When it doubt blame Generation X and Y

This is interesting yet not un-expected. Langeveld Bulb Co has filed for bankruptcy protection. Check out this quote, “many insiders are speculating that the closing is mostly the result of declining sales of bulbs, which are less popular with younger consumers, who want instant results in the garden.”

Yep, it’s those dang generation X and Y folks that are to blame. It appears that these two generational demographics are almost entirely responsible for the decline in our industry. It’s becoming fashionable for closing businesses to blame the younger generation. After all the older generations still support the garden industry, NOT!

I have noticed a decline in interest in bulbs for a number of years and it’s not just the younger generation. It’s also “Baby Boomers” who have other things to do with their time. It also explains the decline in bare root sales that I have been noticing over the years. Both bulbs and bare root are available in the winter when lots of folks just don’t get out in the garden anymore. Hey, if they want bulbs or fruit trees they figure we should have them in spring when they are doing their shopping.

I think the industry is so caught up in trying to appeal to Gen X and Y they are missing the big picture. Generation X and Y want to garden just as much or little as the other generations. They are the up and coming home owners who with a patch of ground want to see what they can grow on it. Most of the boomer generation is just as fickle with its gardening and would just as soon be skiing or traveling to warmer climates.

I think we need to quit trying to appeal to particular generations. Try instead appealing to people who are interested in gardening regardless of age. What with Urban Outfitters entering the gardening market we are all standing around just waiting to see the magic that they posses with these younger generations. It’s like we have to completely rethink gardening to appeal to these people. I like what the comments at the end of this post said. Don said this, “I read a lot of analysis about what “Gen X” and “Gen Y” wants, and I find a lot of it pretty patronizing.” I think a lot of generation X and Y think it’s a bit patronizing.

When all is said and done I think the decline in bulb sales is a result of all generations having a lot more that they can do with their time. It’s the big companies that have the most to loose since so much of their sales depend on a larger percentage of each generation buying their products. Let Home Depot, Hines Nurseries, and Scotts’ worry about this stuff. They pay people to worry. The smaller nursery can fine tune its message to gardeners of all ages. I only need 10% of each generation to find gardening interesting and jump in. Yes, it’s good to be small.

Ouch!

It would seem that nursery workers have a image problem when I read stuff like this. In an article on punning in the Kitsap Sun Newspaper in Washington state an article on punning has this, “Poor quality anvil pruners are called the nurseryman's best friend because they lead to so much plant death.” Ouch!

Now I realize that this is suppose to be funny since the idea is plant death leads to people having to replace the plants. That means more money for the nursery. So lets see, nursery folks are hoping you screw up because when you kill plants, you have to buy more.

This is how it works. I hope you buy some great quality Felco pruners so your pruning doesn't kill the tree. That way you will be successful in your gardening ventures and want to continue, which means more money for the nursery. If you fail your more likely to give up on the whole gardening thing.

I can't speak for all nursery people. Maybe some of us do think this way. But I can assure you the last thing I want is for you to fail at your punning. I want you to spend money on a great pair of shears and be successful.

Its funny how the we in the nursery business are thought of by some people. The author of the article just assumes that if the gardener fails they will run back to the nursery and spend more money. If that was the way it worked the industry wouldn't be wringing its hands worrying about the future. And I would be selling cheap punning shears.

Limited guarantees don't resonate with me.

If you think there is a disconnect between wholesale nurseries and retail this will just confirm that. Baileys Nurseries is offering a two-year guarantee for their new “Easy Elegance” Roses. According to their website “Easy Elegance Roses are so easy to grow that we guarantee your success. This limited guarantee covers all residential plantings for two full years from date of purchase and covers the following,• Guarantee applies to residential use only. • Limit of $60 or two roses per household. • Guarantee does not cover damage from animals or roses over-wintered in containers. • Roses can take some time to grow after a hard winter, so be patient. Guarantees are not accepted until after June 15th. Just send us you name, address, receipt, plant tag and a photo of the rose in question...”

Baileys seems to think that's what is keeping younger people from gardening more, a lack of guarantees. They found that Generation X, and Y find roses hard to grow. They equate roses with grandmas garden. Nothing about wanting a guarantee, just old fashioned, and hard to grow. So we are going to solve that by a guarantee. Let me see, I buy a rose and I am suppose to hold on to the receipt for two years, I can't plant it in a container and over water it(which I guess means container gardening must be hard), but I guess if I over water it in the ground thats O.K. Only two roses? Why? If your going to guarantee the roses shouldn't someone who has bought ten of them be entitled to the same guarantee?

