Lighting Up the Scene

Overview

Jon Bowman from Coastal Source discusses his background in horticulture and landscaping. He shares his journey from working in his family's gardening business to pursuing a career in horticulture and landscape design. Jon also talks about his experience in the hardscaping industry before joining Coastal Source. He highlights the importance of quality and durability in outdoor lighting and audio systems, emphasizing Coastal Source's commitment to using the right materials for long-lasting products. John mentions the possibility of branching out into other outdoor control systems in the future.

Transcript

Angelique
Welcome to SYNKD On Air today I have John Bowman with me from Coastal Source.

Jon
Hi, Angelique. Thank you for having me.

Angelique
Sure. Sure.Well, it's great to have you on and learn a little bit more about your background. I think I've heard snippets before, but we know each other, I guess, through me bugging you for advertising and just want to hear more about your background, and, you know, what was your journey in the industry?

Jon
Sure. Yeah. Well, it started early on, like, like most of the folks in this business. Actually, my my mother was avid gardener. She was a botanist. She loved herbs. She was always out in the garden, as I you know, as a young kid, and I was just behind her helping her you know, harvest the herbs, she she did a lot of cooking classes and things like that. So she was the one that probably got me into the great outdoors. And yeah, it was it was it was fun to, to tag along with her. And she was a wealth of knowledge. And I think that's really what got me got me into the, into the dirt, so to speak.

Angelique
And so you started in the horticulture side, is that right?

Jon
Yes. So probably I was about 12 years old and needed to make some money. And my brother was already cutting grass. So he hired me.

Angelique
Oh, wow.

Jon
I worked all through middle school in high school with him and a couple guys. And then he went off to college. And basically, I assumed 100 or whatever accounts it was, and took it from there. And it was it was really a lot of fun. And I had a lot of my buddies at the time working for me through high school and ran it through college. And, you know, we're slowly getting more and more requests for, you know, creating, you know, beautiful backyards and patios and that was before the whole hardscape craze. But you know, I was just doing what I knew. And then decided to when I graduated from high school decided to pursue a career in horticulture. I went through a four year program through University of Delaware, went through the reward program. Got a minor in landscape design, which was really I really enjoyed that aspect of it. It was it was a lot of fun. And Delaware at the time had a program through Longwood Gardens. So I gardens a number of times, I'm still actively I get down there because it's such an inspiration.

Angelique
I have to make it there. I haven't been yet. Yeah.

Jon
And that was my real introduction to lighting was was down there at Longwood Gardens. Spectacular job. And, yeah, so. So that's really kind of what inspired me to kind of get into this industry. A lot of fun.

Angelique
Awesome. And then how long have you been with coastal source then?

Jon
So I've been coastal source for 10 years now, but kind of in between that, you know, when I was still I still have my family business and my dad said one school he encouraged me to go work for somebody else, you know, get get get some experience elsewhere, you know, so I did that and I went to go work for at the time it was the Berkman Group. And their corporate headquarters was in Langhorne, Pennsylvania. So I was able to work there, which was not all that far from my house. And I worked in the Design Center. And at the time, this goes back. Oh, gosh, it was in the early 90s. I guess. They had a whole residential division. And I think their residential work was was bigger than their commercial work.

Angelique
Oh, wow. Okay.

Jon
So I was one of 12 designers and architects on staff. And for, you know, it was it was a great exposure for me some really great jobs that we worked on. And then as time went on, they wanted me to get out in the field, which I loved that aspect of it. And so then I started working on some of the residential projects, which were spectacular Diller at the time, and yeah, so that was that was, you know, like a lot of guys in this industry that's kind of where they started. They got their education from the Berkman Group. And I learned a lot. I really, really did. That was fun. And then it wasn't until about, I guess, early 2000s, I decided that, you know, got out of the family business and wanted to work for I had a friend or that was in the hardscaping business. And that was at the time, I was like, What is hardscaping? This was early 2000s. It was in the infancy. I went to talk to a concrete manufacturer was making this thing called a paver. And yeah, ended up in that industry on the manufacturing side for about 13 years, I guess.

