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Hey Bulldog - Go easy on me man - I'm only a lawyer - prosecutor- dad etc. LOL
Its a plant nursery - more than a landscape business. Yes its turnkey -they have two employees one "certified" who run much of the business. They would stay.
Sales have gone up each year over the last 4 2009 278k 2010 313k first 4 months this year up 15 k from last.
The person who would go in with me is an accountant. They mark prices on the pots with magic marker - no computer - no website and they don't seem to grow much from seed. All that makes it seem the profits could be much higher.
Ah ok now I understand. Well given that, it sounds like you might have a new profession on your hands.
I was just shaking you down. I remember you can get a little worked up now and again especially about us Catholics.
A web site definately would not hurt. You could announce the different types of flower and plants that are coming into season, planting advice, sales, coupons etc.........
More than the web site, a more aggressive local marketing campaign would be immediately more valuable. You have got to really differentiate yourself from the big box stores like LOWEs.
What can you offer that they can not. I hope you plan on being at the business everyday. With nurseries its all about the culture. I have seen many an absentee landscape supply business fail in the first three years because of the owner not driving the service culture necessary to compete against Home Depot, Lowes etc......
Here is an example of a place I buy a lot of plants from when my whole sale supplier cant get me the more unique plants and flowers some of my projects require. Maybe you can get some ideas from them.
The main competitor for this garden center is also for sale. Those two are the majority of the area market - a county of 26,000 -many retired. This presents some interesting options.
These are very difficult businesses to evaluate beyond the hard assets of the physical plant ...
real estate, buildings, structures, office equipment, nursery equipment and supplies can be appraised and valued ... and, IMO, the value of all the stuff is only it's depreciated value in the marketplace.
The plant inventory is a bit harder to assess. You need to have a very keen sense of what is marketable and what is simply eyewash that won't sell very well in your near term. At best, it is only worth a depreciated value from it's original wholesale cost for you to purchase it now. There's a lot of blue sky associated with these items ... they may yet sell for a good retail price, but how long will you have to hold on to it and what is your costs in labor/supplies/space/utilities to have it ready to sell at some unknown time in the future?
My wife ran a sizable landscaper and greenhouse business while in school (for a Landscape Horticulture BS, her real passion ... after having earned a BS in management) ... and they had 7 figure gross sales for a few years. But the area around it has since been built out and their sales have dropped off quite a bit; the absentee owners have sold off two of their locations for real estate development. For a long time, they depended upon the passion and interest of the local ag students to select inventory, nuture it, and enthusiatically and knowledgeably sell it. For whatever reasons ... the school has distanced itself from those ag career paths and in the last 2 decades focused upon IT and similar hi-tech degree programs. Which means far fewer impassioned staffers to work there ... and far fewer sales.
We've watched for the last three years as the local major independent nursery in our area went from a very successful knowledgeable sole proprietor to the hands of a military retiree ... a 30 year AF officer, used to directing staff but with little real knowledge of horticulture, plants, materials, and an interest in landscape design.
He's been treating the business like he sells a commodity product, and when he's up against the big box stores (HD & Lowe's), he loses out to them. He clearly doesn't understand that he's got to offer something better and different in terms of knowledge, advice, selection tailored to our climate zone and local soils/moisture, and other related issues. He skirted a bankruptcy by selling off the real estate he'd bought ... a prime in-town commercial location ... and moved to a number of leased spots with progressively less square footage, site appeal, and greenhouse (or tunnel) structures which are essential to protecting plants for sale in our area. He has virtually no qualifications in this industry, and while he can talk a good game ... others who have true knowledge of the plants and materials in this area know that the fellow doesn't have good information to share with his clientele. This fellow even puts on seminars and teaches at the local Community College about plants and trees with information that he reguritates from industry suppliers pushing various products without knowlege specific to our area.
Working at the county extension office, my wife runs across all the bad advice and wrong plants that this fellow sells to unsuspecting clients ... just like the box stores here sell inventory selected by corporate buyers who have no knowledge of horticulture in our area. The best they can do is to refer to prior repeat sales and order stock on that basis, and we see all kinds of plants brought in every season that simply will not flourish or survive here, fertilized and sprayed with all kinds of stuff that's nationally marketed but very inappropriate for our soils/climate.
