January 2021 - 82

5 MINUTES WITH ...
MINUTES
-WITH-
JENNIFER MOSS
5
By Teresa McPherson
Could you share a little about your background?
I'm fourth generation family ownership. I'm the oldest
and my brother Dewey is my business partner. We were
both literally raised right outside of a greenhouse, and I
would follow my dad around every day when I got home
from school.
I went to University of Idaho and graduated in 2008
with two degrees - public relations and communication
studies. I had worked in restaurants and hotels up until
I graduated college, and the biggest thing I learned was
what my integrity meant to me.
That's actually what brought me back to the family
business; I found that my morals and ethics did not align
with the people I was working for, so I went back to the
family business. My mom literally went through her job
description and decided what she didn't want to do, so I
ended up taking on some of those responsibilities.
My dad's perspective is that you need to know how to
do every single job on the farm, so I started as the retail
assistant manager. We're about 85% wholesale and 15%
retail, and when I started doing that I learned retail is
kind of a quick-and-dirty Gardening 101 - because you
are dealing face-to-face with customers with gardening
questions who look to you as the expert.
Then I really just started to work in every department
through the off-season and figure out how we do what
we do. To date, I've been at the greenhouse for, I think, 10
seasons now, and I am now one of the owners as well as
the director of sales and marketing.
What do you love about your job?
Inspiring other people to grow. I really find that all of us
have some hesitation in our own strengths, and having the
right person to encourage you along the way and mentor
you is worth more than money can buy.
82 | LAWN & GARDEN RETAILER | JANUARY 2021
Jennifer Moss is director of sales and
marketing at Moss Greenhouses Inc. in
Jerome, Idaho and a GPN Magazine
40 Under 40 alumnus.
But from the hort side of my job, I really wasn't a
gardener, and now I really am. Learning how to garden
and my trials, my errors [let me] really encourage and
cultivate a new gardener. You get to celebrate their victory
with them. Bringing that next gardener in, helping them
succeed is extremely fulfilling for me and for them.
What keeps you up at night?
All the typical business ownership stuff. Because we
were raised in the business, I didn't realize how valuable
it is to be raised by business owners to become a business
owner. I worry about the same typical stuff (budget,
weather, etc.).
On the worst nights, I am literally doing paperwork
in my sleep. That always happens for a period of time in
the spring. It's definitely a bad night when you've done
paperwork in your sleep all night.
What do you enjoy doing in your spare time?
I'm a gardener. It's tomato season right now, so I'm
definitely canning and making sauce, I absolutely love to cook.
I'm a huge skier; I've been skiing since I was a little kid,
and now I'm teaching my stepdaughters how to ski. I'm
really into being outside - hiking, running, you name it.
And my absolute favorite thing - that I miss so much - is
concerts and live music. COVID has killed it. I usually do anywhere
from six to 15 concerts a summer. It's a pretty big thing.
Favorite plant to grow? Why?
Probably tomatoes; I'm a huge vegetable grower. I think
the marriage between the garden and the kitchen gives
us more satisfaction than any flower garden does truly
for me as a cook, and I know I'm an anomaly as a 35-yearold
who home cooks everything from scratch. I really love
vegetable gardening.
January 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of January 2021
