Whichever way you look at it, it has been a helluva year – thanks to the antics of the Class of 2014.
As the registers were called, there was a handful of names you could never ignore... Davies N, Breddy M, Yealland R, Pearson M, Bradshaw K, Conroy E, Roper A, Paris C, Mein M, Culpan H, Natar P....the full list would take up many column inches, but these are the ones who stole the headlines, and featured in GTN Xtra’s best-read online stories. They didn’t all make it to the top of the class, but that didn’t stop them making an impact, each in his or her own way.
And what a weather year....mostly in a good sense (although not for the Somerset Levels, where the floodwaters did not recede until March).
As garden centre sales got the year off to a flying start (34% up on the first week of 2013, according to GTN Bestsellers, and record sales in the wettest January ever), our curiosity was still being piqued by the plans of two of the industry’s former ‘captains’. Nick Davies’ shock departure from Solus Garden & Leisure late in the old year was the first hint of troubled times at his erstwhile company. In retrospect, the announcement that Edward Conroy’s Westland were to back him in a new start-up suggested that insiders might already have sussed Scotts’ interest in joining forces with Solus. Westland clearly saw an opportunity to trumpet a major diversification well ahead of any competitive announcement by their rival.
By mid-January we knew that Davies’ new venture was to be called Crest Garden, but it was another month before we learned officially that Scotts and Solus were in talks.
The grapevine rustled with dubious speculation for weeks. However the consensus was that, if Solus – a pivotal supplier on which hundreds of retailers depended – was in trouble, then a tie-up with Scotts was a marriage made in heaven. Both companies have been fêted for their benchmark levels of customer service over the years. Solus had called in Mark Pearson, who had left his CEO post at Gardman the previous October, to oversee the proposed union. As mergers go, this was potentially a momentous one.
And so the stage was set for the first big upset of the year. On April 2, Scotts CEO Martin Breddy announced that the Solus deal was off, that Scotts’ distribution agreement with Solus had expired, and that retailers should order Scotts products from other wholesalers or direct from Scotts themselves. Then Bayer pulled away, too. All this at peak season.
Unsurprisingly, the news sent shock waves through the industry; despite ‘business as usual’ assurances from Solus while they pursued an alternative investor with the help of business firefighters Grant Thornton.
I must confess that as the pundits, including ourselves, searched for further clues, all trails led to a dead-end...or right back to Scotts. Gardman and its still-new CEO Stewart Hainsworth ruled himself out on the grounds that the timing was wrong. Many were fearful that if Solus ended up in the hands of owners who failed to understand the idiosyncratic nature of the garden industry, more tears would follow. As it happens, the administrators, called in by Solus in May, got Scotts back to the table and July’s news that Scotts had acquired the Solus brands was greeted with a sigh of relief. Wholesale distribution, though, was not part of the deal, offering Decco, Stax and others an unprecedented bonus opportunity.
In retrospect, the decision by the UK’s biggest garden centre chain to set up its own distribution centre was probably a body blow from which it would be difficult for Solus to recover in the short-term.
Which leads us on to Wyevale Garden Centres, as we used to know them and must now know them again, following the Terra Firma management’s decision to ditch The Garden Centre Group branding introduced by Nicholas Marshall in the previous era.
As the year wore on, CEO Kevin Bradshaw’s vision of Wyevale as a major leisure retail chain, not just a collection of garden centres, steadily came into focus. He was building a team with the deepest level of High Street experience the industry has yet seen...names like M&S, Pret, EAT, Britvic, Matalan, B&Q, Asda Walmart, Budgens, Londis, Dixons, WH Smiths and Vision Express were all over the CVs of his new recruits. By re-adopting the Wyevale name, bolting on wide retail skills and experience and extending the group’s national reach through continued acquisition (notably the Garden & Leisure chain in 2014), Terra Firma have clearly set their sights on building a brand capable of realising the kind of value that makes sense to Guy Hands’ equity group.
Meanwhile, it has been relatively quiet over at Dobbies following the arrival of Andy King as MD after the departure of James Barnes in 2013. Barnes set the Tesco-backed group on a course designed to lead to 100 centres, but it’s currently stuck at 35. With Tesco currently pre-occupied with growth and profit issues, it would surprise no-one to learn that garden centre retailing was slipping down the group’s business priorities.
It has been a busy year for Blue Diamond, with an impressive re-build at Redfields turning many heads and the acquisition of Trelawney at Wadebridge and imminent new build at Truro (which will be the group’s 17th outlet). Alan Roper’s approach to empire building is refreshingly different to his bigger rivals, mixing a dash of local autonomy with his own maverick “points of difference” philosophy.
For now, the garden industry is not just all about the big boys. Away from the front line populated by big chains and destination outlets, a host of operators are contributing to the ever-changing garden centre landscape. Boyd Douglas-Davies’ Hillview group now runs nine centres and Paul Chessum’s Home & Garden group bought the fourth of a planned portfolio of 10. No shortage of business to keep buyers and sellers – and their agents – out of mischief then, as a whole generation of garden centre families considers its options.
I had my ear bent at Glee (although it wasn’t my fault) about the shortage of women at the top of garden industry companies. I suppose she was right – so let’s celebrate the ones who are, like Carol Paris (re-invigorating the HTA as a force to be reckoned with) and Heather Culpan, who led Burgon & Ball to GIMA Awards success this summer.
And speaking of Glee, the industry’s much-loved but under-supported showcase may have finally turned a corner with event director Matthew Mein at the helm. If Bayer, Hozelock and Sinclair decide to honour it with their presence next year, it will once again be the show it always should have been.
Products being shown for the first time include animated scenes, plush gift boxes, Santa sacks and stockings, traditional plush Santas and an eye catching point of sale display Case ready-filled with baubles packed in acetate tubes.
The centre, at St Mellons, was reduced to a skeleton of metal girders when 35ft-flames engulfed the building.
