Vanessa Crowley: mowing up a storm in Charlotte

By Phyl Newbeck

When Vanessa Crowley decides to do something she goes all out. The serial entrepreneur is one of the two faces behind Mow, Mow, Mow, a landscaping firm based in Charlotte. Crowley and her partner Dale Knowles started the company in 2007 and incorporated the business three years later. Mow, Mow, Mow has contracts in Charlotte, Shelburne, South Burlington and North Ferrisburgh but Crowley is aiming higher. She’d love to have an office in Charlotte with display windows and perhaps open affiliates up and down the East Coast.

Crowley comes from a family of business people and has spent much of her life self-employed. Her first foray into business came as a dance instructor. “I started dancing when I was two years old,” she said “and I taught professional tap dance, aerobics and modern dance to students from two years to adult.” Crowley managed a studio at the Champlain Mill in Winooski for seven years, teaching over 2,000 aspiring dancers. There were so many students she ended up opening a second studio on the side.

When the dance business became too tiring, Crowley and her brother turned to floral arrangements, operating Vermont Floral for 25 years. The company started in a laundromat on Riverside Drive in Burlington and expended to three stores. Crowley was in charge of the office and finances but she also did some floral arranging. While running Vermont Floral, she found time to go to the Community College of Vermont where she got a degree in Business Administration.

When Crowley’s brother moved to Florida they closed Vermont Floral and she worked for Fletcher Allen and IBM while raising her kids and teaching dance classes on the side. Then she met Dale Knowles and was able to return to her entrepreneurial roots. “We had one mower at first,” she said “and only ten or twelve customers.” When Crowley learned that Charlotte had a bidding process for landscaping work she jumped at the chance although she’d never submitted a bid before. She was successful and Mow, Mow, Mow has been the landscaper for the town for four years.

Crowley and Knowles do both commercial and residential landscaping. In the winter they trade their mowers for plows and sanders. They service several schools and municipal buildings, a dozen businesses and over fifty residences combined for both their summer and winter contracts. Virtually all the work is done solely by the couple although in the spring they get some help with cleaning winter debris and mulching. The company has recently acquired a rototiller so they have added tilling to their roster of activities. They also run the Knowles Farm Farmstand at the corner of Lake and Ferry Roads during the harvest season.

Crowley’s background of entrepreneurship prepared her for office work like billing and advertising but she’s amazed at how much she enjoys the outdoor work. “I never thought I’d be doing lawn mowing on a zero-turn mower or weed whacking, shoveling or salting,” she said. “It’s been seven years and we keep expanding. I enjoy it so much”