This year’s wash-out Spring has given urgency to many garden centre owners’ desire to, if not weather-proof their centres, at least reduce their dependence on plants and gardening goods, writes Malcolm Scott of Malcolm Scott Consultants.

It’s not just the larger groups, who have shareholders to please, but equally the independent garden centres which have seen costs rise over the past five years without any commensurate rise in profitability.

Bigger restaurants and cafés are now a given. It would seem that as long as the quality and price of the food is good, this, together with free, safe car parking, will always woo the important retired and female shoppers.  If high gross margins are maintained, this can offset the higher staff costs associated with catering, and profit as well as turnover can be created. From a planning point of view, in many cases where the restaurant is a subsidiary part of the garden centre and offered as part of the retail experience, then as planning consultants we have a case we can make to the Local Planning Authority to grant planning approval.

So far, so good. The problems arise with food retailing. Food sales are accommodated in town centres and edge of town centres or, under strict planning approvals, in out-of-town supermarkets.  Farm shops, admittedly, are not located in town centres but they have arisen from an allowance within planning law that permits a farmer or nurseryman to sell products that he or she produces on site to the public. Farm shops then usually supplement their sales by an agreed percentage of bought-in products.

Clearly most garden centres do not produce food on site. The only rationale from a planning point of view as to why they should be permitted to sell food is if there is a shortage in the area of fresh food outlets relating to local farm producers. This is one of the rare occasions when the requirements to meet planningcoincide with sound commercial reasons.  In my view, a farm shop or food outlet at a garden centre which does not differentiate itself clearly from offerings made by a local supermarket will not succeed. There has to be a compelling reason why a consumer should shop for food at a garden centre, either because the food is uniquely different, is better in quality, or is produced locally and the public value this quality. 

UK food supermarkets are among the best in the world.  They are very professional in their supply line management, which enables them to sell fresh food and packaged meals in an attractive and competitively priced way to the hard-pressed shopper. Morrisons in particular have developed a clear difference between themselves and other supermarkets with their emphasis on local produce in season which is then offered in a “market street”.

All the big supermarkets have also been very adept at responding to new demands or gaps in the market for healthy food, delicatessens and, recently, economy lines to cope with the financial pressure on household spending.

All this is something of a cautionary tale to indicate that before a garden centre jumps into food retailing, it should understand the offers existing in its locality from supermarkets and be clear as to the competitive advantage which it can bring to its food retail offer. If this unique difference is related to local provenance and the lack of suitable alternative outlets, this may well prove at least the business reason why planning approval should be given for the development. The other planning considerations will be the size of the offer in terms of its impact on the high street (which planning policy is oriented to protect) and whether the development requires new buildings, which may prove contentious, particularly in a Green Belt or open countryside location.