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For some garden centers, especially new ones or those that are located off the beaten path, getting customers "here" from "there" is a task. Jan Westenborg, owner of Green Things in Tucson, Ariz., knew her store met both criteria, more or less, when she purchased the business in 2004. So she met the challenge head-on.
"Probably our biggest focus has been to open up visibility to the property by working in conjunction with the County’s Binghampton Historic District initiative, which is a project to preserve the Mormon, Hohokam, and agricultural legacy of the area of Tucson where we are located," Westenborg said recently. "We are set back from main roads, and many people that have lived in Tucson for 30 or 40 years never heard of Green Things. So, that was our biggest challenge, how to get the word out."
The county was ramping up road improvements and a new park adjacent to the Green Things property when she bought the nursery. "We opened up access to the Rillito River Path, a public jogging trail, by cutting out brush, installing signage and a cactus garden, and installed a new parking lot off of that entrance for runners, bikers and horse people to enter off of that side of the property," Westenborg said. "In 2009 we also held a Poinsettia Race, including a 5K/10K run with poinsettias in different sizes as prizes (poinsettias are one of our primary crops). This drew visibility to our entrance off of the River Path and gave a lot of ‘free’ publicity."
Then the garden center staff installed a large sign with a reference to the “Binghampton Historic District” off of River Road, which is the main street off of which people have to exit to get to Green Things. Westenborg put in a cactus garden around the sign to draw attention from people driving. The County agreed to install the brown and white directional signs in several locations along River Road that pointed potential customers to the store. County officials also agreed to more regularly maintain tree and brush trimming along the roads leading to the property.
"We also worked with our neighbors to paint and straighten fencing and improve the parking lot in front of our store and enhance it with new trees and a garden," she said. "We are also investing in a new retail building and shade structure to replace the 40-year-old hut that has housed the cash register."
That's a lot of parts, the sum of which was a big payback in terms of visibility and drawing the public to Green Things. That's payback, as in "Cha-ching!"
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