This is where the disconnect between some wholesale nurseries and retail operations is growing. My customers do not want more guarantees, but the assurance that the plants they buy are in top condition and that we will be here if they need help. Why only guarantee the roses for two years? What about a lifetime guarantee? How about guaranteeing all the roses a home owner buys instead of just two. Why require the homeowner to deal direct from Bailey's. Shouldn't I be able to take the rose to the retail center where I purchased them and receive my refund or new roses? Do they guarantee the roses will live, or thrive? If they live, but don't thrive as I thought they should, do I still get a refund. Why not give the guarantee to the retail nursery that actually bought the roses from the wholesaler?

Small retail garden center business need to understand that this kind of marketing only benefits the chain stores where this type of mentality reigns. We in the small garden center market are trying to get people interested in gardening, with all the risks and personal responsibility that entails. Who said gardening, or anything worthwhile was risk free? Shouldn't we be encouraging people to make mistakes, learn from them, and jump back in?

Guarantees that have a list of requirements to follow before the guarantee can be enforced just don't resonate with me. Maybe with the market that Bailey's is targeting, but not with the customer I am working with. My customers get a lifetime one-conditional guarantee. The condition is they tell us how to prevent their dissatisfaction in the future. That's it. They also don't have to contact some grower to get the guarantee. They bought the plant from us, and they will deal with us. I'll deal with the wholesale grower.

Keeping it small

I wanted to write about why I think small is cool when it comes to business, especially the nursery business. I have friends, a couple who are not in the nursery business but another retail type business. They recently bought out another business so they now have three outlets. When things were good they were great, but now with the softening economy as well as the sub-prime mortgage mess, which hit their business hard, they are having second thoughts. He told me the other day that he admires us and our small operation, and wishes they hadn't expanded so quick.

It started me thinking about how as a small operation we are able to better handle different types of issues that come up for our business. Right now with the softening of the economy and people not able to get money from their homes you can bet that business is holding its breath. Being a small operation if sales don't match up to our wishes we can cut back without doing to much harm. We don't have a lot of employees that will need to be laid off like Aquascapes. Monica and I do most of the work along with my daughter and one helper.

We can also make changes to our operation on a dime, whereas the bigger you become the harder it is to turn the ship in mid-course. My friends now have to decide weather to try and hang in there or close a store and lay off the employees. Just like Greg at Aquascapes said, laying off employees is one of the hardest things you will ever do. I don't know for sure, but I would guess some of Aquascapes problems stem from expanding the business a bit too fast.

I came across this post today over at the gaping void blog It's about a Savile Row tailor and how his business has grown while staying small. It expresses exactly how I feel that a small garden center should proceed. The tailor and we both offer the best quality, have a niche clientel, and are committed to making the customer experience one of a kind. I like this from the post, “We commonly refer to the people who buy our suits as 'customers', though as the relationships deepen with time, that word no longer seems to do the relationship justice. Words like 'allies' or 'partners in crime' seem somehow more appropriate."

There are plenty of examples of large business success. There is nothing wrong with growing and having multiple outlets. Its just not for me. I want to “grow” but not in a physical sense. Our two acres is plenty “large enough”. I was a part owner in a multi-unit operation and can tell you that while its exciting at first the headaches outweighed the benefits.

I want to have a nursery thats not known for its large physical size or the number of outlets but for its incredible “dollars per square foot” figures. The more you sell in a smaller space the higher your dollars made per square foot figure. This would be a sign of using the space to its greatest potential. When it comes to customers its not the volume of customers thats most important but the quality of customer, and the long- lived relationship that we will build with them.

As a small garden center owner I am proud to be small in physical size. I do however want to be HUGE when it comes to name recognition amongst my target audience. That's where the Internet can come in so handy for small business. Using the far reaching potential of this medium a small concern can get its message out, and build its brand into a international one without going back on its values. What an exciting time to be a small business. Small is cool!

Heronswood Voice

It would seem that we are starting to see more heads of larger concerns starting blogs. One notable example is Greg Wittstock owner of Aquascapes, the number one supplier of pond equipment. We talked about it here. Unfortunately Greg had to start, or started his blog because his company got into some financial problems. Doesn’t matter, because at least now he is out their trying to explain his reasoning for doing what he has done. Greg had to lay off some employees recently, and I bet there are times when Greg wishes he had turned off the comment function at his blog. Some of the ex-employees visit the blog and give Greg a piece of their mind. It makes for great reading for those of us interested in how business works.

