How to Start a Botanical Garden Business
A botanical garden usually is a place where different species of vegetation are grown, cultivated, preserved and displayed for public beautification. But it is more than a place cultivated for beautification; it is also a place for research, education and the preservation and protection of different plant species.
Indeed there are many different types of the botanical garden; each serves different purposes. They include the following:
Backyard gardens: this is about and includes backyard ponds and aquascaping.
Butterfly gardens: these are plant flowers that attract butterfly.
Demonstration gardens: these are garden extensions platform for local plants
Container gardening: this is about growing plants and flowers in containers usually because space is limited.
Fruits, vegetables and herbs: these are edibles that people for themselves set up as a private garden either for sale or consumption.
Organic gardening: this is where yard wastes is re-cycled
Well, Botanical garden draws members of the public who visit the garden for relaxation, more importantly, it is a research laboratory that serves so many interest groups. It has many things to offer and has the following functions:
Functions of Botanical Gardens:
The source of natural science and culture come from Botanical gardens.
Botanical gardens are labs located outdoors..
It is the centre of genetic material pools of important plants.
It serves as Nature Centres and Youth Museums, drawing attention against the destruction of the tropical and temperate ecosystem and environmental degradation.
Keep visitors updated with less eye-catching and forgotten ornamental plants.
Train people who want to be city arborists in the plantation of trees.
Partner with higher institutions of learning and others to research environmental biology etc.
Serves as a centre for educational programmes aimed at enlightening teachers in environmental education and children students among others.
Serves as an archive for the conservation of endangered and rare species.
It provides fresh plant materials for research.
A botanical garden grows pollution susceptible plants to serve as a pollution indicator.
Botanical gardens generate most economic plants and made them available to other parts of the world.
Botanical gardens provide a relaxation site for the public.
It serves as garden therapy for eye-sight, mental-stress etc.
Elderly people find relief and comfort in Botanical gardens.
Gardens regularly organize flowers shows, showcasing seasonal plants, flowers and plants that are less attractive.
The botanical gardens provide research laboratories to large interest groups such as botanists, nurserymen, home gardeners, landscape gardeners, horticulturists, foresters, and tourists.
A botanical garden is a centre of botanical research, particularly on local herbs and plants grown in the region. The following are usually included in Botanical gardens: a herbarium, library, photographic studies, lecture marquee, recreational facilities, etc. Indeed the fundamental and applied science aspects of botany are derived within the area of a botanical garden and it serves as the centre of cultural activities within the region where it is sited.
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Now you know what botanical garden is and its constituent parts including its functions, it is time to know if the business is right for you. Many people are not attracted to this type of business, but those in it are doing well indeed. So if you are contemplating of exploring this area of wild-life, in terms of economic prosperity, you will be glad you did.
How to Start a Botanical Garden Business
Botanical garden business is a long-term project like farming, it takes time to mature. But when it does, it is a beautiful sight to behold. This means that practitioners are always not in a hurry to reap the fruit of their labour. In this article, we have put together a wide range of guidelines, so learn how to start your own Botanical Garden Business; if followed, will help you succeed. If you are ready, make the first move by preparing a business plan:
- Plan your business
- Choose a name and legalize your garden immediately
- Register for taxes, permits/licenses and insurance
- Who is the target market?
- What are botanical garden sources of income?
- Define your brand
- What happens during a typical day at a botanical garden business?
- Establish a Web presence
- Botanical garden’s developmental stages
- Funding Your Botanical Garden
- Botanical Garden Design Guidelines
- Bringing the Garden to Life
- Opening Your Botanical Garden to the Public
- Some basic ways to promote & market a botanical garden business
- How to keep customers coming back
- Conclusion
Plan your business
Business plan unarguably is the first step in any business because it provides the direction to follow, the strategies and programs required to attain success in the business. The plan is expected to answer the following questions:
Who are the target customers?
What name will you give the botanical garden?
What is the cost of acquiring land, paying salaries of the staff, property taxes as well as the payment of commercial insurance?
What is the cost of maintaining the garden, third-party services and others?
How much is needed to start up the business and what the working capital should be?
How long is it going to take to break-even?
What equipments are needed for the smooth running of the garden?
How is the garden going to be promoted and marketed?
Which calibre of staff or others are going to manage the garden?
Is the garden going to generate income through fees or membership subscription?
Any alternative plan in case things go wrong?
Choose a name and legalize the garden immediately
Find a befitting name for your botanical garden, a name that suggests what the business is all about and register it if available. Early registration is important to secure the name so that no one else will be able to use it.
When registering your business, you can choose a limited liability company (LLC) since it is the form that befits a botanical business. Other forms of business enterprises include the sole proprietorship and corporation. The LLC protects you from being sued since it is a legal entity that divorcés ownership from the business entity and offers limited liability status.
Register for taxes, permits/licenses and insurance
Every business undertaking is expected to register for taxes with the Federal and State revenue service before opening for business. So make hay while the sun shines. Don’t open your business to the public until the necessary registration has been completed.
Find out if there are permit and licenses you have to procure in compliance with the State and Local Authority laws. Obtain the permits and licenses as soon as practicable if you want to remain in business or face severe sanctions, including the risk of being shut down.
Since you are going to engage some staff, paid or unpaid, you should obtain the employer’s identification number (EIN). It is a legal requirement.
