FW: Heronswood closing

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Subject: More stories on the Heronswood closing

 



URL:
<http://www.kitsapsun.com/bsun/local/article/0,2403,BSUN_19088_4738081,00.ht
ml>
http://www.kitsapsun.com/bsun/local/article/0,2403,BSUN_19088_4738081,00.htm
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Renowned Heronswood Nursery Closes its Gates 

By Julie McCormick,
<javascript:parent.ComposeTo('jmccormick@kitsapsun.com');>
jmccormick@kitsapsun.com
May 30, 2006 

KINGSTON 

Slam. That's the sound of the gates shutting at Heronswood Nursery at the
beginning of its busiest season. 

In a surprise announcement on Tuesday, 24 stunned employees learned that
corporate owner W. Atlee Burpee & Co. was ending all local operations of the
rare plant nursery tucked away in North Kitsap that has become a Northwest
institution. 

Customers tuned in to the seasonally scheduled open garden tours and sales,
or planning to sign up for one of its in-depth workshops didn't even get to
say goodbye. The next June "garden open" will be closed, and no one will get
a chance to say good-bye to the remarkable acres of plantings that a Burpee
official called the most extensive private botanical garden in the country. 

In its 19 years of operation, Heronswood became a beacon of pleasure to tens
of thousands of Northwest gardeners and garnered international attention for
the diversity of its collection, some 6,000 types of plants. 

Many were grown from seed collected by co-founder Dan Hinkley, a former
horticulture instructor at Edmonds Community College. 

He, or sometimes staffers, traveled to the mountainous areas of Asia to
gather and bring back plants often only previously seen in the wild or at
botanical gardens in other countries. Customers multiplied. Martha Stewart
made regular visits and featured Heronswood and its plants on her show and
in her magazine. National media paid attention, both mainstream and special
interest. 

The densely descriptive and quirky catalogue -- the way most people
purchased from Heronswood -- was written personally by Hinkley, got larger
every year and Heronswood became the little nursery that could. 

But it was precisely the nursery's regional emphasis that was its Achilles'
heel, said Burpee president George Ball. 

"The vast collection of plants, while they were terrific for people in the
Pacific Northwest, they weren't good for people in places like Iowa and
Pennsylvania," said Ball. 

After six years of Burpee ownership, business was flat, and Heronswood has
never been profitable, Ball said. "You have to be able to make a profit if
you're going to survive in business, especially with a seasonal business,"
he said. 

Ball, who flew in to announce Heronswood's closure, said Burpee staffers
will lift samples of the thousands of established plants in Heronswood's
extensive gardens and take them back to its Pennsylvania research and
production facilities to work on adapting them to other climates less genial
than the Pacific Northwest. 

That's what Burpee is known for, said Ball. "Our founder was a genius at
adapting plants to different climates," he said. 

Hinkley and co-founder and partner Robert Jones have continued to run the
business under Burpee's ownership. Neither had any hint that it would be
shut down, nor so quickly. Nor did he completely understand why. 

"It (Burpee) is an organization that looks at profit and I assume that's
what it's all about," he said from his Indianola home, where employees
gathered after the gates literally were shut. 

"We have a family of employees that I have thought of as my closest friends
that have really devoted years and years of hard work to making Heronswood
what it is," he said. "I'm saddened, that's the bottom line." Ball said
Burpee made above-average outplacement and severance offers to employees,
but would not describe them in detail. 

He said the company's abrupt announcement was made to spare the feelings of
employees. If the closure had been announced months ahead of time, the long
wait for the end would have stolen their dignity, he said. 

Both Hinkley and Ball indicated that there have been differences over
Hersonswood's catalogue, revamped this year with only 250 plants offered and
full of bright, colorful pictures like most standard offerings from giant
retailers. 

Hinkley called it a dumbing down that talked down to Heronswood's core
customer base. Ball said the old one read like a textbook. 

North Kitsap Commissioner Chris Endresen said she was shocked and dismayed
at the loss of a county treasure. "In fact, it's a national treasure, it's
nationally known and it's internationally known and shame on Burpee," she
said. 

