Lowlands Gardens in Great Village, N.S. has changed significantly since Greenhouse Canada's last visit 11 years ago. Gerrie and Tony Van den Hoek have improved and expanded their garden centre over the intervening years, introducing new sales features and discarding those that were not adaptable to Maritime market conditions. At one time they had three greenhouses devoted to ornamental shrub propagation. But Tony, recognizing he was spending far too much effort and expense for a very competitive regional market dominated by summertime discount-priced garden centres on shopping mall parking lots, stopped growing his own shrubs. He also bowed to the three great realities of operating a garden centre and greenhouse in Atlantic Canada: a short growingseason, a small market, and a Canny and conservative customer base. Tony tried to extend his Season into the fall by offering cool temperature-tolerant ornamentals, flowering kales and mums. "But people didn't feel they were getting their money's worthbecause of the short fall season," he says.
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机译：新南威尔士州大村庄的低地花园自11年前加拿大温室大棚访问以来，情况已发生了很大变化。在过去的几年中，Gerrie和Tony Van den Hoek改善并扩展了他们的花园中心，引入了新的销售功能，并抛弃了那些不适合海运市场条件的功能。一次，他们有三个专门用于观赏灌木繁殖的温室。但是托尼意识到自己在一个非常竞争的区域市场上花了太多的力气和支出，而这个市场以夏季停车场的夏季折扣价花园中心为主导，于是停止种植自己的灌木丛。他还屈服于在加拿大大西洋经营花园中心和温室的三个大现实：短暂的生长季节，小市场以及Canny和保守的客户群。托尼（Tony）尝试通过提供凉爽耐高温的装饰品，开花的羽衣甘蓝和菊花将自己的季节延伸到秋天。他说：“但是人们不觉得自己因为秋季短而赚到了钱。”
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