103 102 Growth Rings
searching out job listings and attending interviews before finding the internal auditor
position at Davey.
As internal auditor, Covey spent his early days at Davey managing various roles
on the audit team. It didn't take long for executive management to recognize Covey's
skills and interests in the areas of operations and people, and his willingness to take
on any challenge. Within five years, Covey transferred to eastern utility operations
where he began as an administrative manager in 1996. is proved the first of many
steps up the Davey corporate ladder.
Recession and Environmental Revolution –
e Challenges of the New Decade
Just two years in, the revenue increase R/C operations started the 1990s with slowed,
as the U.S. entered a mild recession that saw unemployment rise to 7.5 percent by the
end of 1992. Myriad theories abound as to the causes of the recession, but the end result
for Davey was that the company's affluent but cautious residential customers cut back
on or deferred services. "e recession has impacted our residential customer base
more severely than have prior recessions," the company's 1991 annual report notes.
Davey's Wilmington, Delaware, R/C office was among the hardest hit residential
offices. Wilmington is home to the headquarters of DuPont, which laid off thousands
of employees – many of whom had relied on Davey for their tree and lawn care
needs. "When the recession hit, we assumed that corporations and estates would see
us through," Jay Townsend, then district manager in Wilmington, told the Bulletin
in 1992. "at worked pretty well through 1991, but then even the big clients shut
down."
Other offices faced similar tough times. Davey's North Pittsburgh residential
office instituted a hiring freeze. e office was fortunate to have a five-week backlog
for tree pruning work requests, but calls for other services were down. e office's
district manager during the recession, Scott Simpson, told the Bulletin his staff faced
an uphill battle to maintain the same sales volume as the previous year. In West
Philadelphia, the residential office – like so many other Davey offices – also struggled
with slow demand. e West Philadelphia office relied on its core of experienced
Chapter 6
Davey crews cared for trees at the picturesque Fort Point National
Historic Site beneath the Golden Gate Bridge on the San
Francisco Bay in 1993. e March 1993 Davey Bulletin (inset)
touts the Davey Tree Surgery Company's work on the property.
Alvin Cannon receives an inuagural John
Davey Award of Excellence from Doug Cowan.
Cannon, regional manager, Utility services,
was a key manager in the hurricane-prone
southeastern states during the mid 1980s
and 1990s.
In 1990 Davey sponsored the American Forestry
Association's Global ReLeaf program. Doug
Cowan is pictured third from left at an event
for the tree-planting campaign.
