MOSES LAKE - As a kid, Bob Tatum spent his youth mowing lawns in his Moses Lake neighborhood.

"I liked to make money," he said. "I was just a little kid pushing a lawnmower down the street."

Tatum kept up with his business throughout high school and college. He put himself through Big Bend Community College and Central Washington University (CWU) with money earned from mowing lawns. He earned a business and finance degree at CWU.

With his education and skills, he expanded Tatum Lawn Care.

Now instead of pushing a lawnmower up and down the streets, he has a few riding mowers, more services to offer, and 19 employees to help deliver them to customers.

Tatum Lawn Care celebrates 25 years of business this year.

"We've come a long way, that is for sure," he said. "But it's been fun. We're diversified. We've been able to do lots of different things. I get to work within the business and on the business. A little bit of both, which has been kind of fun. It's kind of enjoyable."

His philosophy is to grow the business slowly with some controls to retain its current level of customer service.

"That's really where it is," he said. "That's the whole business. We're a service industry. It's all about customer service. That's one big reason we've been successful, is the customer service."

The business has a card employees give everyone, emphasizing the importance of honesty, integrity and customer service.

"We act as a team," Tatum said. "We don't consider ourselves as employees, we consider ourselves as a team. You won't get anything done without working as a team."

Some of his employees have been with the business for 10 to 20 years.

His business partner, Doug Philen, has more than 20 years of association with Tatum Lawn Care.

At this time, Tatum Lawn Care has four mowing crews, two spray crews, one landscape irrigation crew, two irrigation repair crews and a pruning crew.

"We're full service, anything to do with the landscape, spider and insect spraying, landscape and irrigation install, and maintenance," he explained.

In the winter, his crews tackle snow removal and hang holiday lighting, which they began three years ago.

"It's going well," Tatum said of their lighting service. "It's well-received and a lot of fun. It's been a good add-on; we'll just keep plugging away every year."

Throughout the slower economy, his diversified business shifted from providing services at all new homes to customers' existing homes.

He found customers are still spending money.

"They're working hard," he said. "They don't want to do some of these things. We provide good customer service. It's what kept us going throughout the bad economy. The building industry just really went hard. We're just able to do different things and still keep going."

Tatum credits his customers for the business's longevity.

"Without them, we wouldn't be there for 25 years, that's for sure," he comments. "Absolutely."

For more information, call 509-762-6771.