You never know what you will get with the weather down in Southland, and that can come with its challenges. Rain, hail or snow, Matt Pope is out with his crew, running the landscaping on subdivisions and other commercial and residential jobs with a smile on his face. The team are always excited about seeing the first break in the ground, and with work in both Invercargill and Queenstown, they get their fair share of job variety as well as beautiful scenery. You can’t get much better office views than that! 

Matt Pope is the director of Quantum Landscaping and Siteworks. Brent from Attach 2 was lucky to catch up with him on a beautiful day on site in Invercargill, where him and his crew are working on the siteworks for a community center and a public BMX track for teens. Weather can be rough in Southland, although “Southland folk are hardy and will still be wearing shorts and t-shirts no matter the weather, always with a smile on their face” he quips. Snow and rainfall aren’t the only obstacles the company have faced, navigating a relatively new business through a pandemic, fast growth of the company and local staff shortages all resulted in some hurdles to overcome. With a strong family foundation and an emphasis on lasting relationships and quality products, Quantum Landscaping are busier and better than ever. 

An early addiction

Matt started the company in October 2019, and currently has four excavators, a skid steer, five trucks and nine staff, but his interest in machines came much, much earlier. Operating machines when he was a young fella, he told Brent he got in his first digger when he was about six years old. “I've grown up in the industry since I was six. I absolutely love machines. I think I was loading trucks when I was about 10 years old on the farm, and I've been in them ever since. Probably addicted to them a wee bit. Being in the game for such a long time, I think it's a really good culture to be in and a great gift to learn as well.” 

Fostering a family atmosphere and culture at the company was very important to Matt. He describes his wife as the backbone of the business; and the entire nine staff being highly involved. No matter how big they get, he plans to continue to implement that structure, as he knows that the value of relationships go a long way. 

Starting with landscaping originally, the company have now also moved into saltworks and construction. Matt and the team like to being able to start a project from the ground up, and then to see it all completed at the end; “doing all the flash wee edits, the final trims and making it all look beautiful when we finish” he explains. Moving from residential to commercial sites, the team now work on bigger projects like subdivisions, house pads and large earthworks. 

Sharing the love 

To do the big jobs, Quantum Landscaping and Siteworks needed the big gear. Running a three-ton truck right up to six-wheeler truck and trailers, the company moves a lot of dirt and gravel around a lot of places. Matt talks about his favorite part, his machines.  

“We like to have quality equipment and quality gear that's not going to be breaking down constantly. It also has to look presentable to our clients and our customers. The boys are proud of what they drive and what they operate.” 

Sharing his love of machines has come naturally for Matt, who utilizes the company’s Facebook page to show them off as well as the projects the team are working on. “We're quite big on social media, we love to get out there and be proud of what we do.” 

Using social media has proved successful in not only building an engaged following of fellow machine lovers, but in also enabling the company to get more clients. Showcasing the before and after images and videos on work sites has led to more jobs for the company, so they plan to keep doing it; got to keep those followers happy! 

Overcoming hurdles 

Dealing with the weather down in Southland has been quite the learning curve for the company, but it has made them adaptable. 

“We can have rain, hail, snow - It can be 30 degrees even. Yesterday it was pouring down, we had close to 140mm of rain and then today's nice and sunny. Dealing with that is a good challenge to have, we can have great summers as well, so we love it down here. It's crisp but it's fun to deal with.” 

Not only contending with the weather, the business has had its fair share of ups and downs.  Going through Covid as a new, small company was hard, but thankfully, they came out the other side of that and now have plenty of work. 

As the company broke new ground and moved into bigger projects – they needed to expand. The business went from one to now ten staff in total. Making sure they are doing a top-quality job as well as growing at the same time has been a good challenge to deal with. They also had to contend with a labour shortage. “We've had a big staffing shortage in Southland, and I think right across New Zealand. It's been hard to find quality guys, or quality people. But we're getting there. We've got a good range of staff as well with different qualifications. We've got operators, we've got builders, we've got our labourers as well and they're just so supportive and it's just a good family company.” 

It is those exact family values and support system that the company prides itself on that has seen them ride through these challenges and come out on top. 

Relationships are key 

So other than their can-do spirit no matter the weather, and the close-knit family company values, what are Quantum Landscaping and Siteworks known for? Quality. They are determined to do a great job for their clients, be it big or small. 

“We like to build an ongoing relationship with our clients and customers. We're not just going to be there to do the job. Obviously, we want quality gear to go with that as well. We love to see smiles on our clients' face after the work's all done and happy with the job.” 

Matt needed to run high performance gear on his machines to keep up the company’s quality reputation. He tells Brent about his first experiences with Attach 2 Equipment. 

“Originally when we started with our first machine, it was a secondhand purchase, and we had an attachment on there with a tilt bucket. We didn't really like it, it was sort of falling to bits and wasn't the greatest product, so when we were looking at what we were to buy in our second machine, which was the Cat 1.8 behind us, we decided to go with A2 attachments.” 

Matt had previously worked with the attachments on some excavators he had driven. 

“I like the quality of them and how they are built. We now have three excavators with Attach2. We've got the Mini-Tilt and two Heli-Tilts and we're absolutely loving them. The 1.8 behind us, the Caterpillar, has done 1000 hours with the mini-tilt attachment. It's been a fantastic machine and a fantastic coupler. Absolute beast of a weapon.” 

Mitch tells Brent how once they had the attachments, his boys were in the machines straight away, getting them dirty and getting them working; no instruction manual reading required. 

“They're very simple to use, yeah, and I'm a simple guy. I like simple gear that's not too complicated.” 

This simplicity in practice, he explained, included the ease and speed of getting the buckets on and off the machine. He is also a fan of the angle of the Heli-tilts, which come in especially handy in the landscaping side of things. 

“We can get very good angles and even up against our landscape berms. We've got that nice, beautiful angle and those shapes which we love and it's nice and tight.” 

Matt explains to Brent that although he has never had to use the after-service team for any warranty claims, any time he has rang to ask any questions, the team at Attach2 have been handy and helpful.  

“We like relationships and Attach2 is definitely a relationship-based business and that's what we're all about. My wife Debs and I, we love to have that friendly relationship with people, that we're not just buying something, that we're in the long run with them. We like to surround ourselves with good companies that are going to walk on that journey with us as well, they're not just going to drop it off and say see you later, and Attach2 have been really about that and we stand by that.” 

Future growth and partnerships 

The future is looking bright (and hopefully warm) for Matt. He is looking to keep expanding his business into the central markets and to grow his relationship with clients, old and new.  Continuing to surround himself with good partners is also important to him to help build the future of his company. The team will continue to be proud of and share their love of machines and are looking to expand their fleet in the future, so keep an eye out for those videos on Facebook! 

“We want to keep bringing in new machines down in Southland and Central. We are going to be putting Attach2 [attachments] on them because we love the backup service and the relationship we have with the team there and why not just make it happen when we know it's quality, you know? Why would we change?”