Angelique
And wow, okay. Yeah. Jon that entire business still stayed, you know, in the in the landscape industry. But but was part of that sort of hardscape boom, which was great.

Angelique
And so yeah, you're you're already tying together the sector's with design, then being out on site and hardscaping. And was it was it after that time that you decided to go to Coastal Source?

Jon
I was actually exhibiting at a at a ASLA trade show a chapter trade show, and, you know, it was like, between sessions, and there wasn't anybody in the aisles. So it's just sort of walking around. And I see these two guys at this table with a couple of fixtures and intrigued because I had done a fair amount of lighting in my day. And I was looking at these fixtures and loose cables. Like, what is this? You know, this was one of the owners. And Todd said to me, Well, this is this is our lighting system. I said, Wow, I've never seen anything like this before with these very thick cables, and a male female connection system where I didn't have to splice wires. And they had, they had these things that weren't light bulbs, they were called lamps, and they were LEDs. This is some cutting edge stuff. And I was just very intrigued with what they were doing. And it was, it was really, you know, out of the box thinking at the time. And I liked that I thought it was I thought it was innovative. And it was fixtures weighed, weighed a ton. And I've always liked to sort of work with a company, firm, that is the best of what they do. And although I'd never heard of them, I could just tell the quality of this product was second to none. So I did a little more research and you know, talk to a few people. And long story short, six months later, you know, I was I was working for Coastal Source. Went down to the keys and met Franco and and yeah, and the rest was history. Angelique Well, I got to meet Franco recently, too. That was a great trip down to the is it annual or biannual? Palm Paradise?

Jon
I think every two to three years the paradise? Yeah,

Angelique
That was really neat, because I'd never experienced the audio other than at your booth, you know, at an event not in a real space. So I thought that was neat that we got to tour. And for those of you who don't know, Franco has D'Asign Source which is a I guess full service architecture and landscape architecture and construction and maintenance company down in the [Florida] Keys, which is where the research is done and the testing far. The connectors, the connections of the plug and play fittings, but it was great to see or, I guess to hear the the sound like follow you through the gardens. You know, yeah, landscaping, I should say.

Jon
Yeah, D'Asign Source turnkey design-build operation. You know, they build these magnificent luxury homes down in Florida Keys and the family has done that for 60 years and through their experiences of building these magnificent homes. And obviously the you've got the harsh conditions of the Florida Keys Angelique The humidity...

Jon
Salinity...

Angelique
The saltwater

Jon
Yeah, it's brutal on anything outdoors that's either electronic or metal. So, ceiling fans, fixtures, grills, door handles, lights, you know, speaker grills, you name it, electric gates, everything, you know, if it's not the highest quality, it will fail. So, so Franco, you know, in his company were doing these magnificent landscapes. But they were experiencing a lot of failures when it came to lighting and some of their sound systems. Franco's an avid sort of ticker of electronics. audio file, and he kind of took it upon himself to start doing some research and figuring out, you know, what, I think I can, I can make a better mousetrap here. And through the experience that I have, and his brothers had instructions out of business, started to put together a business plan and get the right teria materials that would would last and withstand the elements of the Keys and beyond. So yeah, it's a really cool story. And the Palms in Paradise is a tour of many of their homes down there in the Florida Keys that they open up a couple times, every couple of years, for folks to see what they do and how they do it, it really is spectacular, it allows our products, our lighting and audio products really to shine because you can see them, you know, firsthand in in the landscape and how they just kind of blend in and, you know, to your point you're walking around the entire yard, you're just filled with, it's filled with music, background music.

Angelique
Yeah. Well, and it's fantastic. Because we, we always have to deal with such harsh conditions, no matter if you're in the Keys or up in Michigan, or, you know, you have different considerations everywhere. That make our industry a challenge when it comes to design, installation and long term maintenance, you know, you know, there's so much that can go wrong, because Mother Nature's throwing stuff at us all the time. So quality, I think, you know, is is maybe not talked about enough as a differentiator.

