THIRTY NOT OUT FOR PHIL NAGLE

By Stephen Van Schaik

Anniversaries are times of celebration and we’d like to take the opportunity to celebrate a wonderful man that has given so much to us and our industry over the last 30 years. It is of course, Phil Nagle.

We’d like to take you on a journey of Phil’s thirty years in the industry and share Phil’s achievements. For those of you lucky enough to have worked with Phil or even have just spent some time with him, you will understand there is only one Phil Nagle.

The Early Years

Phil started working as a casual at The Greenery in Heidelberg in 1990. In 1991 he was offered full-time work in their garden supply yard. It wasn’t long before he picked up on an issue with local soil they were selling. Customers would buy plants from the nursery and then come over to get some garden soil to plant them in. They would go home plant them and some would die. It was the soils. The Greenery were already dealing with Bio Gro for some of the landscape barks and mulches they sold. Phil touched base with Bio Gro and discussed the need for a better-quality product, after several trials Bio Gro started producing Landscaper Mix solely for the Greenery. It was such a great success they still sell it today 30 years later.

In 1995 Phil was promoted to The Greenery senior management team. He recalls one of the highlight’s as being the Garden Show, the fore runner to MIFGS. It started out at a horse racetrack, “ From the very beginning Phil showed that he had an incredible amount of energy and enthusiasm to help drive not only our business but also the ” industry as a whole. Whether at Van Schaik’s Bio Gro, on industry boards or at industry events. – Stephen Van Schaik, Managing Director and owner of Van Schaik’s Bio Gro.

Phil Nagle

before moving on to Fitzroy Gardens and then Carlton Gardens. The Greenery were always involved. Barry and Daryl Teese the owners were extremely keen on promoting gardening and the industry. The highlight year was when The Greenery built both a Victorian and Spanish garden, complete with full house fronts.

The Bio Gro years

In 1999 Phil was offered a job by the Van Schaik family, they had just purchased a potting mix company called Australian Potting Mix (APM). They asked Phil to run the company as it was their first Victorian site.

APM came with two employees, was renamed Bio Gro and based on the Canterbury Road site. The first thing Phil did was get the site up to industry standards and this involved getting it accredited as a growing media supply. Accreditation was achieved in November 1999. The office was a 40-foot shipping container, no liner, no air conditioner, just a heater, a very basic start for Bio Gro.

From there we bought out Propine another potting media manufactured in Colchester Road. Colin and Garth Campbell retired, and Canterbury Road was relocated to this site. These were exciting years and Phil worked very closely with Kevin Handreck who was our principal consultant. Phil, under Kevin’s guidance, took over the technical side of Bio Gro’s operations, writing formulations, diagnosing issue with plants and growing media. He was very much a mentor for Phil. u

Celebrating 20 years of service with the Van Schaik family

Phil preparing to share his knowledge with university students Bio Gro used many Scotts products like Osmocote, this gave Phil full access to Greg Neighbour’s knowledge in fertilisers. Greg was at the forefront of innovation and development of the Osmocote range. Phil and Bio Gro benefited from this close working relationship. With their know-how we started leading the way in the manufacture of growing media and also the trialling and development of fertilisers. Phil’s expertise was recognised by the industry in 2011 when he achieved specialist status under the certified nursery professional scheme. Kevin who is now in his 80’s still works for us and Phil is in regular contact with him.

One of Phil’s key strengths is his ability to listen and problem solve issues that growers may have within their nursery. If he doesn’t have the answer there and then, he will go away and find it, ensuring that the customer is not impacted in any way.

“Phil’s attitude has always been ‘don’t judge us on what the problem is but judge us on how we fix it,’ ” said Stephen Van Schaik.

In Phil’s role as National Business Development & Technical Manager, Phil has been working on a range of products to complement the nursery and garden industry. It has been great to see the company grow and we now operate out of a facility in Dandenong, with around 25 employees. We have come a long way in 21 years. u

Phil Nagle and Wes Fleming (from Fleming’s Nurseries)

Over the years Phil has played a key role in nurturing a number of our employees to help them understand the many technical aspects of what makes quality potting media.

Stephen Van Schaik said, “Phil’s loyalty and dedication to our company and our family over the past 20 years is hard to put into words but one word does come to mind – humbling.”

Industry and other involvement.

Phil was heavily involved in the Tree and Shrub Growers group in the early 2,000’s and was elected vice chairman for two years. The Chairman was John Marshal. John and Phil were keen to get a corporate sponsor for the Tree and Shrub Grower garden display at MIFGS. They first secured Debco and Yates as the major sponsors.

Phil still had a heavy involvement with the Landscape governing body from his Greenery days, where in the mid 2000’s he was elected to their Board of Directors. With Richard Rose as President and Ian Barker they set up a structure to secure corporate partners for the landscape industry. This was extremely well received and the Platinum, Gold, Silver, etc, partner structure still exists today. Phil spent two years as Vice President.

While Phil was on the LAIV board he was elected to the NGIV board, he was the first person to sit on both boards at the same time. With John Van Der Horst, Steve Potts and Glen Fenton, they set about introducing the same corporate partner structure as the LIAV, this of course was very successful. Phil spent six years on the board, two as Vice President. He was also selected as the Victorian representative on the National Board for two years.

Over the years Phil has absorbed an incredible amount of technical knowledge and understanding of what makes great potting media, knowledge that only comes with decades of trial and error and consultation with leading experts.

And there you have it, a glimpse at the life and times of one of the stalwarts of our industry. It seems fitting to give the last word to Phil.

“I have been very lucky, to work for the nicest family in the best company in the greatest industry, so thanks to all for the 30 years, I may not be here still working in another 30 but I am certainly going to be around for a while.”