For more than 30 years, the van den Hoek family has been growing plants for local gardeners and businesses
by Jodi DeLong
It’s a summer day at Lowland Gardens in Great Village, Nova Scotia, and the greenhouses are awash in colour. Rows of tidy benches are packed with a rainbow of annual flowering plants: stalwart favourites like pelargoniums (annual geraniums), pansies and petunias, and exciting, less-common varieties like nemesia, arctotis daisy, and tropical vines. There is a section dedicated to succulents—including fairy gardens for the young gardener-in-training—and of course, all sorts of herb and vegetable transplants. One whole greenhouse is dedicated to perennials, with even more growing outdoors. Helpful signs pop up among the plants: “You need me!” “Don’t strain yourself—these are easy to grow!” There’s a section dedicated to a silent auction of cleverly-designed planters, with the proceeds from their sales going to the local fire brigade. Eager gardeners, ready to get growing, wheel sturdy metal shopping carts around the immaculate concrete floors, picking up their favourite treasures
If this isn’t a happy place for gardeners, I don’t know what would be.
A family affair since 1985
Lowland Gardens is a family business, operated by Gerrie and Tony van den Hoek and their son Michael. The couple immigrated to Canada in 1982, and after two years in Ontario set their sights on moving to Nova Scotia, closer to Tony’s cheesemaker brother Willem, who operates That Dutchman’s Cheese Farm in nearby Economy. Gerrie says, “We bought this property on July 1st; we didn’t quite have a vision, but Tony had been a tree surgeon in Holland, and since there was already a greenhouse in the village, we were going to grow large-caliper trees.” They purchased a little glass greenhouse from a business that was closing in another community, and then in 1987 bought out the existing greenhouse business in Great Village. “Maybe we didn’t yet have a plan back then, but we had enormous fun,” Gerrie says. “I hadn’t had a lot of experience in growing at that time, and it was amazing to see a tiny seed grow into a beautiful geranium.”
Multiple river floods from the nearby Great Village River soon removed the idea of a larger-scale tree nursery from their plans, and led the van der Hoeks (in typical Dutch fashion, they all joke) to build a three-foot-tall dyke to protect the property. The name “Lowland Gardens” is also a cheeky tribute to the family’s heritage, as the business sits in one of the lowest spots in the village and “The Netherlands” literally translates to “the low countries.”
Soon after they expanded, a landscaping company in Halifax contacted them about contract growing plants for their jobs around the city, and that became a large part of the Lowland Gardens business for the next 17 years. Tony says, “About a third of our plants went to the landscapers for their projects, and we were mostly wholesale, but then we started to pick up more business at home.”
His wife chimes in. “Sometimes, you get so busy you forget your vision of what you’re trying to do,” Gerrie says. “One day we were looking around at the property and it looked to us like we weren’t taking care of things at home the way we should have been. It was so difficult to manage everything because Tony was delivering plants all the time and he’s also the fix-it guy—he can fix nearly anything! We told our client that we could grow for them, but they’d have to come pick up the product, and they said no. So we changed directions.”
That turned out to be a blessing—as son Michael observes, “Our wholesale contracts gave us the opportunity to grow while we were still very small, but by letting the wholesale business go for a year, it really changed the focus to retail, and things started taking off at the garden centre.” While they still supply annuals and perennials to select local markets and landscapers, the booming retail business at the garden centre remains their focus to this day.
Gerrie says, “We got a whole new burst of enthusiasm, all sorts of new ideas, and it’s funny—the minute you start caring more about these things, others care too.” The customers began to come in earnest. Tony interjects, “We’re sitting in what some might consider the middle of nowhere, and yet, probably 80 per cent of our clientele comes from Halifax, Moncton, Stellarton, the Valley. We’re passionate about plants, our customers see that, and they also are passionate about flowers and plants, and many of them make a day trip to come see us.”
“We’re always happy to see them and help them fulfil their vision,” Michael adds, “As cheesy as it might sound, we’re really selling happiness as much as the plants themselves.”
