In This Issue
Kelkay's Easy Fountain picking up on latest trends
Take a look at Westland's 'Lawn Man' TV ad
March sales hit a six-year high
Bedding Geraniums are the top-selling plant
Oh dear... it's GCA Inspectorexit II...
Vitax appoints new sales manager
£12m homes plan for former Dobbies garden centre
Aylings Garden Centre re-opens with original name
Zest 4 Leisure staff complete Manchester Marathon
Mayor opens Castle Gardens’ 30th anniversary celebrations
Communities get chance to win a Chelsea show garden
Get your own copy of GTN Xtra
Growing media sales continue to grow
Lawn care product sales take a boost
Cucumbers top Veg-2-Gro chart
Retailers urged to highlight benefits of feeding plants
Westland appoint new lawncare boffin
Japanese maples are HTA's Plant of the Moment
TV presenter and Johnsons of Whixley team up for RHS Cardiff Garden
Gardman's daffodil campaign aims to raise over £200,000 for Marie Curie
Lobbying success - plant nursery grounds to be exempt for business rates
Bestsellers Top 50 charts every week
Buy your subscription to GTN Bestsellers
All the latest news from the world of garden centre catering
London Coffee Festival serves cupfuls of inspiration
GCA Best Garden Centre Restaurant 2017 - Fron Goch or Squires Shepperton?
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Email neil.pope@tgcmc.co.uk, or trevor.pfeiffer@tgcmc.co.uk or call the GTN News team on 01733 775700


Oh dear... it's GCA Inspectorexit II...

It’s a dog’s life, ain’t it? Your faithful Newshound is used to it, naturally, but spare a thought for all those dear garden centre friends currently experiencing the agonies (and possibly ecstasies) of the annual standards inspection that all members of the Garden Centre Association must go through. Any time between now and early June, they can expect an inspector to call…and unannounced, too! Off the lead, kind of…

Personally speaking, as your Hound always does, it struck me that the GCA’s inspectorate – the body of men and women tasked with putting the scores on the doors – was a tad unlucky when, shortly after 24 June 2016, the day the country voted for Brexit, it lost three quarters of its workforce as three of its four inspectors announced their resignations. Inspectorexit, we called it. Some might have said, as Lady Bracknell remarked to Mr Worthing in The Importance of Being Earnest, that to lose one is a misfortune, but to lose three looks like carelessness. Not us, however. Inspectors come, inspectors go, leaving only the DNA on their clipboards as evidence, and that’s the way of the world…



But then, nine months later, when Premier May reminded us, by triggering Article 50, that Brexit is actually going to happen, lo and behold the GCA temporarily loses another inspector. Perfect timing. Inspectorexit II…not triggered by Article 51 but by the news that new man Hedley Triggs (pictured left above) had to pull out of judging the Midlands and Wales & West regions this spring because he has to have an operation. Please join your Hound in wishing him a speedy recovery.

Hound hears that one of last year’s retirees, Andy Campbell (below left), has stepped into the breach to cover Wales & West in Hedley’s absence. And another of the vanishing trio of 2016, Alyson Heywood (below second left), is back to cover Midlands. She and Hedley were once colleagues at Wyevale.

All we need now is for Ian Boardman, the third Inspectorexiteer, to announce his return “for old time’s sake” and we’re neatly back to Square One.

Meanwhile, woof woof! I’m exiting…until next time.

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