Monrovia confirms rumors, Hines exec. hired to explore box store channels

According to Today's Garden Center, "Monrovia CEO Miles Rosedale confirmed this morning they have hired Mike Trebing, former Hines Nurseries senior vice president for sales and marketing, to explore the box store channel. "Yes, he's absolutely on board," Rosedale says. "We're certainly looking at the channel, we've tried to make that clear." You may remember Mike was the one who after Hines first bankruptcy said, "As an outcome of the bankruptcy, Hines has emerged with one of the cleanest balance sheets in the nursery business. " This is before the second, and final bankruptcy a year later. Yikes! As we continue reading the Today Garden Center report we hear Miles Rosedale CEO of Monrovia say after being asked weather they will sell to the box stores, "We really don’t know at this point. We haven’t done business in the box channel in 15 years …but it wouldn’t be prudent, facing our demise, so to speak, to not consider all the channels, and that’s what we’re doing." That explains why they hired Mike Trebing.