Kitchen Garden Forum

We are blessed(within a 50 mile radius) with about ten garden centres, well nine and an old fashioned nursery that grows it's own plants, we have just visited one of them and we visited one on Friday. Now I like a Cafe in them, makes for a nice break out with a cuppie. But I am struggling in some of them finding much that has anything to do with horticulture, one is more like a pet food store, more dog food than garden produce. Want to ask a question, very few seem to employ anyone with any gardening knowledge, I know I'm getting on a bit, not quite yet Victor Meldrew, but "I don't bluddy believe it"(I remember when such places were frequented by gardeners, now it's just like a supermarket , in fact I think Morrisons had more gardening stuff).

Hi Tiger,

We have a big one right beside the plot & it more or less has everything I need from a horticultural point of view & also loads of other stuff like glassware, sweets, beer, chocolate, books mostly children's, loads of stupid garden ornaments unless you're in the mood for looking out your window to see a plastic huge gorilla! It is also set out really strangely forcing you through areas to get a packet of seeds, but a complete different place for plants or feed & all hugely expensive! The cafe is really nice though & home cooked food with a proper chef, also hugely expensive even if tasty.

On one of our drives through the New Forest we found a couple of little ones, way cheaper, no trashy extra's, nice wee cafe's & extremely helpful & knowledgeable staff. Well one had a pet section but was dogs allowed. I don't go often, but do make the effort for bedding or fruit trees from these.

BTW the big garden centre still has the Gorilla family, must be at least 15yrs+ so when I splash out with the girls for a mooch & lunch 'Find the Gorilla' is on the agenda!

Evening Burnie, nearly all of them are like that here….when I spoke to one of the staff in the gardening section, about the lack of knowledge of some of the staff, she said it was mostly down to the minimum wages these big places want to pay…….

Was taken to one for a Birthday Breakfast. Was more like a supermarket than a garden Centre. though I must say the breakfast was great.