Si
September29,2010______________
Minority & Small Business Week_______________ Pas^3
Dramatic Growth with Helping Hands
Business excels
with help from
Small Business
Administration
J ake T homas
T he P ortland O bserver
by
After having owned his own
landscaping company for over
20 years, M anuel C astaneda
seems to have it made.
Pro Landscape Inc. has been
ranked as one o f the fastest
growing Hispanic-owned busi
nesses in the country. It's also
made the list o f the 100 fastest
growing businesses in the state
for the last three out four years
in the Portland Businesses Jour
nal. C astan ed a w as O regon
Minority Small Business Person
o f the Year in 2008, and cur
rently he has a workforce o f 40
employees.
But things weren't always as
g ra v y fo r C a sta n e d a , the
com pany’s founder and presi
dent.
In 1986, he and a handful o f
other employees at another land
scaping company had a big fall
ing out with management, ac
cording to Castaneda.
Castaneda, 43, knew a big
investor who was going to buy a
big home and needed some land
scaping done, and he quickly
secured the work for him and
the other employees who had
jum ped ship.
W hen the jo b w as done,
w ord had spread on the quality
o f their w ork and they found
that the other residents o f the
neighborhood had jobs for them
as well.
“Pretty soon we were doing
the streets,” said Castaneda.
Pro Landscape is now a full
service company that special
izes in unique water features,
irrigation and sprinkler systems,
all types o f walls, drainage sys
tems, lawn installation, as well
as fences, decks, patios, and
more. It also does work in hill
side stabilization and landslide
remediation.
T he c o m p a n y 's d ra m a tic
growth came about with several
helping hands, said Castaneda.
One o f the big learning expe
riences came from enrolling in
the
S m all
B u sin ess
Administration's 8(a) program,
which helps disadvantaged busi
nesses get experience by work-
Manuel Castaneda, founder and president o f Pro Landscape, Inc., took risks to grow his minority-owned business into a national leader.
ing on federal projects.
bid the project out, and find a
He also said his business
Participating businesses get sub-contractor for the soil stabi emerged stronger from the ex
work from government contracts lization part o f the project. perience, having new knowledge
that they normally wouldn't have Castaneda said the project was o f how to do a construction
a shot at, and learn how about done ahead o f time and received project that it had never at
how to deal with various federal accolades from the city.
tem pted before. The contract
agencies, as well as the bidding
and bonding processes. The SB A
•••building GREEN
keeps in contact with them regu ::: building SMART
larly to evaluate their business
plan and offer tips on how to
excel.
Castaneda also had help from
others as well. Shortly after
enrolling in the SBA program ,
he began looking into a bridge
project in D epot Bay. The p er
son he w as in contact w ith
asked him if he could do sheet
tile, w hich C astaneda said his
com pany w as qualified to do.
Everything looked good until
C astan ed a realized that the
man had in fact said “sheer
p ile,” w hich is a com plicated
soil stabilization process that
his com pany had n ev er a t
tem pted.
Mercy Corps
He called up his SBA pro-
International Headquarters
g ram -assig n ed m entor, Ted
Allen, and explained the situa
For subcontracting
tion.
and employment opportunities,
“No sweat,” was his reply.
Allen helped him successfully
contact Carolyn Wilson at 503-222-4375.
also brought in more money to
the company and helped estab
lish his market position.
“You have to take that risk,”
said Castaneda o f how to grow
a business.
-b u ild in g COMMUNITY
K U tV
w
WALSH
ZZZZZZ j Construction C o .
www.walshconstructionco.com