Challenges and opportunities
There are 13 greenhouses at Lowland Gardens—three for retail, and the rest for growing—and the nursery offers more than 400 colourful annuals, 50 different vegetable varieties, more than 30 herbs, and some 250 perennials. They’re known for doing creative hanging baskets and containers—Gerrie gleefully says that they work hard to “think outside the pot; if you can put soil in it, it is a container!” Although the business has gotten busier and bigger, the family members are adamant about giving customers that personal touch, great service and a wide range of choices for gardeners of all skill levels. As we walk through one greenhouse that is home to a special new project for Tony—everbearing strawberries in hanging baskets—he is always on the lookout for a plant that might need deadheading, or a planter that missed being watered because its irrigation line was moved. “There’s always something to do,” he says.
The van den Hoeks believe strongly that although there are challenges in the greenhouse industry in our region, there are also amazing opportunities. However, they acknowledge that Gerrie and Tony are getting older, a challenge facing numerous other independent nurseries, “which are shutting down because there is no one else to take over or to get into the business,” says Michael. “It could have been that way for our business, except…I caught the bug several years ago.”
Michael took a long and circuitous route to the family business, first acquiring a neuroscience degree at Dalhousie with plans to be a researcher; next he “followed the money” and became an accountant, working in offshore insurance and wine importation for several years. Then several things happened at once. He heard his parents talking about going to Hollard to see if they could find a managing couple to work and eventually take over the operation, although they weren’t ready to let it go right away. He says, “I had my quarter-life crisis when our son Owen was born. Long, late nights at the office, never being able to help my wife Kaylee with Owen…so we went to talk to Gerrie and Tony about becoming the couple who would ultimately take over the business.”
Now in his third season in the family business, he’s sometimes a bit overwhelmed with how much there is to learn. Tony and Gerrie both have specific tasks, and Michael has to learn the business from both sides. Gerrie says, “If I die, I leave good notes, I write them daily, but if Tony goes, he has it all in his head!” That’s where “The Plan” comes in: a meticulous book of detailed notes about what needs to be done on any given day, which Michael created to hold the knowledge of 33 years in the greenhouse industry. You can’t remember all these things off the top of your head, and since Michael acknowledges that he’s a data-driven person, “I need numbers so I can see how to improve things!”
Of joining the business, Michael says, “Succession is never easy, and it’s brought along its own challenges as we figure out how we fit together, but it’s been going well so far.” He says that people come in and ask his father if Michael is going to be taking over, and he’ll reply, “yes, but it’s not a hostile takeover—not yet, anyway!”
The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree with the van den Hoeks’ daughter Jessica, either. She has recently launched Homestead Lavender in Urbania, not far from Shubenacadie (see “Lavender blue” on page 74). Naturally, her father was there to help with propagating plants, building a 150-foot greenhouse and renovating an outbuilding into a beautiful and unique shop. Gerrie says, “Tony can’t build any more greenhouses here, so he built one for our daughter, instead!”
Asked about what sort of challenges they face in the horticultural industry, they all agree that finding enough good staff people to help them throughout the season will always be the most difficult issue. Working in a greenhouse might sound like a dream job to some, but it’s very physically demanding, and you may work in bone-chilling temperatures in early spring and then in very high heat and humidity through the summer.
Since the nursery isn’t open all year round, they can’t offer year-round employment, and being in a rural community they don’t always have access to a pool of people who want to work in the industry. The nursery employees five to seven people at peak season, plus the three family members. Michael says, “We’ve been blessed with many great employees over the years. All our people are very knowledgeable, but it’s always a challenge to get enough of those people. We’ve had more and more growth as others have closed down.”
By the middle of August, Lowland Gardens closes down for the season. In past years they operated a Christmas shop from October to December, and they used to sell shrubs, water plants and trees as part of the main operation. But as Gerrie says, “As we are getting older, there are things we needed to let go of. You have to decide what is working and what isn’t, and we can’t do it all, so we do what we do best.” While the nursery may be closed to the public after mid-August, there is always work to be done preparing for next season, doing maintenance, updating “The Plan,” helping out with Jessica’s business, and otherwise participating in the art of “selling happiness.”
On the Lowland Gardens Facebook page, there is a post from the end of the 2017 season thanking their customers for their loyal support: “Local businesses are the heart of a strong community. Thank you for shopping where your roots are!”