Scotts is a lawn care company that rose to prominence by providing products that enabled residential and commercial customers (including golf courses and baseball stadiums) to cultivate and maintain healthy, weed-free lawns. Along the way they acquired the Miracle-Gro brand and licensed established lawn mower manufacturers to produce a variety of walk behind and riding lawn mowers.
There are two companies today that build the bulk of Scotts lawn mowers: John Deere and the American Lawn Mower Company. Deere produces the riding mowers, as well as the gas and electric walk behind mowers. While American Lawn Mower produces Scotts reel-style mowers. With the manufacture of their lawn mowers in such capable hands is it safe to assume Scotts mowers are a solid investment? That’s what I’ll determine in our Scotts lawn mower reviews.
Our Scotts Lawn Mower Reviews
History of Scotts Lawn Mowers
The history of Scotts is, in many ways, the history of our relationship with the lawn. The company was founded in the late 19th century by Civil War veteran Orlando McLean Scott. Scott created a way to remove weed seeds from grass seeds, thereby assuring his customers (mostly golf courses at the beginning) that they would save big money in the long run because they wouldn’t have to be chasing weeds all the time.
In 1928 the company introduced its signature product “Scotts Turf Builder”, which was the first fertilizer of its kind formulated specifically for lawns. That product really helped the company take off and by the 1950s Scotts was becoming a household brand due to the growth of the suburbs and the attendant focus on lush, healthy lawns.
Fast forward a bit to the 70s when the company was snapped up by then-technology giant ITT. Scotts managers felt the new parent company was ignoring the brand and arranged a leveraged buyout that restored independence to the brand.
Not long after, as part of the company’s new, more aggressive marketing posture, Scotts began licensing its name to a variety of lawn mower producers, finally settling on John Deere and American Lawn Mower Company.
Today, an array of lawn mowers are sold under the Scotts name, including reel-style, human powered mowers, electric and gas walk behind mowers (of both the push and self-propelled variety), standard riding mowers, and zero turn mowers. We cover many of these in our Scotts lawn mower reviews.
Where are Scotts Lawn Mowers Made?
The people at Scotts went to great lengths to find companies that would produce mowers they felt comfortable putting the Scotts label on. And they found two that fit the bill. As such their powered mowers are produced by John Deere in a variety of locations across the US, including Waterloo Iowa, Augusta Georgia, Greeneville Tennessee and Horicon Wisconsin. While Scotts reel-style human powered lawn mowers are manufactured by the American Lawn Mower Company in their factory in Shelbyville, Indiana.