Burpee will carefully market the nursery's buildings and grounds, Ball said,
and will leave the plantings as they are after giving them a sampling
"haircut." Hinkley said he's working on two books, and will continue to
travel and look for plants. 

The only part of the collection he owns, he said, are the gleanings from his
most recent trips to India and the Himalayas. 

As for every fan's burning question, "At this point I have no intention of
starting another nursery," he said.

Copyright 2006, kitsapsun.com. All Rights Reserved.

-- 
Robert L. Jones
Director of Operations
Heronswood Nursery
360.297.4172

 

For  Immediate Release 

For more information contact:  

Susan McCoy, susan@gardenmediagroup.com or 610-388-9330 

Cindy Combs, Cindy@gardenmediagroup.com or 206-285-1143 

  

  

HERONSWOOD TO MOVE OPERATIONS EAST 

  

Seattle, WA - May 30, 2006 -- Heronswood Nursery, in Kingston, WA, today
announced that it is moving its operations to Pennsylvania to better serve a
national clientele of home gardeners. 

  

According to George Ball, president of W. Atlee Burpee & Co., the
Pennsylvania based home gardening company that purchased Heronswood six
years ago, "As the business of Heronswood expanded outside the Northwest, we
found it inefficient to fulfill orders nationally and continue to conduct
operations in the State of Washington." 

  

The move, which is expected to take place over the next three months, will
enable Heronswood to expand its product line to include varieties better
suited to flourish under varied weather conditions. "We shall benefit from a
major expansion and more appropriate climate location on the East Coast,"
Mr. Ball states.  "The plants we've collected from around the world will be
tested under conditions more similar to those of our customers." 

  

Burpee operates a 50-acre nursery in Willow Hill, PA, and a similar sized
test and display garden complex at Fordhook Farm in Doylestown, PA. 

  

Heronswood will retain a reduced staff of employees in Kingston, until the
move is completed to insure a smooth transition.  All events planned for the
remainder of the 2006 Season at the nursery have been cancelled. 

  

The Heronswood Open at Fordhook Farm, July 14th  & 15th, in Doylestown, PA,
will be held as planned, according to Mr. Ball, and the move will in no way
affect the Heronswood catalog or website which was completely revamped and
upgraded for the 2007 season. 

Wednesday, May 31, 2006 - 12:00 AM
HARLEY SOLTES / THE SEATTLE TIMES
Burpee & Co. President George Ball, standing in one of the greenhouses at
Heronswood on Tuesday, said the decision to close the Kingston nursery was a
financial one. "We tried for six years and it just wasn't profitable," Ball
said.

Dan Hinkley, co-founder of Heronswood, said its closure was like "a death in
the family."

HARLEY SOLTES / THE SEATTLE TIMES
The sign leading into Heronswood Nursery was marked as "Closed for Business
Today" on Tuesday, and a guard was posted at the gate to the Kingston
nursery.
Paradise lost: Heronswood uprooted 
By Christine Clarridge
Seattle Times staff reporter
Fans of Kitsap County's internationally acclaimed Heronswood Nursery - which
is credited with putting the Pacific Northwest on the horticulturalist's map
by introducing thousands of exotic plants from around the world - are about
to suffer transplant shock.

Horticulture giant W. Atlee Burpee & Co., which bought Heronswood in 2000,
told employees Tuesday it was shutting down the Kingston nursery and moving
the research and retail operations to company headquarters in Pennsylvania.
The company said it will retain the Heronswood name and catalog and will
continue to offer a similar variety of plants.

For the founders of Heronswood as well as the thousands of gardeners who
visited the lush nursery over the years, the news was devastating.

"This has been like dealing with a death in the family," said Daniel J.
Hinkley, who began Heronswood with his partner Robert Jones nearly 20 years
ago. "We're sad because we believed in Heronswood and believed it was more
than just a nursery. We were trying to contribute to the horticultural
community and the community as a whole."

Valerie Easton, a gardening expert and frequent contributor to The Seattle
Times, said the gap left by the nursery's departure will not be easily
filled.