Another new blog, at least for me, is also from the world of horticulture. Its Heronswood Voice, written by George Ball. I ended up there after George said some nice things about my blog. George Ball, if you didn’t know owns Burpee Seed as well as Heronswood, the much discussed nursery founded by plantsman Dan Hinkley and architect Robert Jones in 1987. There are passionate feeling about the subject and no mincing of words when it comes to some peoples feeling about Burpee and George. I never really got into the situation at Heronswood since until just a couple of years ago I hadn’t even heard of it. Yes its true, I had little knowledge of Dan Hinkley or Heronswood until the fuss over the sale. Most of my knowledge of the place was gathered at Garden Rant where there have been numerous discussions of the subject and the comments have been generally negative of George and Burpee.

Whatever you think of the Heronswood situation, it’s good to see George out there talking. After all, I have been harping about how important a blog is to a business, especially a large one where people often feel a disconnect with the ownership of the business. Scotts CEO Jim Hagedorn would be well advised to start one about now. I think the disconnect that a lot of people are feeling with Scotts could be discussed through a blog, but back to George and his blog. I wanted to leave a comment, but there is no comment feature. I like having the comment feature turned “on” because thats what starts a “conversation”. Of course I don’t run a multi-million dollar enterprise, despite what Stuart thinks. If I did it might just be too much to deal with all the comments. The solution is to allow trackbacks at the end of each post. One of the most popular bloggers around, Seth Godin, does not allow comments at his blog but does have the trackback feature. That way if you want to comment on something he has said you can, on your own blog, and it will show up as a trackback. This is another way to have a “conversation” without having to answer the comments, yet allowing people to have their say.

Welcome to the blogroll George. Come on over anytime, and feel free to participate.

A Dios vais Andee

Word comes from Stuart of the passing of Andee at Gardener in Chacala . Andee visited my blog now and then, usually leaving a comment. I loved the pictures she would post from Mexico. During the winter these pictures would make me jealous, as she lived in a most beautiful place.

It is nice know that the garden blogging community really is a community. I never met Andee “in person” but she was a friend none the less, and I will miss her visits. Thanks go to her son who took the time to let us know about her passing. Per his wishes I will be extra nice to the cats today and next time I have a Coke I'll toast her memory.

Adios, Andee

The sexy gardener

So consumer spending on pesticide is going to grow by 4.8% to 1.7 billion by 2011. At first blush this sounds like we are going backward when it comes to sustainability. What the study doesn't seem to reflect, or I couldn't find is what type of pesticides we are talking about. I would assume this includes all pesticides including organic and synthetic. I would like to know if organics are a big portion of this increase or are we talking about more Scotts synthetic products for the lawn? My guess it is probably a combination of the two types.

Billy Goodnick over at Garden Wise Guy has figured out the secret! If you want to increase your web site traffic nothing like a little sex to help. He says his post “Have they no shame?Erotica on the streets of Santa Barbara.” increased traffic five times! As soon as I read the headline I made a beeline over to his site since Monica and I had just returned from that fair city. I thought maybe Billy had been snooping around the motel or something. No, it was a case or "hort-erotica" concerning a fig and a Canary Island date palm that have “embraced” right on the streets for everyone to see.

Billy as well as the rest of us that have blogging for a little while know that if you put a sexy title on a post its bound to get more traffic. I like it! Gardening is all about being sexy. Just about everything we do in the garden is about helping our plants in their reproductive urges. We wouldn't be eating if it wasn't for the birds and the bees and the plants frolicking in the garden. Somewhere along the line, I would guess Victorian times, gardening became something of a prudish pursuit in the eyes of many. We may not feel sexy while digging in the ground, or pulling weeds but thats our own fault. It's perception. I say bring back the sexy allure of gardening and watch interest grow.

You might think I am being tongue and check about this subject but I believe the secret to getting more people involved in gardening is through sex appeal. We are already hearing about how good gardening is for weight control and overall health but what about its mental benefits, which would naturally include ours and the gardens sex lives. Nothing like the sound of buzzing bees and tomato plants with big, plump, juicy fruit to set the scene. We're talking about more than just the visual cues that some plants might give, but the more subtle sexuality of the garden. The fragrance of a freshly cut musk melon enjoyed in the garden, while the sound of buzzing bees and bird calls fill the air. The feel of the warm sun on our bodies (naked or not), and the knowledge that growing our own delicious healthful fruit will only make us feel better about our selves, but the world too. Now that's sexy!

