Ep. 654 Aspire Ignite Conference 2026: Takeaways for Landscape Professionals
Marketing & Media Communications Specialist Megan Lockhart sits down with Landscape Group Partner Greg Garcia, Account Executive with Rancho Mesa to discuss Aspire’s recent Ignite Conference for the landscape industry.
Show Notes: Subscribe to Rancho Mesa's Newsletter
Host: Megan Lockhart
Guest: Greg Garcia
Editor: Vanessa Hanna
Music: "Home" by JHS Pedals, “Breaking News Intro” by nem0production
© Copyright 2026. Rancho Mesa Insurance Services, Inc. All rights reserved.
Transcript
Megan Lockhart: You’re listening to Rancho Mesa’s StudioOne™ podcast, where each week we break down complex insurance and safety topics to help your business thrive.
I’m your host, Megan Lockhart, and today I’m joined by Greg Garcia, Partner with Rancho Mesa. He specializes in providing insurance and risk management solutions to landscape companies.
Today, we’re going to discuss the recent Aspire Ignite Conference.
So Greg, welcome to the show.
Greg Garcia: Hey, Megan. Thanks for having me. Happy to be here.
ML: Yeah, we're happy to have you.
Now, for those listeners who aren’t familiar with this event, will you explain a little bit about the Aspire Ignite Conference, where it was held, and who typically attends?
GG: Yeah, Aspire is basically an annual conference that Aspire conducts, and it's usually somewhere within the United States. Last year, it was in Anaheim. The year before, it was in Las Vegas. This year, it happened to be in Orlando, Florida. So I had to fly across country to get over there, but always an event that I'm looking forward to going to attend. At this event... Aspire is a software company that most landscape companies use, and it can do a lot of different things. My tech background's not great, but on a small scale, it can track jobs, it can track margins, payroll, things like that. So basically anything that the business is using to run, they run it through Aspire. And it can connect to a lot of different devices. Maybe it can talk with Azuga, which is a fleet safety product.
So it has a lot of different capabilities and what we found going to these events is that a lot of our clients use Aspire, so we want to learn more about it. And these are good opportunities for me to get there and get more involved with the software and kind of what's going on with it. And then in terms of who typically attends, it's mostly business owners. And sometimes these businesses will have kind of their tech person that is in charge of being the champion of using Aspire. but definitely all landscapers. They do have a little pest division as well, so some pest companies as well, but that's basically who usually attends these events.
AB: Okay, awesome. So for this year, what do you think was the most memorable part of the conference?
GG: Yeah, they always do a great job. They have something that's called Ignite the Night every year, it's kind of their big party. You do the conference all day, there's classes and courses and you're networking all day, and then at night is a chance for all the attendees to kind of let loose a little bit. This one was 90s themed. So kind of fit right where, that's my childhood, and they had a 90s band playing some music, so good throwbacks and things like that. So that was probably one of the most memorable moments of the event. But I also got to meet a couple new clients in person. Chantel over at Ocean View Landscape Management, I was able to meet her in person. She's a Florida account that we recently just wrote. So that's also memorable, too, is getting to have that face-to-face interaction with some clients that maybe I don't get to see throughout the calendar year. So that was really, really nice to see, see her there and we had a good conversation.
ML: That's great. So tell me what brings you back to this event every year and why do you think industry professionals should attend?
GG: Yeah, for us, you know, going back to this event every year is just a good opportunity for us to connect with our clients. Like I said, I got to meet Chantel this year, network with new industry leaders that maybe we haven't had a chance to connect with. So getting to meet them and then also just continue to learn about what's relevant within the landscape industry or the green industry for that matter. You know, we definitely have our hands on insurance, but we also want to know some of the other ins and outs of the industry. And this gives us the opportunity to do that by attending this conference.
And then, you know, in terms of why I think other landscapers should attend, if, you know, if they feel like they're a little bit disorganized in terms of operations, they feel like they're always pulling their hair out. You know, they got a file cabinet that's full of papers that are overflowing. Might be a good time to take a look at Aspire and see if this software could help clean some of those processes up, because I believe that's what it does. And then also you get to kind of rub shoulders, like I said earlier, with industry leaders and how they're using it and how they're, you know, bettering their company and operations and all of that. So overall. It's a great event to not only network, but to learn about technology within the green industry.
ML: Great. Well, Greg, if listeners have questions about their risk management or have any more questions about this event that you attended, what's the best way to get in touch with you?
GG: Yeah, I think the best way would just shoot me an email. So that would be at ggarcia@ranchomesa.com and yeah, I'd be happy to answer any questions. And I think doing a podcast like this is great to kind of recap the event, but definitely something that we'll be attending in future years.
ML: Yeah, great. Well, Greg, thanks for joining me in StudioOne™.
GG: Awesome. Thanks for having me, Megan.
ML: Thanks for tuning in to our latest episode produced by StudioOne™. If you enjoyed what you heard, please share this episode and subscribe. For more insights like this, visit us at RanchoMesa.com and subscribe to our weekly newsletter.