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Marposa
Horticultural Enterprises, Inc.- Terry Noriega graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in ornamental horticulture from Cal Poly Pomona in 1979. He started Mariposa Landscapes performing work on homeowners associations and picking up small landscape projects. He readily admits that he was always into plants. "I was fascinated by them. I'm a pretty boring guy I guess," he said, "but I was the kid who mowed everybody's lawns, I raised a large variety of orchids that I would sell every year to the local florist." He was attending a junior college when someone told him about the program at Cal Poly. He was surprised to find that he could have a promising career working with plants. When he really got down to searching for a profession, he realized that horticulture was the area that he knew he would enjoy the most, so his hobby became his profession. Over the years, change has come. According to Noriega, the changes have been pretty radical. Right out of college he moved into a one-bedroom apartment, but unfortunately his truck was not a welcome sight or sound to the neighbors. When a second truck was acquired, he was an even less popular local resident, which forced a decision. Would he move his home or find a place to store those two trucks? As fate would have it, he stumbled upon a small parcel of land up for lease and he immediately jumped upon the opportunity. He housed the trucks on the lot and with a couple of accounts, he hired on two employees.
In true entrepreneurial fashion, Noriega would locate jobsites and drop off bids in person. After a while, he got a job here and a job there with fairly minimal marketing strategies. All he had was a business card and an answering service. Not much more is needed when the determination is set in place. The industry standards began to alter their shape as newer and larger equipment emerged, especially the technology. There were many mergers and acquisitions within the industry. With that wave of larger companies gobbling up the smaller fish, Noriega began to worry about whether or not they were going to squash his fledgling operation. He was approached and given many written offers to sell his company, but for Noriega, Mariposa was a labor of love in its purest form. The offers continued to arrive hoping that they could tempt the owner to concede, among them TruGreen and LandCare were the most tenacious. LandCare eventually ended up selling to TruGreen in the end. In all the turmoil and swirling offers with dancing dollar signs, it forced Noriega to reflect upon why he was doing this type of work. "I thought that I was battling this business with a small stick," he said. Many times the temptations did get to him when he knew that he could sell and live off of the investments while sipping an martini on a beach somewhere, but he soon realized that that was not really what he wanted to do. "I want to grow the business," said Noriega.
With that decision came the true period of growth and today, Mariposa uses a number of pieces of equipment from various manufacturers, including Bobcat, Case 760 trenchers and more to get the job done. They also utilize Ford, Dingo hydraulic implements which is known as the Swiss Army Knife of multi-purpose machines, Toro mowing machines, Vermeer trenching machines, etc. Noriega enjoys Case machinery because of their financing options and reliability. Noriega stated that Mariposa is highly efficient in operating costs and costs of sales, in which the evidence can be found in calculated positive ratios. They also have been able to maintain a well-experienced staff of management and operators, allowing the company to function with no debt. Currently, over 300 employees work for Mariposa Horticultural Enterprises, running the gauntlet of responsibilities from branch managers to laborers. For their fine work, the company won several positions in the last CLCA Awards, a short time ago. With a total of 6 awards, 2 for maintenance and the rest for landscape installations, they enjoyed brandishing the distinction of first place for residential landscape installation at the Guzman residence, first in landscape renovation at the Gilchriest residence, and another award of achievement for the Roncelli residence. The maintenance awards were for the continued excellent care taking of the Norton Simon Museum, which they have a full time staff in place at and the Ontario Convention Center.
The company is based in Irwindale, on an industrial redevelopment property, which the city has disallowed them to put in a permanent facility. Currently, modular structures take the place of a firm office foundation, but that suits Noriega and his team just fine. "It is exactly what we need and it is very nice," he said. The buildings are highly functional and organized within the existing 3,600 sq. ft. of office space. Housed inside the offices are Larry Rudd, who heads up the sales and marketing departments, while Ren Flugel, serves as the General Operations Manager. Theresa Lu is the Controller, and branch managers, Rich Jensen, Antonio Valenzuela, and Luis Huizar man the shops in San Bernardino, Ventura and Glendale, Arizona, respectively, have their own locations and full time staffs.
In recent years, many milestones have been reached and passed along the road to a successful company. One of the most difficult milestones to reach was that of acquiring land for the main offices. Since passing the mark in the road, they have purchased their own property as well as their own office facility. "It was extremely expensive and getting city zoning approval was not at all simple," said Noriega. "It is a very costly endeavor to obtain industrial property for a company of this type." Other challenges include being able to set up for a project in a particular location that has major obstacles in it and successfully perform the work. Maintenance has allowed Mariposa to stand on legs of much needed stability, but the company is often driven by the construction industry, which imparts a cyclical standard of ups and downs throughout the year. Noriega always finds room for improvement. He has seen the changes in the current equipment and he likes to improvise with new methods and ideas. Even so, he feels that they have started a strong tradition of excellence at Mariposa Horticultural Enterprises and they are not about to change a good thing.
Within the ranks of personnel at Mariposa Horticultural, there is a deep expertise that allows the company to rise above the commonplace competition. According to Noriega, that expert knowledge is directly related to a superior complement of services, in which they are licensed in both landscaping and engineering. "We are able to tackle the difficult jobs and do them right the first time," he said. "When we receive bids from landscape architecture companies, we are called quickly because of our excellent reputation." Noriega is also known to have a reputation for athletic competition. In his off-time Noriega spends many hours perfecting a routine to balance his body. He works out at the gym for bodily maintenance, which also prepares him for distance running. He says it is a release, which allows him to juggle both a personal life with his wife and three daughters as well as maintain and operate a company. "My three little girls keep me very busy," he said. "We try to take vacations two times a year and we, of course, love it." Most recently, they have traveled to several national parks and the children love visiting various botanical gardens. They might be a bit biased.
Noriega and Mariposa are looking for good healthy growth in the future of the plant industry. With continued flourishing, the company stands to thrive with each successful day. One thing remains and one thing is for sure, Noriega, with the assistance of the men and women he has working with him, is sure to have little interest in matters not involving plants. |
