Building in Public:

First, I just want to thank you for reading. I appreciate it. We just posted an article on the web titled “Don’t Deadhead Everything: Discover which native plants thrive when you let them be.” which you can read by clicking the button below.

I was 29 years old, four years into building Ruggiero Landscaping, when a doctor told me I had stage 3B lymphoma. Six months of intensive chemotherapy. Mental ups and downs I wouldn't wish on anyone. But I beat it.

On my 30th birthday, I was able to celebrate, knowing I was in full remission.

But that diagnosis changed everything. Not just how I saw my own life, but how I saw the business I was building. I couldn't stand by anymore, designing beautiful installations knowing they'd be handed off to maintenance companies drowning them in chemicals. My eyes were open, and there was no going back.

That was 2010. I'm 44 now, fourteen years cancer-free and healthier than I've ever been. And after all this time perfecting what I knew had to exist—a truly sustainable, year-round maintenance program that doesn't require poisoning workers or properties—I'm finally ready to build in public.

If you care about sustainable landscaping, green entrepreneurship, or just want to see what it actually takes to build something that matters in the Lehigh Valley, I'm glad you're here.

Here's the part that made everyone scratch their heads: I graduated from Temple University with a BS in Community & Regional Planning in 2007, then started a landscaping company a year later.

My professors thought I was wasting my degree. My family didn't get it. Even I wondered sometimes.

But the timing wasn't random—it was forced. I graduated just as the mortgage crisis was developing, which obliterated my goal of working for a developer to create more sustainable communities. The industry I'd trained for collapsed before I could enter it.

But I could feel something in my bones: above all else, I was passionate about business. And I knew I loved working with landscapes, design, and the outdoors. So I started Ruggiero Landscaping with the intention of focusing on design and installation rather than maintenance.

Looking back now, that "detour" was exactly where I needed to be. The planning degree wasn't wasted—it just took 18 years to fully activate it.

For the first four years, I was building a traditional landscaping business. Design. Installation. Trying to grow. Then came the cancer diagnosis, and six months that rewired how I saw everything.

When you're sitting through chemotherapy, you have a lot of time to think. About what matters. About what you're building. About the chemicals pumped into your body to kill the cancer—and the chemicals we were casually spraying on properties every day.

I started researching. The data was horrifying.

Workers in our industry face dramatically elevated risks for cancer, neurological disorders, DNA damage, and respiratory complications. Of the 40 most commonly used pesticides in landscaping, 26 are known or possible carcinogens. Twenty-four disrupt the endocrine system. Thirty-two cause kidney or liver damage.

I was blessed. aAnd not a day goes by that I’m not grateful for beating it. But how many guys on landscape crews across the Lehigh Valley were getting poisoned without even knowing it?

That's when I made the decision: I had to create a sustainable, earth-friendly maintenance program. Not as a side project. Not as a marketing angle. As the core of what we do.

On my 30th birthday, I got the call: full remission. And I got to work.

The next fourteen years brought everything you'd expect: financial struggles, crew challenges, and countless opportunities to compromise my values for profit.

I bounced between one to three crews, staying mostly in the field myself, trying to hone my craft and become the best at what we do. I passed up large contracts that would've required adopting traditional chemical-heavy practices. I turned down lucrative commercial accounts because I couldn’t bring myself to follow the scopes in the RFP’s would’ve required poisoning their properties to hit their aesthetic standards on their timeline. I knew that I was onto something and I knew that the cost effectiveness over the course of 3 years could actually be better than traditional methods. It’s just a lot more complicated to pull it all together while working crazy hours and staying competitive in a market like Bethlehem.

People thought I was being stubborn. Maybe I was. But I was also being strategic.

I knew that if I scaled too fast—if I hired more crews before perfecting the systems—we'd lose the quality that made us different. The whole point was to prove that sustainable practices could deliver superior results. If we compromised on quality, we'd just be another "green" company making empty promises.

