Good luck ladies!
Launching a new business just as a global pandemic locks down the country is far from an ideal situation, but Peta Swift and Henrietta Hood of The Avid Gardener have been surprised by the reception they have received.
“We’ve been booked up to 3 months in advance within the first couple of weeks,” said Peta of the new gardening partnership that offers a qualified horticulturalist, gardening transformations, maintenance, vegetable expertise, garden development, as well as expert pruning.
Originally from corporate banking and finance backgrounds, both Peta and Henrietta made the decision four years ago to find a career that allowed them to focus more time on their children.
“The biggest thing in Orange is there are loads of people who do lawn mowing and whipper snippering and hedging, but we actually offer proper gardening,” said Henrietta, who is a lifelong gardener and trained horticulturalist.
“So we do all the boring stuff like weeding and we do horticultural advice, but we are really wholistic about it so we tend to have a much more sustainable approach to it.”
The tough social distancing measures being enforced to limit the spread of COVID-19 have certainly put limitations on how we all do business, but Henrietta said they are fortunate in that they can operate without any face to face contact.
“The beauty of this business in this current climate, is that we don’t need to have physical contact with clients. We can do the initial correspondence over the phone and internet, and when visiting clients, we are outdoors and isolated. What we’re most thankful for is the opportunity to help people during a time of uncertainty,” she said.
“Gardening is such a reward in itself and it is just wonderful that we can make a business out of it, but probably the biggest satisfaction is that we are really getting to help people.”
And with the recent demand for vegetable seedlings, Henrietta said they have begun sowing seedlings and sourcing plants so that The Avid Gardener can help get people start producing vegetable in their own backyards.
“We have a real interest in vegetable production and what you actually do with the vegetable so we offer recipes and things on what to do when, say you have an excess of tomatoes, we then have recipes we can use to make beautiful tomato sauce to feed your family. So, we are really focused on people looking after themselves and their families—home based sustainability,” she said.
“So many people are getting into it, but they don't really know exactly what to do and when. So we can help them with that via the internet or over the phone. And we have Facebook and Instagram pages and every day we have tips on there about what to do and when to do it, so we are very open with sharing our information.”
https://www.instagram.com/the_avid_gardener_orange/
https://www.facebook.com/The-Avid-Gardener-815391955158180/