Billy Stinson, Rilee Harman and Ian Smith, from left, recently added Miller Irrigation & Landscape Lighting to their Terra Forma Landscaping business. (File photos by Ian Smith)
The owners of a Henrico landscaping company have closed their second property in less than a year, this time going into the irrigation business.
Rilee Harman of Terra Forma Landscaping, Ian Smith and Billy Stinson recently purchased Miller Irrigation & Landscape Lighting, a 24-year-old firm led by husband and wife Jim and Lisa Miller. Rules are not presented.
The purchase, which closed in late June, comes six months after Terra Forma’s three business partners and former classmates acquired Robbins Landscaping, a 35 is about to switch to the Terra Forma brand.
Miller Irrigation will continue under its name as a division of Terra Forma, said Smith, who noted that it is adding a new service to Terra Forma’s wheelhouse. While Terra Forma previously did landscape lighting, Smith said the deal enhances that service while adding irrigation to its capabilities.
“Irrigation is usually one of the biggest issues we deal with smartly,” Smith said. “Our goal is to be able to manage all of those services on site together, whereas before they were often very disjointed between different contractors, and that disjointedness creates quality issues on site.
“It’s a great thing for us, because it helps us build who we are as a company, rather than growing as a landscaping business.”
Smith said they didn’t want to buy again but jumped at the chance when they heard the Millers wanted to sell their company, which Terra Forma has worked with on properties near the city.
“They came to market, and it was like, ‘wait a minute, this solves the problem we have,'” Smith said. “You don’t often get the opportunity to buy and combine energy and business of their value, so even though we didn’t look, we felt like it was the right move, so we tried to do it.”
Jim Miller, who founded the firm in 2000 after more than a decade in the industry, said he and Lisa were ready to leave the business but wanted to make sure it would be in good hands.
Lisa and Jim Miller
“After 24 years, we were like, ‘Okay, we should move on and start traveling and start enjoying the fourth quarter of our lives.’ It was the right time to do it,” he said.
“We were hesitant, because any time you work hard to build a company, you want to make sure that whoever takes the reins is going to treat it the same way you got it to the point boo. It seemed like a perfect match.”
The couple worked with salesperson Casey Grimes, who at the time worked locally with Seamless Business and Practice Sales, and discussions with the Terra Forma team began in February, Miller said.
Smith said all 24 Miller Irrigation employees came to terms with the deal, including Miller, who is still there on a consulting basis.
The addition brings Terra Forma’s number of employees to 70. The company operates at 3100 Aspen Ave., where Miller Irrigation was founded.
Smith said Miller Irrigation was doing about $3 million in annual revenue before the deal. Miller said that number will vary from year to year but has kept between $2.5 million and $3 million in recent years. Terra Forma and Robbins brought in $6 million in combined revenue last year.
Miller says his company has room for growth but has stayed small to maintain a healthy work environment. He said he and Lisa plan to spend more time traveling at that rate now they retire.
“As you get older, you have to go deeper into it to get to the sources, and we were at that point where we decided to stay the way we were and we’re still we live outside of work,” he said. “We were in high demand, but we can only take what we can without stretching ourselves too far.”
Regarding their new owners, Miller added, “I think they’re going to take it to the next level.”
Former Collegiate classmates, Smith, Harman and Stinson joined forces to buy Robbins after Harman and Stinson acquired Terra Forma, a 20-year-old firm, in 2021. The deal is a result of Terra Forma becoming a client of Yard Works, a national supplier. the company Stinson partnered with his father, Bill Stinson, before it was bought two years ago by a national retailer.
Smith and Stinson attended Virginia Tech together, both studying architecture, while Harman, a William & Mary and VCU Brandcenter grad, has degrees in business management and strategic communication. All three graduated from Collegiate in 2006.
While the Miller Irrigation partnership has expanded the scope of their services, Smith said they are not looking to get more money right now.
He said: “We weren’t at the time when Miller was available. But eventually, when they are available, sometimes you have to move, because it’s the right move.
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