Plants at their heart

When the management teams at HillierGarden Centres were considering their next purchase, little did theyknowthat instead of buying just one centre, theywould end up with achain of three! This now brings the total number of Hillier Garden Centres, located mainly around the southofEngland,toahealthy 22.

Thethree newcentres belonged to the Rosebourne group based in Aldermaston, WeyhillnearAndoverand Hamptonin Arden. “Wewerelooking foranotherdestination size garden centreshould one become available,”saysChrisFrancis, Director of Hillier Garden Centres. Although not looking aggressively,orfor achain, the Rosebourne centres were ideally located withAldermaston and Weyhill falling into the Hillier geographical strong hold, but in places it wasnot yet represented. “Theywerenice large garden centres and phenomenally successful. That suited the direction we were moving in andwelovewhat theydo,”says Chris. “They can bring something to our businessinterms of their food and leisureoffer andwe haveour ownstrengths to bring so we cantie those two together.” From afinancial perspective, and because of thecurrent highprice of building materials, theacquisitionisa good investment as Hillier was able to buy threecentres for less than thecostofbuilding two newcentres.

The twolarger stores will become Hillier destination centres much likethe one at Eastbourne. Also,there is anew 35,000sqft Hillier garden centre beingbuilt at Newbury, with theexisting centretherebecoming aspacefor concessions.

“Weare growing anumber of destinationstoreswhich is taking Hillier slightly away from itsroots, but it doesn’tmean we’removing away from being averystronghorticultural business.”

Rosebourne Hampton in Arden is asmaller sitewith amore horticultural soul so is agood fit with the other Hillier Centres.

After the interruption of the covid pandemic, Hillier is nowback on track with investing and upgradingits existing sitessothe three newcentres havehad to join the queue. However, arefit will takeplacewith Aldermaston having itsofficialtransition to aHillier Garden CentreinMarch. The most obvious change will be the entrance.“The entrancewilltakecustomers straight into the plantaria because plants arethe core of our business,” says Chris.“We’resignificantly expanding theplant and the gardening rangesothe typical journey will be from plants through to the leisureareaand food.”

Aslightchange in customer flowatAldermaston will mean retail food willbethe last port of call before reaching the tills “The teams here arereallykeen to see this changebecause they talk aboutcustomers in the food retail area leavingor getting to the restaurant andwondering what to do with their purchases,” explainsChris.

Forthe time being, theWeyhill andHamptoninArden stores will be rebranded with significant refurbishment taking place beyond the summer.

TheMulberry& Thymerestaurants atHillier Garden Centres havetheir ownidentity anduniform whichthe newcentres will adopt.“The other important thing we’vechosen to do,” says Chris, “is maintain the Rosebourne brand forretailfood.Itwill become the Rosebourne Food Hall.”Staff herewill keep the current purple Rosebourneuniform and this branding will also beadopted in the newly developedNewbury store.

The company’s decision to stop wholesalingplantsgrown on itsHampshirenursery to other retailers and focus on onlysupplying Hillier gardencentres sent afew ripples throughthe industry. OtherthanHillier’sonlinefacility, its gardencentresare nowthe only placewhereHillier branded plants aresold. Chrisexplainswhy thedecision wasmade, and why, even through thepandemic,itturnedout to be theright thingtodo. As we improvedand increased the numberofour centres,webecame serious competitorsto otherretailers.“We knewinyear one we woulddropthe numberofplants we were growing on thenursery,but as we got bigger, we also knewour centreshad the capacity to take them alland more.”The pandemicthrew things off abit but Hillier wasabletoturn anegativeintoa positive. “Wewereone of thefew garden centresstillabletosecure plantmaterial because we were growing it for ourselves and pumping it into our centres.”

Following covid, and with 19 centres, the nurseryin Hampshire, wasgrowing amillion plants per year which contributed to the centreshavingtheir ownpoint of difference. “Last year we hadamillion pots on the nurseryand everyone of those went into our owncentres.Lines of other plants such as seasonal bedding,are bought in to supplement the high quality shrubs and perennials growninHampshiretoensure garden centre customers can choose from acomprehensive range. Additionally,the nurseryisexperimenting with other ranges including Senetti and in 2022 supplied arange of herbs. Ironically,the garden centresdoalsohavetobuy in trees. Hillier Nurseries is knowfor its fantastic range but the 750,000 semi-maturetrees it produces today aretoo large for garden centres to stock and aredestined for large landscape and local authority projects instead.

With half amillion members of its gardening club,Hillier is able to see exactly what its customers arebuying.“We’ve got this great tool so we really get to understand andknow our customer base. It really is an amazing resource,” says Chris. This resource is likely to become even more valuable as it becomes available to former Rosebourne customers this month. As newmembers will be asked to nominatetheir ‘home centre’, data from individual sites can be extrapolated to makecommunication morebespoke.

Another positiveresourceisa central pointfor holding product such as furniture. Being stored in onelocationmeans the centres can sell from theirdisplaysetsand send the sales information to the warehouse, which organises delivery directly to the customer generally within aweek.

The newcentreatHampton in Arden is Hillier’s furthest north and Chris says thereare no planstogoany further “Weverymuch see ourselves as asouthern businessand thereare lots of spaces to fill in between. There’sabit of an opportunity in the west andalittle further east but you arenot suddenly going to see us in Manchester or East Anglia.”However, backed by the historyand strengthof the Hillier brand thereare obvious opportunities online.

Although in existencealready,and the vehicle which helped Hillier sell morethan £1m during the first week it wasopen during lockdown, it is nowbeing developed to its full potential. “Wehavenow putour full plant range online. The advantage is we have anurserythat growsanenormous rangeofplants so we cansupply our ownonline business…and interestingly we have quitea following in Scotland,”says Chris. The online shop sells exactly the same plants as those sold in the garden centres which helps to spread the word about their good quality and attracts 4.8reviewscoresonFeefo