Bottom line: I don't care how successful you are as a home gardener or as a lawyer ... unless you have true knowledge of your climate, soils, water, growing conditions, and a true passion which you can share on a daily basis with your customers as a trusted resource for their landscaping and gardening hobbies ... you'll have a very difficult time in this business, even if they sold it to you for no more than the FMV of the real estate and structures. This is not a commodity business, it's a people business ... and you'll be blindsided by the knowledge of long term enthusiasts coming to your place of business ... if you can show them something that adds to their knowledge and earns their trust, you can make a sale, if you can't ... they will go elsewhere. Your real competition is the knowledge and availability of the specialists that are on-line who can replace you as a trusted resource.
For example: my wife receives over 200 cataloques (as well as 20 commercially oriented publications bi-monthly) in the mail every year, and she studies their offerings to find out the latest as well as who has heirloom varieties of the plants and vegetables she is interested in growing. Every year, our greenhouses have about 20-30% of the plants in there that are just for trial and to see if we can get them to grow in our climate zone ... and the varieties that do, we add to our plantings for the next year's Farmer's Market sales. Sometimes they are hits, sometimes they aren't ... two years ago, we had an heirloom white eggplant that grew well and had wonderful flavor and decent size. Last year, we planted a lot of it and it sold out every Market. This year, we wanted to get more ... sorry, not available. Now we're stuck back to experimenting with finding another comparable eggplant for our produce line ... and I know folk will be disappointed to find out in July that we don't have it this year. My point here is that this is the type of dedication and full time year around committment it takes to be successful in this business ... are you willing and able to do this for your prospective operation?
I'd add that my wife sometimes hands me an article from one of her publications ... and the article can be just as complicated and lengthy and footnoted and referenced and cited as a legal document/trial or case review. It's not trivial receiving this much information so frequently, and you've got to wade through it all to determine what is applicable to your operation and what isn't, and then read/comprehend and sometimes, implement operations or products in accordance with what you've learned. This is not the stuff of a pastime that an employee in your business is going to undertake; you'll need to do this for yourself to manage the place. Between new developments, chemicals and regulations, varieties, and a host of other important and relevant stuff to your business ... you must stay informed so that you can be that trusted resource for your clients. Do you have the time to devote to this background work for the business? Do you have the time to teach this stuff in clinics or seminars to your clients to keep them coming back to you for contact with meaningful and valuable content?
Responding to your questions:
1) Many small greenhouses have turned to internet sales to expand their operations. Generally, they specialize in certain types of plants and market them ... for example, try to buy "mexican oregano" plants, which are not a true oregano variety. Most likely, you'll only find a couple of greenhouses selling live cuttings because these are a bear to grow from seed. But for cooks who want the flavor of this herb freshly grown, this is the best source for it. Niche sales are an item you can develop on-line ... a larger catalogue of products would be taking on some of the large, well capitalized majors in the greenhouse/landscaping business.
2) Lots of software available for these types of businesses. Check the ads in industry publications like VGN (Vegetable growers news), or in dedicated nurseryman periodicals. Absent that, check the "app store" for Mac software which you may find suitable.
Sun that's a really informative post. There is someone pretty much running it that will stay. We know something about plants and what grows but not an expert however are friends with the Ag Extension people.
As the competition is for sale- any ideas on how that might play? If I could find someone to buy that and work cooperatively -maybe stock different types of plants or share advertising highlighting this as a great area to buy plants ( two big centers one block apart) that could help.
Sun that's a really informative post. There is someone pretty much running it that will stay. We know something about plants and what grows but not an expert however are friends with the Ag Extension people.
As the competition is for sale- any ideas on how that might play? If I could find someone to buy that and work cooperatively -maybe stock different types of plants or share advertising highlighting this as a great area to buy plants ( two big centers one block apart) that could help.
