Everything’s
ALEX MARASCO, KAREN TIMMERMANS AND PETER HUGHES. .
COMING UP ROSES FOR PETER HUGHES LANDSCAPE
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n May 1973, 22-year-old Peter Hughes scored a summer job with the City of Calgary Parks Maintenance department, but he was laid off after a month. With few options for other employment, his father suggested Hughes take what he’d learned mowing grass and start his own enterprise. With an old Chevy truck, a borrowed trailer and his dad’s lawnmower, he went to work for his neighbours, family and friends. His six regular clients quickly grew to more than he could handle alone so he hired a friend to be the first employee of Peter Hughes Landscape.
WRITTEN BY RENNAY CRAATS PUBLISHED BY COURTNEY LOVGREN PHOTOS BY RIVERWOOD PHOTOGRAPHY
Being self-taught in both landscape construction and business, Hughes expanded his residential lawn maintenance services to include landscape construction, hired more staff and within a few years, the company flourished. It hasn’t always been a bed of roses for the business. Devastation struck the Alberta economy due to the National Energy Program in the early 1980s and business withered and dried up. It resulted in Hughes having to lay off about 25 workers, leaving only one other person and himself on the payroll by 1983. For the next three years, Peter was pushing a lawnmower by himself. Personal circumstances took their toll as well: a failed marriage, the death of his father and a workplace tragedy. It was a bleak time.
PETER HUGHES LANDSCAPE || CELEBRATING 50 YEARS
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