Oct 15, 2026 · 36 min · 10 segments
Insurance specialist Greg Botson from Higginbotham, explains how landscape and snow contractors can avoid audit surprises, survive non-renewals, close dangerous coverage gaps, and lower their cost of…
Rob MurrayHost
[laughs] Okay, so then y- you mentioned in the beginning that you're really helping folks, you know, reduce risk and chaos, but then you kind of led to this idea of like increasing and helping with enterprise value.
Can you draw the line for me for like insurance to enterprise value and how that comes to light?
Well, I think if, uh, an, a landscaping company is well run with processes, with looking at risk and safety, what measures they're taking before snowplow season to look at customers' job sites and they're, they're looking at their trucks and equipment, they're looking at their employees, they're doing the correct processes before the season for snowplowing, during the season for snowplowing, after the season of snowplowing, if they can really run a tight ship and do all the necessary safety and loss control things to reduce risk, reduce claims.
Obviously reduced claims means less insurance premiums and the more you can save on insurance premiums, the more you g- are gonna be profitable and when you're, you know, you know, considering, you know, merging with somebody or selling, if, if you're more profitable and you got processes, you're gonna, you're gonna increase your enterprise value over the long haul because of the safety and the processes and more turnkey operation.
Yeah, which I mean, in, in itself is gonna probably lead to happier workforce, longer, you know, tenure for staff.
Never once has the conversation of snow season prep come up at the dinner table over a glass of wine.
What does a company do when it comes to, you know, job sites or client sites, truck and equipment, people in preparation for the snow season?
Well, some, some things on a high level would just be looking at all your trucks and your equipment, you know, looking at brakes and tires and lights and guards, making sure everything's in good working order, making sure your employees are trained on all the equipment so that they can operate it properly, especially, you know, at 2:00 in the morning during a blizzard.
You know, making all, making sure all things are working properly, you know, and just training them a, at different, about different drops, job sites and making sure the routes are efficient and, you know, making sure they're taking breaks.
even though a lot of, some insurance companies give discounts for having GPS and cameras inside and outside the vehicles.
I think to be a, a safe company you need those cameras available to, to help with safety and to sometimes get you out of a situation where you might be, someone's telling you you're liable and the camera comes around and, you know, you didn't cause that accident or you didn't, you know, you weren't speeding and it, it helps, it helps in a lot of cases to, uh, reduce liability.
And if, if the, if the employee knows that there's cameras inside the vehicles, that's gonna help with distracted driving and causing less accidents because they're know, they know they're being watched and, uh, monitored and if they, if they have a lot of incidences where they're being distracted, they're gonna have increased liability and more accidents and hopefully there's a, a program to, you know, to work on that behavior or correct that behavior.
It's, it's interesting you say that too 'cause I, I heard one guy who I think was at an NALP event.
Anyway, he was saying that how if you do use monitoring equipment, GPS and cameras, and there's evidence that somebody is maybe speeding or maybe not the best behavior, but you don't do anything to correct it and then they get into an accident, you can still be even like more liable.
[laughs] Okay, so then y- you mentioned in the beginning that you're really helping folks, you know, reduce risk and chaos, but then you kind of led to this idea of like increasing and helping with enterprise value.
Can you draw the line for me for like insurance to enterprise value and how that comes to light?
Well, I think if, uh, an, a landscaping company is well run with processes, with looking at risk and safety, what measures they're taking before snowplow season to look at customers' job sites and they're, they're looking at their trucks and equipment, they're looking at their employees, they're doing the correct processes before the season for snowplowing, during the season for snowplowing, after the season of snowplowing, if they can really run a tight ship and do all the necessary safety and loss control things to reduce risk, reduce claims.
Obviously reduced claims means less insurance premiums and the more you can save on insurance premiums, the more you g- are gonna be profitable and when you're, you know, you know, considering, you know, merging with somebody or selling, if, if you're more profitable and you got processes, you're gonna, you're gonna increase your enterprise value over the long haul because of the safety and the processes and more turnkey operation.
Yeah, which I mean, in, in itself is gonna probably lead to happier workforce, longer, you know, tenure for staff.
Never once has the conversation of snow season prep come up at the dinner table over a glass of wine.
What does a company do when it comes to, you know, job sites or client sites, truck and equipment, people in preparation for the snow season?
Well, some, some things on a high level would just be looking at all your trucks and your equipment, you know, looking at brakes and tires and lights and guards, making sure everything's in good working order, making sure your employees are trained on all the equipment so that they can operate it properly, especially, you know, at 2:00 in the morning during a blizzard.
You know, making all, making sure all things are working properly, you know, and just training them a, at different, about different drops, job sites and making sure the routes are efficient and, you know, making sure they're taking breaks.
even though a lot of, some insurance companies give discounts for having GPS and cameras inside and outside the vehicles.
I think to be a, a safe company you need those cameras available to, to help with safety and to sometimes get you out of a situation where you might be, someone's telling you you're liable and the camera comes around and, you know, you didn't cause that accident or you didn't, you know, you weren't speeding and it, it helps, it helps in a lot of cases to, uh, reduce liability.
And if, if the, if the employee knows that there's cameras inside the vehicles, that's gonna help with distracted driving and causing less accidents because they're know, they know they're being watched and, uh, monitored and if they, if they have a lot of incidences where they're being distracted, they're gonna have increased liability and more accidents and hopefully there's a, a program to, you know, to work on that behavior or correct that behavior.
It's, it's interesting you say that too 'cause I, I heard one guy who I think was at an NALP event.
Anyway, he was saying that how if you do use monitoring equipment, GPS and cameras, and there's evidence that somebody is maybe speeding or maybe not the best behavior, but you don't do anything to correct it and then they get into an accident, you can still be even like more liable.
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