"Heronswood is a Mecca for gardeners around the world, and it's
quintessentially Northwest," Easton said. "Without Dan Hinkley or its
Northwest setting, I don't know what Heronswood is."

A plant explorer, Hinkley traveled the world to find unusual and exotic
specimens that would thrive in the Pacific Northwest. He brought them home
to Heronswood, planted them, grew them and sold them through a highly
anticipated and richly detailed catalog.

It was through Heronswood that hardy orchids and many species of hellebores
were introduced to the U.S., according to Richard Hartlage, a landscape
architect with AHBL Inc.

"This is a disaster," Hartlage said. "Everyone is just shocked."

When the sale was announced six years ago, many local garden lovers feared
that Heronswood's homegrown charm and emphasis on Northwest cultivars would
be swallowed by the profit needs of the much larger and older Pennsylvania
company.

But those fears receded as years passed and Heronswood and Burpee seemed to
coexist peacefully. Heronswood remained a plant lovers' paradise that
counted Martha Stewart among its fans, a world-renowned garden with 10,000
plant species, and two dozen dedicated employees dubbed "Heronistas."

Burpee President George Ball said the decision to close the Heronswood
gardens and move the nursery operations was a financial one.

"We tried for six years and it just wasn't profitable," said Ball, who was
in Kingston on Tuesday to break the news to Heronswood employees.

Ball said the move, which is expected to take place over the next three
months, will enable the company to expand its product line to include
varieties better suited to flourish in other parts of the U.S.

"The plants we've collected from around the world will be tested under
conditions more similar to those of our customers," he said.

Burpee operates a 50-acre nursery in Willow Hill, Pa., and a similarly sized
test-and-display garden complex at Fordhook Farm in Doylestown, Pa.

Ball offered an apology to local gardeners who were grieving the loss.

"I'm sorry for that," he said. "If I could bat a thousand, I would, but
nobody's perfect, and I did the best I could."

Of the 26 employees at Heronswood, seven have been asked to work through the
summer. The others were told their jobs were gone, Ball said.

The gates to Heronswood were locked shortly after the announcement and
workers began packaging plants for transport, Hinkley said.

"The hardest thing for me to swallow right now is that this is what people
feared would happen," he said. "It was my decision to sell to a large
corporate nursery, and it was not a decision that was made lightly, but I
made it, so ultimately I am the person to blame."

The closing will leave a gaping hole in the local horticultural landscape,
several experts said, and gives rise to speculation about whether someone
will step in to fill the void.

Hinkley said that while he has several years remaining on a noncompete
clause with Burpee, he is not ruling out the possibility of starting anew.

Ball said the 15-acre Heronswood property, which he called the best private
botanic garden in the U.S., will be sold to someone who will honor it.
"We're not going to just sell it to a developer who will tear it apart,"
Ball said.

Hinkley said he hopes that's true.

"One thing I want to tell the people at Burpees is that the garden is filled
with some extraordinarily rare things, and I hope that whoever acquires it
values it."
Christine Clarridge: 206-464-8983 or cclarridge@seattletimes.com
Copyright C 2006 The Seattle Times Company



SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/272206_heronswood31.html
World-famous Heronswood Nursery closes 

Owners plan to relocate it, but new site may be online only

Wednesday, May 31, 2006

By GORDY HOLT
P-I REPORTER

It was barely 2 o'clock Tuesday and the news had yet to sink in, but Dan
Hinkley was already on his second beer.

Heronswood, the world-renowned Kingston plant nursery founded by Hinkley,
and a place treasured across the Northwest and around the world for its
collection of exotic plants, had just been closed by the Philadelphia-based
Burpee seed company. 
     Meryl Schenker / P-I
     The famed Heronswood Nursery is home to a number of exotic plants.
These Helleborus are from the Baltic states.

After hearing of the closure, Hinkley was not without words although he was,
he said, "still in shock."

"Yeah, obviously, it's very sad for me," he said. "They didn't even afford
me the opportunity to see the news release."

The organization had bought Heronswood Nursery from Hinkley, a world-class
plant hunter, and his partner, Robert Jones, six years ago with a promise to
keep things as they were, with Hinkley still hunting down rare plants for
the nursery's collection while Jones ran the business end.

