different in the entrepreneurial environment as compared with a large corporate machine.
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about LB Holistic Tree – what should we know?
At LBHT, we focus on building the complex beneficial relationships which will give clients a healthy tree and delicious fruit for years to come. We use pruning as a tool to develop a healthy branch structure, enable appropriate air flow and light penetration, and if the tree is fruiting, we make sure there’s wood with the right age to give great fruit well into the future. We do soil testing and targeted amendments as well as fertigation and foliar sprays. We can assist with drip irrigation systems, mulching and tree removal as well.
We are one of the few companies that can visit a site and take time to do a thorough evaluation of site conditions both above and below the ground. Most companies simply visit a site to collect scope of work information or fill out a pre-existing form to cover their liabilities for risk mitigation purposes. Trees are complex and are often impacted by things far from their trunk and well into their past. We take time to evaluate the whole current and historical site conditions in evaluating current tree health.
LBHT is also set apart from other companies because only experienced orchardists and arborists touch the trees we work on. Other companies will have an expert come out and dazzle you with semantics and then a less skilled labor force will come out to do the actual work. The problem with that process is that the primary focus for many of those teams is speed, resulting in gnarled crossing growth in spring. We don’t make pruning cuts to a tree except to promote tree health or work towards a specific requested future size or shape.
As a smaller enterprise, we don’t have to charge for a whole network of office hierarchy. Because of our horizontal organizational structure, we can afford to put experts on the front lines doing the work and still have the best price.
Is there a characteristic or quality that you feel is essential to success?
I do things for a reason. I have always had an inclination to ask “Why?”
Very few tree companies take the time to do things right. With a chainsaw, anyone can hack a tree quickly and change its shape. Most people just pollard a tree to cut it down a particular shape and size each year, an indication the wrong tree was planted there and the wrong person is cutting it. Fighting a tree’s natural inclinations, or nature’s existing patterns is a waste of energy. If you pay attention to what a tree is doing you can give appropriate outlets for its energy while still improving its health and form.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.lbholistictree.com
- Phone: (562) 270-5463
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lbholistictree/
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/lb-holistic-tree-long-beach-2
Image Credit:
Tercermano and Ginomartez
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