If I Could Turn Back Time: Six Things I’d Do Differently
- Design for Flexibility - Change is inevitable. Are my greenhouse structures configured to easily accept changes like blackout curtains or even thermal blankets? Can I adjust growing conditions in individual greenhouses (temperature, humidity) easily and quickly?
- Consolidate for Efficiency - Keep crops with similar growing needs consolidated in the same greenhouses, even if it means leaving some empty. By closing unused space, it can free those spaces to be opened and configured to whatever growing conditions are needed for new and incoming crops. Take advantage of downtime to perform maintenance or upgrade systems.
- Plan for the Future - Develop a vision for the next 5, 10 and 20 years and plan how to get there from the beginning. Constantly reacting to the past and even the present ties me down and restricts my ability to respond to changing conditions.
- Monitor Operating Expenses from the outset - It’s a false economy to reduce capital expenses by taking shortcuts which limit my flexibility and options for the future. Comparison shop from the outset - don’t be tempted to take the easy option over the most cost-effective one.
- Avoid Cookie-Cutter Solutions - greenhouse structures, lighting systems, airflow, shading or light deprivation - are my setup and associated systems optimized to allow maximum flexibility? Don’t choose “package B” just because it’s easy and carries a discount - what will work best for me in the long run?
- Consider Sales Opportunities - for both retail and wholesale operations. Will add-on products like cut flowers or garden accessories increase appeal for your retail operation or will they make your presentation random and unfocused?
You’re Just the Right Size: Wholesale vs Retail
Retail locations depend on a convenient, moderately high traffic location with easy road access to bring lots of customers who may notice the business and later decide to stop by because it has lodged in their mind. This point cannot be underemphasized. Highly desirable businesses have failed because their location, despite a busy intersection, was inconvenient to enter and exit except from a single direction. Immediately, this newly established retail location lost approximately 50% of their spontaneous drive-by customers.
Wholesale businesses don’t depend so much on location - plenty of space to produce a high volume of product is more important, but a visible location, good signage, and easy access for trucks to load purchases is critical. For wholesale businesses, the ideal customer is a business owner who requires a diverse lineup of houseplants, landscape plants, and trees.
Seasonal flowers, vegetable startups and bedding plants are certainly a requirement for customers who operate retail locations, while landscaping plants and bedding plants will be popular with landscapers. Grocers and florists will order a smaller volume of plants, but they can’t be ignored. The goal is to sell a wide selection to each customer so that you have a consistent rotation among all your inventory. Stagnant inventory will lose freshness and appeal to your customers.
Consider your experience and preferences when you’re deciding whether to go wholesale or retail. Excellent retail locations are almost certainly more costly than wholesale locations which may be in rural areas still convenient to major highways. The types of customers and their typical demands will differ. Wholesale customers aren’t as likely to be interested in ornamentation and casual add-on objects like garden gnomes and windchimes, unless they’re available in wholesale volumes. Retail customers will need a lot more personal time and advice. Which are you more comfortable with?
Step Right Up: Marketing Your Greenhouse
- Curb Appeal: An appealing street view with beautiful, healthy plants and attractively displayed addons will draw many more new customers than a blank facade and broad expanse of asphalt. Spend time on dressing up your presentation and count it a worthwhile investment in marketing.
- Online Advertising: Online search engine ads can be tightly focused on your local market and directed to potential customers who have plants and gardening on your mind, based on their recent search history. Be sure to work with someone who has direct experience with online advertising who can streamline and optimize your advertisements and focus on those which produce the best results.
- Social Media: Popular social media sites offer great opportunities to keep in touch with loyal customers and find new ones. The key to success in social media is to provide more than a splash page with your end-of-season bedding plant sale. Potential customers usually go online to find growing advice, problem solving, care and feeding, and how-to’s for everything from designing attractive flower beds, establishing a wildflower garden, or diagnosing tree diseases. Create informative content on your business website which you can feature on your social media platforms (even just a timely mention and link on your Twitter feed).
- Business Website: This is the place to keep plenty of useful content focused on helping your customer. The more fresh, useful information available to your customers, the higher your website will rank on search engines like Google. Work with an SEO specialist to ensure your site is optimized so that local customers will be directed immediately to your site and not to the anonymous big-box store down the street.
- Online Promotions (Groupon, WagJag, Living Social): Some businesses who use Groupon and similar deal sites say that these are great for bringing new customers in, but they’re focused on the deal and rarely produce return business. Consider the profit potential for your offers (on-site classes?) and then concentrate on wowing your customers enough that they wouldn’t seriously consider going elsewhere.
- Direct Mail/Flyers: So much physical mail is tossed as junk these days, and unsolicited flyers left on windshields or doorknobs may offend rather than attract new customers. Ask around with your customers to gauge their interest and likely reception to this kind of marketing.
- Word of Mouth: You need to make your business memorable enough to stick in your customers’ minds so that next time a gardening discussion comes up, they’ll gush over the quality of your stock, your helpful employees, your unique offerings, etc.