Well, things change, said George Ball, president of the W. Atlee Burpee &
Co., the nation's oldest and arguably most successful home-gardening
company.

"But we're not closing it, we're just moving it," he said.

Turns out the move may be to online only.

Hans Miller, Burpee's vice president, said Tuesday that the company has no
immediate plan to open a Heronswood nursery in Pennsylvania, where the
company has a 50-acre nursery at Willow Hill and a similar-size test and
display garden at Fordhook Farm in Doylestown.

Burpee will test the market for a Heronswood facility at an event dubbed the
Heronswood Hydrangea Open at Fordhook Farm, July 14-15.

If it doesn't test well, Miller said, "Heronswood will just be a Web
mail-order site." 

As Ball spoke into the business end of his cell phone from Kingston on
Tuesday, the Burpee president said he was helping with the packing.

"When we purchased this six years ago," he said, "we were anxious to make it
a profitable company that would be fulfilling our ambition to serve a
national audience of gardeners, which is predominantly on the East Coast.
For six years we worked away at it. But finally we decided the best thing
would be that we relocate."

Among Hinkley's associates hard hit by Tuesday's news was Sarah Reichard, a
specialist in the biology of invasive organisms at the UW's College of
Forest Resources.

"This is not a good thing for Heronswood," she said. "I'm a major customer,
but I guess I won't be anymore."

In recent years Hinkley leaned heavily on Reichard to determine which of the
plant species he had been gathering might threaten the Northwest's native
species.

"He has been very responsible," she said. "Going through his catalog --
what, now, seven or eight years? -- I've identified 15 or so species I was
concerned about, and he took them out of his collection and marked another
200 as potentially a problem. At no time was there any pushback. He simply
said, 'It's up to you, if that's what you think.' "

Hinkley said he won't be wanting for things to do, even though his contract
with Burpee included a five-year non-compete clause that will keep him from
creating another nursery during that period. His lecture schedule and two
more books will fill the bill for a while.

Less is known about the future of Heronswood's famed display gardens.
Burpee's president was circumspect.

"Oh," he said, "we're not digging things up to ship back East. No. I'm
hoping to keep this as long as we can, hoping to find ... let's say ...
someone who wants to buy one of the few first-class private botanic gardens
certainly in America if not the world.

"But I haven't figured all that out yet."

Heronswood was founded on little more than a leaf and a prayer in 1987 while
Hinkley taught horticulture classes at Edmonds Community College, and Jones,
a University of Washington-trained architect, kept his pencils sharp at a
Seattle architecture firm.

In dribs and drabs, one species at a time, the nursery's catalog was built
and its display garden took shape. Then, almost before either knew it, their
knowledge and expertise earned them recognition throughout the plant world.

The photoless catalogs Hinkley produced annually had become collector's
items. And through essays, books and his Heronswood Web site, Hinkley has
kept the public abreast of his Indiana Jones-like hunt for fine but
little-known plants. 

China, Nepal and South Africa are just some of the places Hinkley and his
trowel traveled after he graduated with a master's degree from the
University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture. 

From China, for example, came this communique:

Truly, there is no excuse. I should have been more mentally prepared for
what they meant. "Road Bad," we were told. "Road Bad" embraces a great deal
of plasticity across this planet. I knew this. "Road Bad" in China
translates to 180 miles of barely passable terrain, all of which is under
construction, though no one seems to be working on it. Then add three days
of torrential rains."

Did he get his plant? He goes on:

Our minds drifted from the moment, fast-forwarding to the most aggravating
part of the process. Phytosanitary certificates, inspections, lost packages,
changed rules at the USDA. Our bellies hurt down deep with anxiety. We know
these hurdles possess the potential to mar the polish of the days we have
experienced in Sichuan. Yet, this time at least, the buff and shine of this
most incredible journey has remained intact. The seeds are now safely to
Heronswood and sown.

But now there is no longer a Heronswood where they can set roots and produce
offspring for the rest of the world to enjoy.

C 1998-2006 Seattle Post-Intelligencer

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