P.S. I think the sexier gardening is the less likely you are to use synthetic pesticides. Synthetic pesticides are about the end result, while organic and natural products are more about the "process", and the end result. I use all natural products in the garden. The garden and I wouldn't have it any other way.

"I'm a gardener"

This might be old news to you but I found this interesting. George Harrison, the quiet Beetle said this about the music business in the late 1990's. “I’m really quite simple. I don’t want to be in the business full time because I’m a gardener. I plant flowers and watch them grow. I don’t go out to clubs and partying. I stay at home and watch the river flow.” Here was a man who had all the money and fame a person could possibly want, and he would still rather be known as a “gardener”. Interesting.

5o year record winds!

Returning to work last Friday we had no idea that the weather had gotten so bad while we we're gone. In southern California we kept hearing about the approaching storm. While in Riverside the wind did pick up but not that bad. It was interesting that while we were in Santa Barbara it did rain one night but by morning it was clear.

So when we got to the nursery we we're surprised to hear the power had been out four days. The wind was a 50 year record! Trees were down all over northern California and in the foothills power remained out for some as long as seven days. We had power at the nursery but it was weird. Some things worked, others didn't. Lights glowed at half their strength. PG&E said we had lost our negative wire when the trees blew against the power pole. This is a dangerous situation that Monica and I had no idea about. They cut the power to the store, fixed the pole, and got us power, all in the dark! One guy in a boom truck with a chain saw and lights got the job done. Our utility deserves credit for their hard work. Just a couple of miles from here a utility repairman was electrocuted trying to get the power back on.

The clean up will take days but we are glad we didn't loose any large trees like Alden Lane Nursery did. That nursery, located a couple of hours from here in Livermore lost one of, if not "the" signature oak tree of the nursery, which had stood for centuries. I have been to Alden Lane and met owner Jackie Courtright and she must be devastated at the loss. Here is a link to their website and I assume the tree mentioned is the one in the picture. What a storm!

This next week we should receive our bare root fruit trees. While I don't like the physical part of dealing with them (as I get older my back "talks" to me more) I do like having something new and fresh to get the season rolling. We will plant up half of the trees right away for spring sales and sell the rest “bare root”. I wish bare root season was a growing side of the business but as people become less knowledgeable about gardening many don't even realize there is a bare root season. Customers want fruit trees when they are shopping in spring, hence the reason we pot half of them up. We may start potting up a greater percentage in the future if sales dictate it.

We are having our fruit tree pruning workshop this Saturday from 11 to noon. It is in the event tent, which I am amazed didn't blow over. We'll have coffee, hot chocolate and tea. See you there.

The future begins now.

My blog, which started as just a way for me to talk to my potential customers as blossomed into something more. I realized this after someone ended up at my site after Googgling “we want to start a nursery”. Low and behold it is, as of this writing the first site to show up. I have been getting more and more interest from people who want to know what it means to start and run a small nursery or garden center. Of course I am still trying to figure that out, but I do realize that some of the stuff I take for granted is of great interest to someone just starting out.

This year I am going to try and give you a feel for what some of the day to day issues that come up in a small garden center are. Maybe it will help you decide if this business is right for you. I don't have all the answers. No nursery person does. Its through sharing that we will all be more successful in our efforts. I have received invaluable advice from this blog. Fellow nuserypeople as well as enthusiastic gardeners have given me advice as well as inspiration which we have acted on. Being open this spring seven days a week was one such result of reader feedback.

I invite everyone to participate. If you are a gardener but don't feel your ideas would be appreciated by a professional, you are wrong! Its your advice that I need to help design a better garden center experience. I also appreciate professional advice from people who have been where I find myself now in my garden center career. Realize that while I appreciate your advice there are others who are visiting this blog who are also listening and learning. By helping me you will be helping lots of people who still find this profession interesting and worth while. The challenges are many but through our “connection” we will be able to meet those challenges and enthusiastically work together to create the “garden scene” of the future. I see a gardening revolution taking place as we speak! Revolutions are generally messy and uncertain, but at the other end I see a stronger “garden scene” that we will all remember because we we're there at the Renaissance.

All right, enough of that. Monica is giving me that look that says “get off that computer and let's get to work”. It's off to the first working day of the new year. Cheers!

