Sigma Nu Landscape Renovation
One of the ways in which we try to reinforce that the work we do has value that goes far beyond a day’s work and a paycheck is through our community service efforts. We involve our employees in these projects to ensure that each of them experiences that feeling of goodwill that comes with giving back to our communities. Two percent of the total five percent of our annual profit that is donated to community service projects is managed directly out of our branches to ensure that employees are directly involved in the projects. Employees are encouraged to get their branch involved in projects that are near and dear to their hearts—whether their cause of choice is a breast cancer walk, feeding the hungry, raising fund to support our nation’s military veterans, etc.
Michael Moody, field manager in our Baltimore, MD landscape management branch, recently got his team involved in a community service project for Sigma Nu, a fraternity at the University of Maryland.
“I joined Sigma Nu my freshman year at UMD when I was studying landscape management,” said Michael. ”After I graduated in 2012, I kept up with them as an alumni, so when Bobby Becker [Sigma Nu alumni vice president] contacted me to ask if we would be interested in donating time and materials to help renovate their landscape, I immediately got him in contact with my area manager, Brandon Simmons, who greenlighted the project.”
The Sigma Nu fraternity espouses many similar values to the Ruppert organization—including developing ethical leaders, fostering personal growth and perpetuating a strong, friendly team. The fraternity house itself is the oldest on campus and is owned by the alumni association. In recent years, the alumni were able to raise enough funds to renovate the house. They temporarily closed their doors last year until construction wrapped up in August. “They had a great new interior space, but the landscape still needed work,” said Michael.
On Saturday, September 24th, Michael and two of his fellow field managers, Tyler Wertz and Rob Horton, ventured to the Sigma Nu fraternity house to help the 30 brothers living there renovate the grounds. Together, they planted shrubs and perennials/fall flowers, overseeded, mulched, mowed, and helped clean up the volleyball court in the backyard. The newly renovated fraternity house and grounds were now ready to welcome alumni and guests during homecoming weekend.
“It’s cliché but true; when you join a fraternity you become brothers for life. So it meant a lot to me, personally, to be able to get my team involved in giving back to my brothers at Sigma Nu,” said Michael.
Getting our employees involved in projects like this is a self-perpetuating thing—it helps the community, it motivates our employees and gives them pride in the company, those employees work hard at keeping our customers happy because they work for an organization that they believe in, and in turn, the company continues to succeed, which enables us to contribute even more money to worthy causes.