As I have done on several occasions I find it better to run the competition out of the market. Especially in this economy. As sunsprit described in several detailed paragraphs, you need to eat, drink, and breath this business everyday or you will not make it.
There is a running joke in the Green Industry-" The fastest way to make a small fortune in Landscaping/Landscape Supply is to invest a large fortune." As a small business person you'll need to put in 12-16 hour days to make this thing work. The last thing you need is a competitor taking away your cash flow.
Sun that's a really informative post. There is someone pretty much running it that will stay. We know something about plants and what grows but not an expert however are friends with the Ag Extension people.
Thanks for the kind words.
As I and bulldogdad have pointed out, your expertise in this business is the key to success ... and even that must be a 7-day week effort. Plants don't take a day off, and your clientele depend upon you to supply them with insect free, disease/virus free, healthy, attractive, properly trimmed/pruned (if needed), good root structure, appropriate to your area vigorous plants and materials.
The extension office can certainly be a valuable resource if it's got trained folk in your area of concern. Ours does, but many do not ... they focus on other aspects of their business, such as 4-H or Home Economics. A lot depends upon the leadership and their allocation of funds, which are typically pretty tight these days for these services. If you've got a good County Horticulturist, then that's a person that should be seeing you a lot for many years.
As the competition is for sale- any ideas on how that might play? If I could find someone to buy that and work cooperatively -maybe stock different types of plants or share advertising highlighting this as a great area to buy plants ( two big centers one block apart) that could help.
I'm not sure that I have enough information at this point to give good advice re your market position and potential competition in your client area.
You do present, however, an interesting possibility with two operations so close by each other ... Buy them both, even if you need to take in a partner that might otherwise have been your friendly (or maybe not) competitor. There's a lot of potential in that combination ... you could announce a merger of the two businesses (if you see name recognition being a factor in their sales), you could announce the new ownership of the one center and the other now becoming the "annex" featuring goods and services that the "main store" doesn't support ....
Well, you get the idea. The synergy possibilities are numerous and to secure a niche business under your control allows you to have a working partner in the day-to-day hands on retail operations while you could be free'd up to handle the back side of the house operations ... the knowledge business, the wholesale purchasing, etc.
With your legal background skills, a workable contract to benefit all parties ... and to get the additional investment into your business ... could be a real possibility, do you think?
I'm not sure that I have enough information at this point to give good advice re your market position and potential competition in your client area.
You do present, however, an interesting possibility with two operations so close by each other ... Buy them both, even if you need to take in a partner that might otherwise have been your friendly (or maybe not) competitor. There's a lot of potential in that combination ... you could announce a merger of the two businesses (if you see name recognition being a factor in their sales), you could announce the new ownership of the one center and the other now becoming the "annex" featuring goods and services that the "main store" doesn't support ....
Well, you get the idea. The synergy possibilities are numerous and to secure a niche business under your control allows you to have a working partner in the day-to-day hands on retail operations while you could be free'd up to handle the back side of the house operations ... the knowledge business, the wholesale purchasing, etc.
With your legal background skills, a workable contract to benefit all parties ... and to get the additional investment into your business ... could be a real possibility, do you think?
As usual fantastic business advice from the Sun.
However I did find it surprising that you popped up in Garden as I am used to seeing your insightful advice over in Business. 10/10 again on your posts.
A good friend of mine had a small but really profitable garden center in Toronto. The secret to his sucess was that he also had a gardening business. You don't make much selling a flat of annuals but you do make a good profit if you plant them in someones garden. I have seen him go out and do jobs in wealthy areas where he was planting 100 plus flats. He also did a lot of sodding and usually had about 5 people working in that end of the business. Of course a natural to go along with this is, multch, sand, stones of different types. Because you need a small dumptruck and a loader you also sign up your gardening customers for snow removal services in the winter. LOL, I guess there's no snow where you'r from. Anyway, this buddy of mine was surrounded by big commercial garden centres and they never hurt him at all because he was offering services they they wern't.
i wouldnt sell online, but id definitely have a website with photos, gardening tips and articles, contact information, directions, etc
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