Our Speakers

 Katie Elzer-Peters is the founder and CEO of The Garden of Words, LLC, a digital marketing firm that specializes in email marketing, web development, web strategy, and business development for green industry clients. For 18 years she has helped green industry businesses of every size (from individuals to small, family-owned businesses and large corporations) grow and thrive in the digital age. The Garden of Words takes a broad approach to marketing plan development and implementation, blending tried and true traditional marketing techniques with new and emerging solutions. Katie and her team specialize in making digital marketing tools and tips accessible to everyone, regardless of their background or experience.

 A recipient of the ‘Order of Canada’, the ‘Order of British Columbia’ and an ‘Honorary Doctorate of Technology’, Brian Minter, B.A., is a horticulturist, entrepreneur and co-founder, with his wife, Faye, of Minter Country Garden, a destination garden center and greenhouse growing operation in Chilliwack, British Columbia, Canada. Brian has sat on the boards of many community organizations and has served two terms as the first Chancellor of the University of the Fraser Valley. Well known for his magazine articles, syndicated newspaper columns and TV and radio programs, Brian is an enthusiastic speaker welcomed by horticultural industry members and gardening groups alike.

 Dr. Ken Fry, Entomology Instructor in the School of Life Sciences at Olds College of Agriculture & Technology, has been involved in insect pest management research, teaching, and extension for over 30 years. His research is focused on biological control of insect pests and integrated pest management.

James didn’t just want to become an entrepreneur; he was determined to advance entrepreneurship for all. While attending University, he staged business plan competitions and job fairs to help others launch their careers. In 2003, he ran his first business via College Pro, became Vice President, grew revenue to over $11 million, and trained more than 500 business owners. In 2013, he launched a real estate development company, followed by an office services business.

James’ voracious appetite for helping entrepreneurs reach their utmost potential is what led him to help build Breakthrough Academy (est. 2015). Here, he guides a top-tier group of industry-specialized contracting coaches to transform honest, hardworking trades owners into well-balanced leaders and thriving entrepreneurs.

He’s got a black belt in BJJ, loves adventure obstacle races, is a proud father and husband, and is arguably the most creative ‘would you rather’ question facilitator you’ll ever meet!

 Colin Peters graduated from the University of Minnesota in 2019 with a Bachelor’s in Plant Science, with a focus in Sustainable Plant Health; after which, he worked for several years at Rainbow Treecare as a tree injection foreman and consultant for ash tree health. Additionally, Peters has served a term as a crew member in the Conservation Corps of Minnesota & Iowa. In January of 2023, Peters returned to the University of Minnesota to pursue a Ph.D. in Plant Pathology under the advisement of Prof. Robert Blanchette.

 Bio forthcomingJaime Kedrowski is the Marketing Manager for Ball Seed Company, supporting growers across North America in producing and marketing annuals, perennials, cut flowers, and veggies. With more than 10 years of experience in horticulture sales and marketing, Jaime has supported businesses across the entire supply chain, including breeding, production, post-harvest, distribution, wholesale, e-commerce, and retail. This broad industry experience, combined with a passion for gaining new perspectives, has given Jaime a deep understanding of the challenges and opportunities growers and businesses face in a market that demands innovation, authenticity, and connection. Outside of sales and marketing, Jaime is a licensed drone pilot, raptor rehabilitator in training, and lifelong learner with a curiosity for finding new ways to see and experience the world.

 Dr. Annie Ray is Founder and CEO of Anandi Botanicals Inc., an Alberta-based plant tissue culture company focused on controlled-environment production of fruit, horticultural, and medicinal crops. She has more than a decade of experience across India, Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands, spanning research, commercial micropropagation, and the design and start-up of Health Canada and EU-GMP compliant facilities. Her work in Alberta includes scaling disease-free planting material, integrating greenhouse and field production, and improving plant logistics and packaging to reduce costs and losses for growers.

Dr. Ray has led micropropagation programs for crops such as haskap, sour cherry, cannabis, berry crops, bamboo, and several medicinal and bioenergy species, with a strong focus on practical adoption by producers in the Prairies. She is a reviewer with International Association for Plant Biotechnology (IAPB) and is a member of The Alberta Greenhouse Growers Association (AGGA) and Canadian Society for Horticultural Science (CSHS), contributing to industry and scientific communities locally and internationally. She holds a Ph.D. in Plant Biology from India and a Professional Master of Forest Conservation from the University of Toronto.

