Company description

Portland Edible Gardens (www.portlandediblegardens.com) helps people grow food at their homes in the Portland metro area.

We support our clients by building custom raised garden beds and providing full service vegetable garden mentorship and maintenance services. We work with a wide range of gardeners from total beginners to long-time growers in order to help them meet their edible gardening goals and to create beautiful, sustainable, and productive edible gardens.

Job description

Portland Edible Gardens is seeking a skilled, reliable, and energetic horticulturist to join our amazing team to lead, administer, and help facilitate our vegetable garden maintenance/mentorship program for 70+ residential vegetable garden clients in the Portland metro area. As the leader of our Home Gardens Program, candidate will work closely with PEG Owner and will oversee operations for all of our garden clients, manage and support other Home Garden Mentors, as well as working extensively in the field planting, teaching in, and maintaining many of our clients’ raised bed vegetable gardens.

JOB RESPONSIBILITIES:

Fall/Winter Tasks (November-February)

Scheduling:

• In January and February create a garden visit calendar for 70 + clients and multiple employees for the March - September season in Google Calendar
• Solicit availability requests from clients, communicate with each client about their schedule for the season and expectations regarding attendance, etc. per PEG guidelines
• Design schedule for efficient transportation and functional work flow, with appropriate drive time between clients, appropriate visit length given garden size, buffer time for traffic etc. (guidelines will be provided)
• Anticipate potential scheduling conflicts and send clear, friendly, professional communications to our clients accordingly
• Schedule spring bed preparation visits which take place in February and March
• Schedule all garden winterization visits which take place in October
• Update client profiles with relevant garden and contact information in Google Calendar annually in the winter

Inventory and shopping:

• Inventory all supplies and seeds at the end of the season
• Order all needed supplies for garden mentor kits for the coming season
• Track all inventory and purchases in spreadsheet

Planting Plans:

• Work closely with PEG Owner to finalize planting plans for our clients
• Use Inkscape to transfer written planting plans to finalized digital versions which are provided to our clients
• Transcribe all information from planting plans into a spreadsheet form using Google Spreadsheets
• Track the progress on steps of progress in spreadsheets shared with Ian

Garden Season Tasks (March-October)

Conduct garden visits (majority of weekly work hours):

• Drive to clients' homes in Portland Metro Area conducting 3-4 garden visits per day managing time to complete garden visits within allotted time.
• Instruct clients in organic vegetable gardening principles and techniques in accordance with PEG curriculum including:
  • direct sowing
  • planting methods for seeds/starts
  • organic pest and disease identification/prevention/treatment/control
  • irrigation techniques for specific vegetables
  • drip irrigation management
  • composting/cover cropping/mulching techniques
  • specialized care/maintenance for specific vegetables
  • fertilization and soil fertility management
  • harvest timing and methods
  • manual tillage techniques
• Plant seeds and vegetable starts following client's customized seasonal planting plan
• Harvest vegetables with client
• Adjust drip irrigation systems according to anticipated weather
• Document garden visits for record keeping and generation of content for PEG social media accounts
• Maintain tools and equipment weekly
• Once trained, co-train and co-manage new garden mentors with PEG Owner in facilitation of garden visits
• Take photos and use slack to update client profiles every visit

Workshops at PEG Demonstration Garden:

• Teach up to 4 weekend community workshops on seasonally relevant topics at the PEG Demonstration Garden site during the March-September planting season.

Client Customer Service:

• Answer all client emails regarding scheduling questions, horticulture questions etc. Work closely with PEG Owner.
• Coordinate with staff regarding time off requests, and with clients regarding rescheduling,Work closely with PEG Owner and staff to make sure client communications are clear, consistent, and professional, and in line with PEG policies.

Plant Shopping:

• Create shopping list of all plant starts needed for the week using client planting plans
• Submit order to wholesale nurseries for drop off and shop for remaining starts at local nurseries
• Organize all plant starts in trays by client and inventory leftover plants weekly

Social Media/Communications:

• Curate content for PEG social media posts
• Write blog posts for portlandediblegardens.com on seasonally relevant topics

ESSENTIAL QUALITIES:

• Must be highly organized, driven, and capable of managing wide range of tasks independently
• Must demonstrate extensive (3+ years) professional experience and knowledge growing vegetables using organic methods
• Must demonstrate high level of interpersonal, social, and communication skills and provide top level customer service and educational experience to PEG clients
• Must be comfortable with a wide range of people and skillful in adapting to different environments and making clients feel comfortable, supported, and successful
• Must be able to have a very close working relationship with the owner and communicate frequently about shared responsibilities

ADDITIONAL PREFERRED SKILLS:

• Crop planning experience
• Social media/marketing/design experience
• Photography background
• Professional horticulture training
• Experience teaching horticulture
• Experience growing and caring for fruit trees, berries, and other perennial food crops in the PNW using organic methods

COMPENSATION:

Overview:

This is a Full Time, Salaried, Exempt position with an annual salary of $45,000-$50,000/year DOE (Beginning 1/1/2025) with 10 paid federal holidays, 25 additional days PTO and 40 hrs sick pay annually.

Probationary Period:

A 90 day probationary period will commence 9/1/2024 with part time work (30 hrs per week) compensated at $24-26/hr DOE

Paid Time Off (after Probationary Period):

10 paid federal holidays

10 days PTO for December winter break

15 days additional PTO annually (some restrictions apply commensurate with seasonal workload)

Sick Pay:

40 hours sick pay annually. Begins accruing after 90 days employment

Compensation

this position is: salaried, varies DOE, $45,000.00 - $50,000.00

Application instructions

Deadline

August 15, 2024