Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, June 20, 1990 TAG: 9006230365
SECTION: SMITH MOUNTAIN TIMES PAGE: SMT-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TRACY WIMMER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
"I was lucky to find them," she said, gazing out from the driver's seat of her old yellow van.
In the back, 4-year-old Allison, who was napping in a car seat, woke up just long enough to reach for dinosaur stickers that her 7-year-old sister, Whitney, left behind.
Both daughters have grown up on the lake and in this van.
"That's one of the best things about this job," Smith said. "I work hard, but I can take them with me. Or other times I can take off to be with them."
Historically, landscaping has been considered a man's job. The false presumption was that women couldn't handle the dirt, the lifting and the sheer labor.
Some of Smith Mountain Lake's most successful landscapers - Booth's Landscaping in Burnt Chimney, Greenscapes Landscaping and Nursery in Union Hall, and Crockett's Lawn Service in Hardy - are run by men.
In recent years, more women have become involved in landscaping. Donna Clark opened Lakeshore Landscaping & Plant Gallery in Moneta just over a year ago.
But Smith is considered one of the premier female landscapers on the lake, opening her business in 1982.
The name? What else? Smith Mountain Landscaping.
Smith - smallish, fine-boned, with cheeks freckled from the sun - looks much younger than her 37 years. And she cuts a tiny figure behind the wheel of her dump truck.
But it was only in recent weeks that Smith even hired men to work for her. It wasn't a feminist statement, she explained, just a solid business decision.
"I had tried using men on projects," Smith said. "But women have just worked out better. They pay more attention to detail. . . . The new guys are working out fine."
While landscapers across the country are experiencing a boom, the novice often thinks landscaping simply means pretty flowers. As Smith explained, driving her van down the winding gravel road to a job site, landscaping serves numerous purposes: It can solve problems for people who don't want to mow. It can increase the value of a home.
Landscaping can also be art.
Standing atop some limestone rip-rap lining the water before an A-frame vacation home, Smith showed how.
Rip-rap or rock piling is a ubiquitous sight on the shores of Smith Mountain Lake. Smith added green pampass, Hollywood junipers and day lilies, which were beginning to spring forth from the rocks. Soon boaters would see a full-blown rock garden from the water.
"I just didn't want it to look like just a bunch of rocks," Smith said. "There's always something you can do."
Smith was eight months pregnant with her first child when she graduated from Virginia Western Community College's horticulture program.
It was her husband, George, a former bridge builder and now the owner of Dockside Marine, who wanted to move to the lake from her native New Bern, N.C. Getting into landscaping, Smith explained, was as much a means of lake-living survival as anything else. For a while, Smith tried her hand at antique dealing, quickly finding it to be more interesting than lucrative.
"I began to realize that if you want to make a living - a real living on Smith Mountain Lake - you have to work for yourself," she said. "That is unless, of course, you're in real estate, contracting or are independently wealthy. I know a lot of people who had to leave the area because they just couldn't find work."
So Smith began to search for her niche.
As a child, she spent hours tending her grandmothers' flower beds. In high school, she mowed grass for extra money. Deciding to follow her heart was the best of all moves for Smith.
Upon graduation, she printed checks and business cards, and placed an ad in a local newspaper calling herself a landscape consultant. Within a week, she found a client. Two things about that job still stand out in her mind: The client had a bad erosion problem. She got paid.
"I just did it," Smith said. "I just got out there like I knew what I was doing and did it."
Smith's courage got her started. Her savvy kept her going.
Within two years, she went from landscape consultation to landscape installation. Now she simply designs.
Most of Smith's landscaping jobs average $5,000 to $6,000. Occasionally they run as high as $35,000, the price of a recent Waterfront subdivision project. That's about two weeks of work, barring rain.
But even with six full-time workers, five part-timers and a slew of kids during the summer, Smith still finds it tough to keep ahead of the lake's development.
As recently as five years ago, landscapers tended to worry about the economy, rationalizing that the last thing businesses and homeowners would spend money on in hard financial times were plants.
Smith isn't too worried. Word of mouth is her best advertisement. Most clients want to contract with her for maintenance after a project is completed.
And then there is the economic reason.
"Most people who can afford to buy and build down here now probably have enough money to invest in their yards," Smith said.
Up every morning at 5, working until dark, Smith and her husband often bring their two daughters to the Sportsman's Inn for dinner. After the girls are in bed, she and he go there to relax - mainly because it's such a short walk from their waterfront house just across the road.
Even with her limited free time, Smith wouldn't trade jobs with anyone. In the future, she hopes to open a nursery on the lake. For now, she is content with designing, then putting her profits back into the business.
"Actually, it's all been a matter of trial and error," she said. "Fortunately, I have an excellent accountant and a very nice banker."
by CNB