Jon
Yeah, for sure. And, you know, it's, it's the quality that really, I think sets us apart and the way we design things, and we use the right materials that work together, as opposed to, you know, designing something that looks great. But within three to five years, it's going to fail, you know, because he doesn't utilize the right materials. They're not machined properly. They're not finished properly. And yeah, you're just you're asking for problems down the road, and nobody in this industry wants to go back and fix it. Nobody makes money doing that. You can offer your client a really good value, and a sustainable product that's going to last a long time. You know, there's something to that, and that's really what we kind of hang our hat on is that this stuff is built to last.

Angelique
And because it's a plug and play system, does that mean you can do it? Install it without electricians on site?

Jon
Yeah, I mean, it's it's all low voltage. So you don't need to have an electrician you need to have power. So you'll need to have an outlet, a standard, you know, 120 outlet but other than that, there's no tools that are needed. It's a simple male female connection. And you've got an what we call an IP 68 connection, which really, there's no water. You didn't operate underwater. Which, you know, you think about it. You don't have to be in the Florida Keys. You can be in your backyard, my backyard when it's irrigated in that ground, you know, and this cable is six inches below the ground, so it's constantly submerged or near moisture. we have approached on how we go about it.

Angelique
Yeah, yeah, I know. I think that that's great. In Scotland, we had a lot of times where, you know, the weather was good, it was dry enough, we thought making the electrical connections and put them in a waterproof connection box as well. And then they would still fail within six months sometimes, you know, and I think Scotland is quite humid. Didn't realize, you know how humid it was until we had those failures.

Jon
Yeah, no, I mean, and we've studied, you know what, you know, you talked about electrical boxes and connections. And I mean, that's we are the experts that really anything outdoors, that's, that's electronic, you know, whether it's an amplifier that lives outside or a transformer, or lighting fixtures, they need to last. There's certain materials that work in certain materials that don't work. We've tested them all.

Angelique
So you name lots of things that need waterproofing outside. Is Coastal Source gonna branch out into other areas, too?

Jon
We're always looking, I mean, our focus is lighting and audio. But yeah, there's there's a ton of opportunities. And as people are spending more and more time outside, you know, and I think the pandemic has certainly helped that. But you see these fantastic backyards that are going in with, you know, outdoor televisions, full kitchens, bars, you know, cabanana, screens and everything. Yeah, fire bowls. I mean, it's all got to be controlled, somehow turned on turned off. And, you know, and having an ecosystem that can control all that, you know, that's, that's certainly a possibility.

Angelique
Yeah, yeah. Well, great. Well, and you're in New Jersey, is that where you are based?

Jon
Yeah. So our main company operates out of New Jersey, sales and marketing in all the fulfillment. Our Florida Keys location is really just our research and development, and where we hold trainings and other things of that nature. But that's the backbone of what we do is here in New Jersey, and just makes it easier logistically to get things in and out, as opposed to the Florida Keys.

Angelique
Awesome. Well, and we're doing an article soon on the proper design and installation of lighting on live oak trees, too. So you'll see an article coming out possibly might be fall before that comes out. But that's another project that we're working on. So yeah, be a nice little case study for everybody to read about as well.

Jon
It's a beautiful, beautiful tree to light and I can't wait to dig into it and actually see it at night. They're quite spectacular. We actually did a, a similar tree down on the Florida Keys. And it was spectacular.

Angelique
Was a live oak too or was it something else?

Jon
Yes

Angelique
Yeah, okay.

Jon
Yeah. And it was really it was had a 360 degree viewing angle and a challenge to light. But, boy, once we got it, we nailed it. It was it was a lot of fun. And it looked great. And we had lighting from the ground, lighting in the tree going up and then lighting going down from the tree. So it was really captured.

Angelique
The whole live. Oh, yeah. Live books are amazing. And yeah, just stunning all by themselves. So looking forward to that project and showing everybody about it.

So well. Awesome. Well, thank you so much for coming on and telling us all about your history, how you got into the industry. And looks like you have a little bit of, you know, all of the sectors in your background. So good, good person to be in the lighting and audio install because you understand it all. Well, thanks for being on the show, and we'll talk to you soon!