So I stayed small. I tested. I refined. I failed and adjusted. I studied the academic research on soil biology, mowing height, aeration techniques, and organic pest management. I applied it in the field and learned what actually worked versus what only worked in theory.

Incorporating lawn care, landscape maintenance, and snow removal into a cohesive year-round program was harder than anything I'd done academically. But piece by piece, season by season, I built systems that worked.

And now, finally, I'm confident we've cracked it.

For years, I felt like I was early. Too early. Clients wanted organic services in theory but balked at the investment required. Competitors undercut us with cheap chemical applications. The market hadn't caught up to what I knew was inevitable.

But something's shifted.

The U.S. landscaping market is worth $153 billion, and it's increasingly driven by environmentally conscious consumers. Fifty-eight percent of landscaping businesses implementing sustainable solutions are seeing revenue increases of 76%. Properties with organic landscapes command premium prices.

More importantly, regulations are changing. Municipalities across the region are implementing restrictions on synthetic pesticide use. Schools are banning chemicals on their grounds. Commercial properties need LEED certification. Insurance companies are paying attention to worker safety.

The industry I thought I was walking into and have been doing everything in my power to prepare for is finally here.

And I've spent fourteen years building the systems, testing the methods, and proving the science works in real-world conditions across the Lehigh Valley. Many industry leading companies are just now starting to scramble. We're as ready as we can be.

This newsletter is the first step in something bigger.

For years, I've kept my knowledge close—partly because I was still refining it, partly because I was too busy executing to document anything. But if sustainable landscaping is going to transform this industry, it can't stay locked in my head or limited to the properties we manage.

So I'm launching Ruggiero Sustainable Solutions as a media platform that shares:

The real numbers behind sustainable landscaping - Not marketing fluff, but actual data on costs, timelines, results, and ROI

What actually works (and what doesn't) - over a decade and a half of field-tested methods, backed by academic research but proven in Lehigh Valley conditions

The business model for scaling sustainability - How we've built year-round maintenance programs that protect workers, improve properties, and generate profit

The mistakes and pivots - Because if I only share the wins, you're learning half the story

This platform will eventually include partnerships with quality brands that align with our values—companies making products my audience will actually benefit from. And soon, a premium tier for the most in-depth guides on sustainable design, soil health, and organic maintenance strategies.

But it starts here, with this newsletter, building in public.

I'm not hiding behind polished marketing anymore. You're going to see:

Some weeks will be tactical (here's how we handle snow removal organically). Some will be strategic (here's why we're pursuing certain partnerships). Some will be personal (what fourteen years of cancer remission teaches you about building something that matters).

But it'll always be honest.

Here's what most people don't know: I’ve never lost interest in everything I learned while earning my Community & Regional Planning degree from Temple. Through this newsletter and our articles, it’s finally getting activated.

Sustainable landscaping isn't the end goal—it's the foundation.

I'm working toward:

The Tree of Life concept I'm developing isn't just a metaphor. It's a framework for how we grow people, businesses, and ecosystems simultaneously.

But you can't do any of that without proving the foundation works. That's what the better part of the past decade has been: proving it. Now comes the next chapter, the sharing, and the building in public.

If you're a homeowner in the Lehigh Valley curious about organic landscaping, you'll get practical insights you can apply immediately—whether you work with us or not.

If you're a landscaper wondering if there's a better way than the chemical treadmill, I'm going to show you the systems we've built and the results we're getting.

If you're an entrepreneur interested in building businesses that create genuine positive impact, you'll see the real challenges and rewards of staying committed to values when market forces push you to compromise.

And if you just think it's time we stopped poisoning the people who maintain our properties, then welcome. I've been fighting that fight for fourteen years. Let's finish it together.

If you haven’t yet, Please Subscribe below, and let's build something that matters.

Mike Ruggiero
Founder, Ruggiero Landscaping
Bethlehem, PA
Fourteen years cancer-free, eighteen years building