 Dev is a cross‑functional technology strategist with experience spanning multinationals, NGOs and startups. He has led product strategy and management, enterprise software design, and applied R&D. He has held senior roles at IBM and Symantec, where he worked on storage products and HIPAA‑compliant archival solutions. He has also led digital cinema, GIS, satellite data‑casting and knowledge management initiatives across agriculture, health and education. As Co‑Founder of Anandi Botanicals Inc. in Lethbridge, Dev now focuses on integrating Automation, robotics and smart packaging with plant tissue culture and conservation, while collaborating with Indigenous organizations and the National Research Council. He has helped in securing multiple grants, collaborations and partnerships.

 Mike Bone is the Curator of Steppe collections and Associate director of horticulture. Mike’s work involves travelling to steppe regions around to world to look for plants that can help provide solutions to the rapidly changing environment. Using climate models, collections are made in regions that fit the projections for the future. Mike also over sees the horticulture research programs and plant improvement programs at the Gardens. This work leads into the Plant Select program that introduces and recommends plants for the greater Colorado front range.

 Megan is a terrestrial ecologist with over 15 years of experience in conservation and environmental management. She is passionate about protecting biodiversity, particularly native plants and pollinators, and advances these efforts through her role as Executive Director of both the Alberta Invasive Species Council and the Alberta Native Bee Council.

Louis has many years of greenhouse experience through his role as a business manager and technical advisor with the Dramm Corporation.  Louis also helps manage a family greenhouse that includes a wholesale location growing specialty plants and spring crops.  A second location includes a seasonal garden centre that requires different watering and plant care strategies.  Louis has developed some key focus principles that help identify successes and trouble shooting.  These principles help owners and managers stay focused on producing profits in their greenhouse business.

 Cynthia Pohl is the founder and principal of Living Lands Landscape + Design, an ecological landscaping firm with over two decades of experience serving the central Alberta region. With a background as a Journeyman Landscape Gardener and Green Roof Professional, Cynthia has channeled her deep-rooted love for nature and ecosystems into a diverse array of projects. These projects, varying in size and complexity, all embody a common thread of reverence for and comprehension of the intricate web of life that supports biodiversity. Notably, in 2015, Living Lands’ biodiverse green roof project was honored with a Cities Alive award for its innovative excellence. Cynthia consistently engages in sharing her expertise in the green roof sector with various audiences.

 Dr. Linda Chalker-Scott, Ph.D., is an Urban Horticulturist and Emerita Professor in WSU’s Department of Horticulture. She is also an ISA Certified Arborist and an ASCA consulting arborist. Linda conducts research in plant and soil sciences, publishing the results in scientific journals and university fact sheets. She enhances the scientific literacy of her audiences by teaching them how to assess the credibility of information sources.

Linda is the award-winning author of five books and appears in The Science of Gardening produced by The Great Courses. She also founded the Garden Professors – a group of academic colleagues who educate and entertain in their blog and Facebook pages. Linda’s educational contributions to science-based information for the public have been recognized many groups including Garden Communicators International and the International Society for Arboriculture.

 Jane has 30+ years of experience in the wholesale nursery industry, primarily in sales and marketing. In her career, she has had the pleasure of helping to introduce some outstanding plants to the North American horticulture industry, including Little Lime® hydrangea, Black Lace® Sambucus , and Bloomerang® lilacs. She has spoken at several industry events, most recently at the NJ ASLA conference, Iowa State University Shade Tree Short Course, West Virginia Nursery and Landscape Association Annual Conference, and the Cincinnati Zoo and Botanical Garden Plant Trials Day.

 Mike Pletz is the owner and operator of Ever After Landscaping, a boutique landscape company based in Ontario. While building and operating his business, Mike recognized a need for practical, real-world education in the hardscape industry and launched the How to Hardscape platform — a growing educational resource dedicated to helping contractors improve their skills and businesses.

Mike is also the host of the How to Hardscape Podcast, where he interviews landscape business owners, entrepreneurs, and industry experts to uncover the lessons, systems, and strategies behind successful companies.

Building on that mission, Mike expanded into video content through his YouTube channel, I am a Hardscaper, which has grown to more than 30,000 subscribers. Through documenting projects, sharing lessons from the field, and creating authentic content, Mike transformed YouTube into a powerful organic marketing engine that not only generates leads for his business, but also produces revenue — allowing him to build a marketing system that gets paid instead of paying for leads.