A lonely survivor

While we we're visiting my daughter and granddaughter in Riverside I just had to get another picture of her next to the Parent Navel Orange Tree. It was just about two years ago that I took the earlier picture of her. The Parent Navel Orange Tree is the original “Washington” Navel Orange Tree from which all others descended. It was this tree that spawned the great citrus industry in California. You can read more about it at a earlier post from two years ago. It is the tree on the right.

The earlier post is my most widely viewed post to this day. It is used as a reference for the Wikipedia entry for orange (fruit). I am footnote #2 Its amazing how this encyclopedia is becoming the reference source for certain subjects. I find myself using it more and more as I search the web.

We stayed at The Mission Inn in Riverside which is where the other Navel Orange was planted by Theodore Roosevelt. That tree died shortly after and the one I wrote about is the survivor.

The Mission Inn and The Parent Navel Orange Tree are reminders of a California that has long passed, yet changed the development of of the west, especially southern California, forever. I find the lonely orange tree at the busy intersection quite moving. It's a little sad to think about how this one tree spawned and then outlived the great citrus era of The Late 1800's to the 1950's. It stands ignored by the thousands that drive by everyday.

Welcome Garden Rant Readers

Over at Garden Rant Amy has posted a survey asking “who are Garden Rant Readers?” Head on over and take the survey.

Amy, one of the writers for Garden Rant was nice enough to mention my blog in her latest post. Needless to say I am excited and proud that she actually reads my blog. Nothing strokes a bloggers ego more than being mentioned by another blogger, especially one who I have always looked to as an example of a great writer. Amy has her own blog and it was there where she caught wind of my blog a couple of years ago, and posted on it. That was where I found out about the larger world of garden blogging, which I wasn't aware of then and I thank Amy for that.

I am passionate about business blogs. If you have a business and are not blogging I think you are missing out. Small business especially can benefit from the conversation that blogging brings. Its a way to let your customers and potential customers know about who you are and what your business is all about. It gives the small business a equal footing with the big players, as they hardly ever will be able to blog in a really honest and open way. Corporate culture just won't allow the honesty necessary to produce an interesting blog. There are to many “secrets” that can't be reveled.

The future of business, especially small business is in not having any secrets. The customer we are trying to attract wants to know more about the business they shop at. They want to make sure that the money they spend not only buys the “stuff” they want but also supports the type of business they like. Blogs are a way to let the customer know what the business stands for. Its also a way for the customer to respond, as long as you allow comments.

The future of small business is to reduce the feeling of “us” (business) and “them” (customers), and increase the felling of “we”. Small business needs customers who will spread the word about the great new business they have discovered. One way to help spread that word is through a business blog. When I Google a business I am interested in I look to see if there is a blog and check that out. Its generally less buttoned down than the company web site, and a more honest look at who runs the company.

Now that I have been blogging for a few years I am starting to see a lot more horticultural professionals visiting my blog. This is cool as our industry tends to be a bit slow when it comes to change. Never the less I have built this blog on my relationship with non-professional gardeners. They are the customers that give me the vital feedback to build our business. They may not actually ever visit my “physical” location, but I consider them my customers never the less.

P.S. The above picture was one of the last of our vacation. We really enjoyed our coastal adventure from L.A. to S.F. It has rejuvenated us and now we are actually looking forward to getting back to work.

Back from vacation

We're back from our vacation to southern California and the coast. We headed down to Riverside to visit my daughter and granddaughter. While there we stayed at The Mission Inn which is a National Historic Building that is a must see if your ever in that area. It is a cross between a hotel, mission, and castle. Covering a whole city block Monica and I spent two days exploring. It is truly a magical place.

From Riverside we drove up the coast to Santa Barbara for a couple of days. After that it was up Hwy. 1 through Big Sur and to Monterey. Then up to San Francisco and home. We had a great time and feel refreshed, which is what vacation is for, right?

Just wanted to let you know where we have been. I will post more once I find out where I left my eclectic toothbrush holder, (I meant electric but it was a bit of an eclectic toothbrush, too), (Santa Barbara likely) and my camera cord used for downloading pictures, (lost somewhere after Santa Barbara and before Monterey). They do call that “The Lost Coast”, now I know why.

No rush honey, I am going to sit over here.

I think that there are a lot of us that could have said “duh” to this story. Open Register points us to a Forbes magazine article titled, “Shop 'Til Your Husband Drops”.

