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