Steve Turner says that he was "the kind of kid who couldn't sit still." He wasn't sure what he wanted to do, but given his difficulty keeping focused on academics, he knew college wouldn't be a good fit for him. In a family with three older siblings who all went to college, Turner had to chart his own path.

"This was the 1980s, and our school had an automotive trade program, so I got into that," he recalls. Upon graduating he got a job in a related field, doing auto and boat upholstery. But when the recession hit in the late 1980s, he and all the other employees in the shop were laid off. So at just 19 years old, Turner decided to open his own upholstery shop - one that he's been running successfully in southern New Hampshire for 35 years.

For Turner's first 15 years in business, he was a one-man operation. But in 2006 he began to hire employees. As more work came in, he expanded his workforce. But he also noticed it was becoming more and more difficult to find young workers interested in upholstery, or any other trade. "It was almost impossible. And I wasn't alone. Every time somebody who worked in construction or plumbing came into my shop, we'd all be talking about the same thing: how can we get kids back into the trades?"

Building momentum

In 2017, Turner decided to take the first small step by spreading the message himself. He had a few hats made reading "Bring Back the Trades," and would wear them at work. A friend who was a house builder saw it, loved the message, and asked if he could get similar hats with the same phrase and a saw and hammer on them. The next week, an electrician commented that he'd love to get some with an electrical logo on them. By the time a year passed, Turner had produced 47 versions of the hat for different trades and was selling them nationally. That's when another friend saw the potential for not just a side hustle spreading a much-needed message, but a full-blown non-profit that would encourage young people to consider a career in the trades and funnel revenues into trade school scholarships.

"That's how Bring Back the Trades became what it is. I can't take credit for everything that was done - it was really a community grassroots effort," says Turner.

Green/white focus

That community has grown to include a number of business owners in all sorts of trades, including the green and white industries. One early supporter of the effort was Turner's friend and southern New Hampshire neighbor, Ben Holmes, CSP, who owns Rye Beach Landscaping. "When I heard Steve's message, it just rang a bell with me immediately, that this was an area we needed to focus on," recalls Holmes. "I think it's great to show young people this option for a career - and it's a necessity for the trades in general. Landscaping and snow is just one of the many trades that benefit from having young people delve into the various hands-on trades."


Holmes went to college and earned a degree in horticulture, but he says that, for many, college today has become "such an expensive way to experiment with what you want to do with your life - and many times it really sets people back. So the concept of being able to go into a trade, to get paid to learn that trade, can be appealing."

He emphasizes that the Bring Back the Trades mission means educating not only today's job applicants, but also getting in front of very young people. "I'm talking to 12-year-olds. I'm talking to 15- and 16-year-olds, talking to their moms and dads," Holmes explains. "We have lots of conversations with people who are not necessarily employable right away because they're young, but it's a way to reach them early."

Across the border in Vermont, Russ Marsan, who co-owns landscape and snow services provider Carpenter & Costin, says that finding employees has been extremely difficult for him since Covid, and that the state's declining population of young people makes the job even harder. When he heard about Bring Back the Trades, he immediately wanted to learn more.

"I'm friends with Mark Aquilino and Billy Butts at Outdoor Pride Landscape & Snow Management in Manchester, NH, and they told me about it, and how they feel the mission is critical to the future success of their business," says Marsan. "I completely agree, and anybody that knows me knows I typically don't stick my toe in the water - I usually just jump in and then I'll figure out how to swim from there. A week later, I was in Steve Turner's upholstery shop talking about ways that he and I could collaborate." Now, a large Bring Back the Trades event is being planned in Vermont for the spring with a goal of building awareness, offering trade school scholarships, and connecting employers with young people considering a career in the trades.

Marsan says he's had no problem getting support from other companies in his area that also are concerned about the future of the trades.

"It seems to be an easy conversation - it resonates well with people. They're eager to talk about it, and eager to talk about it in terms of finding solutions." He notes that it's a topic that business owners will often complain about when they're together, "but you can only do that for so long; at some point you have to just get after it, because complaining about it is not going to make it better," he emphasizes, encouraging others to join the Bring Back the Trades community.

Giving back

Zech Strauser, who founded a successful landscape and snow management company in Pennsylvania and now operates Urture, a work apparel company, has seen firsthand the importance of promoting the trades. Urture is a sponsor of Bring Back the Trades, and also donates a percentage of its revenues to help fund trade schools through its "3Patch Project" program. Companies that order branded employee apparel can specify which local trade program they'd like Urture to support.

Strauser says it's been exciting to see companies be able to help support the trade programs that are producing the next generation of what he calls "green collar" employees. "And I think we're right at that tipping point of now," he notes. "Parents, children, students, educators are starting to talk about it. And I think the trades are being framed up as a good option for what we would traditionally call a successful career," says Strauser.

Turner says that this type of messaging around jobs in the trades is critical. "When I started doing this work, I thought the shortage of people in the trades was a kid problem: kids just don't want to learn, or they don't want to work," he says. "But as I started really getting into it and talking to the people and going to the trade schools, I saw that the issue often has to do with parents saying to their kids, 'You really should go to college, because you can't make a good living in the trades.'" He says this is usually because of the nature of the trades in past generations: dirty, unsafe, low-paying, no room for advancement. Many trades today, he notes, are more characterized by technology, career growth, competitive salaries and retirement programs.

"I'm not against college whatsoever," Turner emphasizes. "I have one son, and he went to college and is doing really well. I created Bring Back the Trades specifically for kids who don't want to choose the college path." And he's thrilled to report that progress is being made. "In the last two years, I've seen the pendulum swing; the message is really starting to grab hold, and the parents are starting to figure it out," says Turner, who noted that Bring Back the Trades is also building mentor programs for these future tradespeople to look up to and get help from.

Holmes agrees that the trades are beginning to be seen in a different light: "Partially as a result of Steve's efforts, the trades are less looked down on as a fallback now, and rather as a true career path where you can legitimately build wealth, and also have a guarantee of work."

Mass exposure for the trades

On November 15, Bring Back the Trades - backed by many supportive sponsors - held a huge event at the New Hampshire Technical Institute to promote the trades as a promising career path and give students exposure to more than 80 companies offering a wide array of career opportunities.

The event was headlined by Mike Rowe, who became well known for his TV show "Dirty Jobs," and has since become a national spokesperson promoting careers in the trades. Bring Back the Trades handed out more than $50,000 in scholarships at the event. Similar events are now being planned in other states. To learn more about the organization, and to become a part of the effort, visit bringbackthetrades.org.

Patrick White has covered the landscape and snow and ice management industries for over 25 years. Contact him at pwhite@meadowridgemedia.com.