Here is the gist of the article. Major retailers like Bloomingdales have made a HUGE discovery. After a “comprehensive analysis to learn how to make shopping more enjoyable.” “Stores need more areas for weary shoppers to relax.” Of course it's only the wise retailers that are catching on, “'Park-your-husband lounges'” are slowly making their way into retailers from Bloomingdales to Kohl's.”

Its taken these retail giants this long to figure it out! I love this from the article, “Retail analysts say it's impossible to quantify the return on investment these lounges bring in. But the results speak for themselves.” Those analysts always have to quantify everything, don't they?

When you read stuff like this it makes you wonder how these business have become retail giants and stayed in business for this long. I guess we as customers have been willing to put up with this stuff for so long that it now seems like news that most men would like to sit and relax while the ladies shop.

What this says is that the most obvious things that matter in the shopping experience have been, in some cases completely ignored by the major retailers. I am sure many of us could have told these stores just what they needed to do, YEARS AGO! You can imagine the amount of money spent on analysis just to figure out that a few chairs for the men to sit in might make a difference. Of course it will take much more analysis and money to discover that its not just men that need a place to sit, but with the aging population there might be a need for the elderly to sit while the younger member of the families shop.

This all goes to show that just because these places are large with multiple outlets they can be completely oblivious to the most obvious things. I hear that in store sales this year are likely to be a bit softer than they had hoped. Yet, Internet sales rose by 20%. Maybe its not just price, but the fact that you can shop comfortably from home without having to drag the mate to the store, where they will just bug you complaining about the lack of a place to sit.

Vacation!

I know a lot of people end up here at my blog because they would like to start a nursery and are looking for advice. Most recently Joe in Florida wants to know if starting a nursery is the right thing to do . He has received mostly negative feedback so needless to say he is confused. I would imagine the same thing holds for most small business. I for one can't imagine starting a restaurant. That must be an awful hard and difficult business to make profitable. The same could be said for opening a bookstore. The competition from the chains as well as peoples changing shopping habits make starting a new business in almost any field a difficult endeavor. The fact that its a difficult proposition explains why so few people own and run their own small business. There is no safety net. If things go wrong you can blame the economy, competition, the weather, you name it. Just because you can blame the competition for your woes won't cause the empty feeling in the pit of your stomach from going away. You must see, like I do business going in where you ask, "what are they thinking?" We have small business going in and out of business all the time in Placerville. Its like a revolving door.

I got involved in this trade right out of junior college in the late 70's. It was a time when the independent nursery ruled. The only chain competition was K-Mart, and they did a terrible job with the garden department. I remember the first Home Depots going in. The nursery I worked at, Christensen's nursery was located in Belmont, just south of San Francisco. It was a business that catered to the carriage trade and as such the Home Depot's didn't have much of an effect. It's gone now. The land became too valuable to operate a garden center on. It's now condominiums.

Where am I going with this? I don't know except that the business of garden centers has changed dramatically over the last 20 years. Would I still get involved in the business now? I don't know. When I got into the business it was "cool" to be into gardening. You had the hippies moving out of the Haight and into the mountains where they could "get back to the earth". So times have changed, or is it myself that has changed. Both I suppose.

We are on vacation for two and a half weeks now. The nursery is closed until Jan. 12. This will be a good time to plan out what we want to do next year. I find that time away from work helps open your eyes to new ideas that might have been hidden when you are simply focused on work. That's one of the hard things to do when you work for yourself, finding time to get away. It's most important as I find the best ideas often come from "out of the blue", when you least expect it.

I love the outside world, and working in and owning a garden center has allowed me to enjoy that world. Whether or not I would start a nursery today is meaningless. I have one now, and we are committed to having the best one possible. To those of you contemplating opening a nursery don't get bogged down in the negativity. Search out successful business of all types, not just nurseries. See if some of the ideas they are using might work in your business. You cannot just sell plants anymore. You have to sell the whole experience. Gardening has been and will continue to be a source of joy for a large segment of the population. Why would those people want to come to your store? What are you offering that the competition isn't? What could you do better than the competition? How can you continually "wow" the consumer that walks through the door so as to turn them into and keep them as customers. Figure that out and you will be in business as long as you want. We're still working on it.

Here is an link to a garden forum at Garden Web discussing starting a nursery.

The Internet is a great resource that wasn't available when I started out. There are more and more websites you can use to find out more about horticultural business. I am thrilled to think that people would come here to seek advice. Thank you.