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Blue Bell Greenhouse is a steadily growing family business owned and operated by Yuda and Amy Daskal of Lee, New Hampshire. Blue Bell is in operation year round, with retail sales in the Spring and special order cut flowers the rest of the year. ............................................................................................ What is your favorite plant? Why? What do you think is the key to success in the horticulture industry? a. Diversification -- We have a retail bedding plant season, and most of our income is generated from that, but we also do installation and maintenance of annuals (mostly for commercial accounts). We also grow indoor and outdoor cut flowers during the summer and fall, and in winter, grow another indoor crop. These are for the wholesale market and we deliver to local shops as well as the Boston market. We tried an experimental mini-CSA this year. We planted and irrigated enough vegetables for our 5 shareholders. We planted only the basics for the main growing season, to see how things went, and the shareholders came to our farm and harvested their own produce. We will meet with the group at the end of the season to see how we should proceed for next season, and we'll possibly extend the season with different crops. It worked well for us that we did not have to be involved with the harvesting and delivering, and our shareholders live close enough to us that it was convenient for them to come over whenever they needed produce. b. Quality of plant material. We are really devoted to keeping our plants of very high quality, keeping our greenhouse clean and pleasant, and we try to have a good selection of some more unusual varieties that won't be found at the local supermarkets, drug stores and big box stores! c. Quality of service. We really engage with our customers and go out of our way to be helpful to them. This is not difficult to do because our customers really have become friends. We try to make the "newbie" gardeners feel comfortable. No question is too "silly", as some of them worry when they approach us. And we really enjoy watching them become experienced and devoted gardeners over the years. Others know much more than we do, and we pass along their expertise to other customers. If we don't know the answer, we say so. We look it up, try to find the answer and get back to people with the information. This takes time, but it can be more interesting for us than just cut-and-dried sales. We've been in this business for so long that we really have gotten to know our clientel. When they come in each spring, it's like seeing old friends. And they meet each other in the greenhouse, too. Sometimes we feel we've taken the place of the old dump, where people used to be able to have conversations and socialize. What keeps you up at night? This year we are keeping only one greenhouse open. We are looking into a geo-thermal heating system. It is still in its very early planning stage so there isn't much to report yet. Now that it's time to place the order for next spring, I feel more uncertainty than ever before. Will customers be buying in the spring? Or will they be considering their gardens to be an unnecessary expense? We don't want to have too much stock if that is going to be the case. Where do you see your business in 10 years? What do you think would increase the value of NHPGA to its members? |
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Yehuda Daskal
