Landscape Workshop Acquires Lawn Butler, Entering Salt Lake City

What happened

Landscape Workshop, a Birmingham, Alabama-based commercial landscape maintenance company, announced on August 25, 2026, that it had acquired Lawn Butler, a commercial landscaping business in the Salt Lake City area, from Outworx Group. Lawn Butler was one of three Outworx landscape maintenance businesses in the transaction, alongside Aero Groundtek in the Orlando area and Gold Landscape in Dallas-Fort Worth. Lawn Butler's employees joined Landscape Workshop, and Christopher Null, previously vice president of landscape services at Outworx, joined as a regional vice president. The announcement did not state a price.

The seller

Lawn Butler is a commercial landscaping business based in Murray, Utah. Its service, which now continues under Landscape Workshop, covers Salt Lake, Utah, and Davis Counties, in an area running from Salt Lake City to Lehi, Park City, Saratoga Springs, Vineyard, and Alpine.

Rudy Larsen founded the company and ran it as owner, president, and CEO. This is its second sale in six years. In April 2020, Aero Operating, then a portfolio company of Mill Point Capital, acquired Lawn Butler, at the time a Centerville, Utah, landscaping and snow removal company, in a three-company deal that also added Groundtek of Central Florida and The Shepherd's Landscaping. By this year Lawn Butler was a division of Outworx Group, a commercial exterior services company whose work runs from snow and ice management to landscaping. The seller this time was that corporate parent, not the founder.

The buyer

Landscape Workshop serves office, industrial, retail, healthcare, multifamily, municipal, HOA, education, and hospitality properties. An Ares Private Equity fund acquired a majority stake in the company in May 2025, when it had 38 locations across the Southeast. It now operates from more than 50 locations across 16 states.

The Outworx deal takes Landscape Workshop into Dallas and Salt Lake City and adds to its existing Orlando operations. "This partnership strengthens our presence in Orlando while establishing new operations in Dallas and Salt Lake City," said J.T. Price, the company's chief executive, who added that Landscape Workshop has "a longstanding partnership with Outworx's National Exterior division."

The deal follows two Florida acquisitions this summer: Palm Atlantic Landscape Maintenance in Fort Lauderdale in June, and Big Yellow Services in Tampa a week before this announcement. Bradley Arant Boult Cummings was Landscape Workshop's legal counsel on the Outworx transaction, and Warren Averett provided diligence support.

What Outworx sold, and what it kept

Outworx sold its landscape maintenance businesses and kept its national exterior facilities maintenance business. "This transaction sharpens Outworx's focus and allows us to continue investing in our core national exterior facilities maintenance platform," said Derek Simon, Outworx's chief financial officer. McDermott Will & Schulte served as Outworx's legal counsel.

The other two businesses in the package had long local records: Aero Groundtek has served greater Orlando for more than 35 years from Ocoee, Florida, and Gold Landscape has served Dallas-Fort Worth for more than 30 years. Owners weighing a sale to a platform can read our guide on selling a landscaping business to private equity.

What this means for Utah commercial landscaping owners

This time, a business its founder built in Utah was sold by a parent company choosing which service lines to keep. In the Palm Atlantic and Big Yellow sales, the selling owner joined Landscape Workshop as a senior account manager; the leader who came across in this one was an Outworx executive. For a commercial landscaping owner weighing an offer from a group that runs several service lines, the Lawn Butler sale is a concrete case to raise before signing: what happens to the business, and its people, if the buyer later decides that line is no longer its core.

OffDeal is an advisory firm that helps lower-middle-market business owners sell with confidence. Reach out to learn more about our expertise with commercial landscaping businesses in Utah.

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Source: Landscape Workshop - https://landscapeworkshop.com/landscaping-blog/landscape-workshop-expands-national-footprint-through-acquisition-of-outworx-groups-landscape-maintenance-businesses