Atlanta, GA— February 9, 2026 — Granum today announced the release of its inaugural technology adoption report, From Seed to Software: State of Digital Technology Adoption in the Green Industry in 2026, providing a data-driven benchmark on how landscape and tree care companies are adopting digital tools to run and scale their businesses.

Based on nearly 700 respondents across the green industry, the report shows that operators who have built a reliable digital core are widening their margins, moving faster, and adopting next-generation capabilities sooner than their peers.

In addition to quantitative findings, the report features commentary from respected industry operators and advisors, including Sam Gembel (Atlas Outdoor), Kevin Scott (Muskoka Landscapers Inc. and The Wealthy Landscaper), and Tom and Dana Groh (Minnesota Sodding Company), who share on-the-ground perspectives on building a digital core, leading change, and safely deploying emerging technologies.

At the center of the report is a striking technology adoption gap: Granum customers are 41% more likely to report being fully digitized across their core business workflows than the industry at large.

The biggest differences show up in the sales-to-service pipeline, including CRM, estimates and proposals, and job site notes and photos—the functions that govern speed, accuracy, and handoffs between sales and the field.

Companies that are fully digitized in these areas report faster sales cycles, smoother handoffs from sales to operations, and better visibility across the entire job lifecycle, resulting in fewer mistakes and less rework.

“The green industry is at a true digital inflection point,” says Mark Sedgley, CEO of Granum. “This report makes it clear that the companies building a dependable digital core today are the ones pulling away from the pack. They’re not just buying software—they’re changing how they operate, making better decisions faster, and turning technology into a real competitive advantage.”

While cost is often blamed for slow technology adoption, Granum’s research shows that the real barrier is enablement. Across both Granum customers and the broader industry, respondents cite training and implementation, platform fit, integration complexity, and lack of internal IT support as the top blockers to realizing ROI on technology investments.

The report frames this as the “Barrier Behind the Barrier”: the biggest challenge isn’t buying software, but fully enabling teams to use it well through playbooks, role-based training, and well-planned integrations.

“Landscape and tree care businesses don’t need another buzzword,” says Sedgley. “They need a clear, practical roadmap for going from clipboards to a truly digital operation. This inaugural report gives owners that benchmark. Our commitment at Granum is to stand beside them in that journey, so technology becomes a stabilizer bar for the business, not another source of friction.”

Looking ahead, respondents see the greatest economic upside in two areas over the next year:

Early adopters are using AI to augment, not replace, field judgment—deploying it in estimating, reporting, and routing—creating safer and more approachable entry points into advanced technology.

The report highlights real-world examples, including Minnesota Sodding Company, which is exploring drone-based pond seeding to improve coverage and keep crews off steep, uneven terrain, building on its use of drones for before-and-after documentation.

Beyond today’s digital adoption gap, the report outlines a practical roadmap by business stage, showing how reliance on technology grows with company size and how landscape and tree care firms are adopting differently in the field.

Taken together, the findings underscore that the green industry’s top performers are not just buying software, but building a strong digital core and investing in enablement. The full report gives owners and operators clear benchmarks and an actionable playbook to close the gap and turn technology into a durable competitive advantage.

From Seed to Software: State of Digital Technology Adoption in the Green Industry in 2026 draws on two complementary surveys:

Surveys were fielded from September 23, 2025 to October 31, 2025, with standardized labels applied across information sources, digitization functions, barriers, and emerging-tech categories to enable apples-to-apples comparisons.

The full report is available for download here.

Granum is a software company devoted to serving landscapers and arborists across North America, providing intuitive, industry-specific solutions designed to help them improve and grow their businesses while impressing their customers. Granum brings together three of the most trusted names in the industry — LMN, SingleOps, and Greenius — into one powerful software ecosystem. More than just a software company, Granum works alongside its clients to implement systems for estimating, scheduling, crew training, invoicing, and payments, blending technology with hands-on onboarding and human support. The company’s mission is to help industry professionals unlock their potential by improving their operations, all united by the belief that its clients’ success is not just a milestone, but a shared mission. Granum’s products are used by thousands of organizations throughout North America.

Media Contact:

Taylor Gould
CMO, Granum

[email protected]