 Weston Zimmerman spent 15 years in the dirt – starting on crews at Tussey Landscaping, building award-winning outdoor living spaces and world-class water features (winning the 2017 Aquascape Artist of the Year award). He saw first hand how hard contractors work and how little visibility they have into whether it’s actually paying off. 

So, he founded SynkedUP, a project management software built to make blue-collar contractors prosperous. Now he’s blazing a new trail: putting AI into the hands of people who’d rather run equipment than a spreadsheet, so they can run smarter businesses and stress less.

 Jason is a former golf course superintendent, having joined the Olds College faculty in 2009. He specializes in Turfgrass Science and Golf Resort Management, and represents the Alberta Turfgrass Research Center as its Executive Director.

 Born into a second generation nursery family, the green industry has always been a player in Breanna’s life. From folding cardboard trays for the garden center during Friday movie nights as a youngster or arriving at elementary school late because chasing a moose family out of the nursery became a priority side quest enroute to school; the nursery informally woven within, throughout her formative years. Her first job would be mowing the grass in between the tree rows and subsequent summer jobs included working in container production, transplanting field stock and eventually, working her way through the ranks on the landscape division.

 After completing her Bachelor of Education and Bachelor of Science at the University of Calgary, Breanna would start working in her family company, Parkland Nursery and Landscape Services Ltd, full time and eventually becoming management as the company’s Project Manager and supervisor on the landscape construction side. In 2024 she completed her Landscape Horticulturist Journeyman and Red Seal designation. Despite all the paperwork, emails and meetings that comes with management, Breanna still finds a way to get her boots muddy as she still regularly jumps on landscape crews or helps transplant in the fields in the spring. As a third generation grower, Breanna is active as a volunteer at various levels in the green industry. She is the current chair of the Landscape Alberta Nursery Producers, Chair of the Canadian Nursery Landscape Association (CNLA) Grower’s Group, Vice Chair of CNLA’s Emerging Leaders and Co-Host of CNLA’s podcast: Branching Out. Outside of the green industry, Breanna is an Assistant Coach of Rocky Mountain Rage of the National Ringette League and Chair of Ringette Canada’s Athlete Council after having won numerous medals on the national and international stages during her ringette goalie career. In her moments of free time, Breanna is an avid quilter, a stereotypical millennial dog parent to Poppy, a lover of adventure both locally and abroad and the ring leader for mischief and imagination with her two young nephews.

Alec McLennan didn’t grow up in the green industry, but he did grow up with an appreciation for the land. His grandparents, rooted in cattle farming and rural Alberta, maintained large vegetable gardens that became a backdrop for many family memories, while his mom shared that same passion for gardening and the outdoors. Although landscaping wasn’t the career Alec initially envisioned, after joining the industry in 2016 he quickly discovered a passion that would shape his future.

Determined to deepen his knowledge, Alec earned a Bachelor of Applied Science in Horticulture from Olds College, graduating in 2021. Today, as Operations Manager at Land Tec Landscape Contractors, Alec has built his career around delivering high-quality commercial landscape projects that leave a lasting impact on Alberta’s communities. From municipal tree planting initiatives and park development to complex landscape construction and Prime Contractor projects, his passion is on creating and enhancing green spaces that leave a lasting impact on Alberta’s communities and people.

Committed to giving back to the profession, Alec serves as Chair of the Canadian Nursery Landscape Association’s Emerging Leaders Committee, sits on the Board of Directors for Communities in Bloom, and co-hosts Branching Out, CNLA’s podcast, where he enjoys highlighting the stories, challenges, and opportunities that make Canada’s green industry so unique.

In his few moments of quiet time, Alec enjoys camping, collecting vinyl records, writing fiction, cheering on his favourite hockey team, and following the F1 season. His greatest joy, however, is spending time with his wife and their two young boys, whether they’re exploring a new trail or simply enjoying precious time together.

 Lindsey Best began her journey in the landscape profession over 14 years ago after graduating from Algonquin College’s Horticulture Program. She quickly rose through the ranks to manage a multi-million-dollar landscape company, gaining deep expertise in company culture, client relations, business operations, and strategic growth. Lindsey has taught in both the Horticulture and Apprenticeship Programs at Algonquin College, and she serves as an instructor for the Fusion Landscape Professional Certification and the Grow Program. Passionate about the landscape profession, Lindsey is dedicated to supporting and empowering others to reach their full potential. She is currently the Chief Operating Officer of EXT, a landscape management software company.