UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Will customers of lawn-mowing services accept robotic, autonomous lawnmowers cutting the lawns at their homes with no human operator nearby? Eichenlaub Inc., an upscale landscape firm in Pittsburgh, is counting on agribusiness management students in Penn State's College of Agricultural Sciences to find out.
Dan Eichenlaub, founder and president of the design-build-maintenance landscape firm, is studying the new technology as a potential solution to a tight labor market.
"You can have the best technology in the world, but if no customer wants it at their property, it isn't a solution," Eichenlaub explained to 70 agribusiness management students who visited the firm's headquarters this fall for a hands-on, experiential learning project organized by the college's Entrepreneurship and Innovation Program. "Is the market adoption going to be there?"
As part of a live venture case, agribusiness students over a two-week period interviewed Eichenlaub's customers about their perceptions of autonomous mowing and now are analyzing this feedback to develop recommendations. The firm is studying the automatic mowers as a potential solution to a labor shortage affecting its lawn-mowing service contracts.
Husqvarna, the manufacturer of the autonomous mowers Eichenlaub is testing, demonstrated the company's Automower for students. The machines operate rain or shine, which helps lawns look good during rainy summers, although Husqvarna recommends storing the mower inside during extreme weather.
But there are also potential risks. Customers are likely to be concerned about what happens when a child or pet is in the path of the machinery. The Automower is designed to stop and turn around when it encounters an obstacle and to stop automatically if the mower is lifted up or turned over.
Ben Patterson, a Penn State senior animal science major from York, thought of another risk: Some customers may be more interested in buying their own automatic machine to maintain their lawn instead of paying a lawn-service contractor.
Traveling to Pittsburgh to meet Eichenlaub, see the company's operation and see the Automower at work was all better and more valuable than watching the best PowerPoint presentation in a classroom, said Moira McCullough, a senior agribusiness management major from Birdsboro, who also will graduate with a minor in entrepreneurship and innovation.
Getting students out to real businesses to witness entrepreneurship and innovation as it unfolds is essential to their education, said College of Agricultural Sciences Dean Rick Roush, who identified this need a few years ago. Roush supported and attended the day-trip to Eichenlaub in Pittsburgh and the fall 2017 trip to Sterman Masser Potato Farms.