Landscape Company Celebrates 20 Years in Business

Mark Fockele’s career move from attorney to landscape company owner has proved successful as the Fockele Garden Company celebrates 20 years in business.

Trading law for a career in gardening has proven to have been the right verdict for Mark Fockele.

In 1990 after 10 years as an attorney, Fockele felt he needed to find work he could take pleasure in. Having always enjoyed working outside on projects and in the garden, he moved in that direction and the Fockele Garden Company was created. Twenty years later, the company is thriving.

“When I worked as an attorney, I spent every spare minute outside working in the garden,” Fockele said. “On Saturdays, I would stand in the driveway waiting for the first light.”

Fockele started small with two employees. Over the next two decades, the company grew to 42 employees with clients in Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Alabama and Florida under Fockele and co-owner Julie Evans.

During that time, The Fockele Garden Company, has designed, built and maintained gardens – at first just locally and now throughout the southeast – for residential and commercial customers.

In the beginning, Fockele learned about the landscape business through seminars and studying at home. He used word of mouth to promote his new business. His first customer was Jane Eve Wilheit for whom he built a brick walkway and added some plantings.

Focusing exclusively at first on residential design and installation, the Fockele Garden Company began to grow. It expanded into commercial design and installation with its first significant commercial project for City Plumbing in Gainesville, Ga. in 1995.

The Fockele Garden Company has grown by offering a complete set of services. FGC designs, builds and maintains commercial and residential gardens. It provides services such as irrigation systems, cisterns, custom water features, and stonework. And The Fockele Garden Company does it all internally.

“With a staff of 42 it is unusual for a company our size to do so many different landscape functions in-house,” Fockele said. “We control the work from beginning to end. This allows us to guarantee the quality of the project as a whole as well as the individual components.  This gives the customer one company responsible for everything.”