Read Also: Why You Must Register Your Small Business
Who is the target market?
The target market will ideally depend on the type of botanical garden you are growing. If you are growing different types of species, in this case, you might be looking for companies producing cosmetics who want to test new scents from different plants. Alternatively, if you are using your botanical garden for educational purposes or you are targeting the local community, then your target customers should be research centres and the general public respectively.
What are botanical garden sources of income?
Botanical gardens generate revenue depending on their purpose. For instance, a botanical garden built solely for the public use, patrons will pay admission to tour around the garden. If however, it has signed a contract with the ivory towers or other establishments to generate research report on new shrub species, then the university or company foots the bill for the research. The garden is most likely to make money offering guests the opportunity to become members, in this case, the garden makes money through subscriptions. Or the available space in the garden can be rent out for a fee. Examples of special events for which the garden space can be rented out are conferences and weddings.
Define your brand
Your brand is something that identifies your business and differentiates your garden from others. Choose a brand name that is easily pronounced, recognizable and easily remembered. If you choose to, the brand name should form the basis for your garden name, the purpose for which it was established, the core value of your garden and the unique thing you are providing for the interest groups. After picking a brand name, register it to avoid being taken by other botanical gardens.
What happens during a typical day at a botanical garden business?
The typical day of a botanical owner will see the time spent on maintaining the garden land and managing the staff. They will see researching as an ongoing exercise and continue research on new hybrids seeds and conservation work that is being done. Choices will be made concerning which species to sow and where to sow them. Owners may schedule other activities for the day including, test developing plant conditions as well as manage third party vendors
To carry out these tasks effectively and efficiently, owners should usually possess a higher degree in botany, together with some history in an ideal gardening establishment. Without a proper understanding of the very conditions each plant needs to grow well and the efforts required to make them grow to their highest potential, it may be likely that the garden will do well.
Establish a Web presence
Most of the existing botanical gardens are on the web and therefore it would be out of place if you don’t show up on the web too. If you don’t, the public will not know you exist and no visitors to your garden should be expected.
In setting up your web presence, be professional in its creation and if need be, engage a professional who will also offer you some tips on how to go about setting up an interactive website. The profiles of members of your team are some of the important elements of the site; others are engaging contents and detailed information about the site. Use social media and engaging and relevant contents on the social, internet ad, print and electronic media ad to drag traffic to the site.
Botanical garden’s developmental stages:
The logical way to create your botanical garden site, assuming you are a novice is to visit and study the layout of other operating gardens. If you can’t visit them in person, you can turn to their sites to study the website and garner some useful information.
Here is a website that includes in their site some site plans. They include:
Better Homes and Gardens provide different free botanical garden plans in their websites. These include the following: container garden plans, fountain garden, drought-tolerant, a woodland garden, perennial garden, spring garden, etc. With the help of their innovative “Plan a Garden” interactive tool, you can craft an amazing garden on your computer screen. This software lets you manoeuvre with elements like plants, tree, shrubs, flowers fences, buildings, ponds and sheds.
Stage one: One of the ways to make your botanical garden unique is to plan it with a small team of experts in their field who may eventually have a stake in the business. The point is that they don’t have to have horticultural knowledge but are experts in other fields. They will add their specialised knowledge on the planning and developmental stages and enhance the planning process. For instance, one member of the team can market the garden, another has so much influence and wide network, another is in the business of raising funds, yet another can apply management and accounting skills to keep the financial records. You the founder can’t be left out, you may have the botanical knowledge to put together the botanical part of the planning. Coming together, as a team, you have a better chance to craft a strategic plan that has your mission and vision, you goals, programs of action, tactics for execution, and the probable dates for each step in the process towards launching the botanical garden.
Stage two: Research on possible stakeholders in and outside your community including higher educational institutions’ department of agriculture, biology and architectural design. Those in the business of conducting research who possibly relate to your garden are also potential candidates. Find out botanical gardens that that will attract the interest of team members, and if possible pay them visits and seek for assistance in areas of advice, the solution to problems encountered, and possible tips that will help your team achieve its goals. Consult with gardeners for possible advice and an opportunity to be a stakeholder at a fee.
Stage three: Appoint one member of the team to share work in progress with team members and keep every member of the team in the picture all the time. Begin to brood over who will build the garden, who naturally will be experts with the right equipment.
Funding Your Botanical Garden
Begin to work out who the potential sponsors will be. Approach people of substantial affluence in the community who might provide funds in the form of donations and/or other resources. Begin early to seek for possible donors to finance putting up the structure, and procuring the plant. You might be interested to know that The American Public Gardens Association has lists of grants that are accessible to funding public gardens but with conditions. Such conditions may require that such public garden must be for educational purposes and contain herbs, for instance.
An important resource for an entrepreneur is to have a quality mentorship. From the outset, you can connect with a free business resource close to you and get as much help you need. Keeping close to a support network you will easily turn to in times of economic need, breeds business success.
Read Also: Funding Options for Small Businesses
Botanical Garden Design Guidelines
The gardens objectives and the types of plantings separate botanical gardens from the rest. Such purposes may include: to study, research and information. For example, each garden has a sign note of plants’ biological and common names, care origin and benefits.
The design of each garden is unregulated; however, the American Public Gardens Association requires its members to adhere to botanical garden design guidelines which are as follows:
- The public should have access to it even on a limited basis
- Its purpose should be educational and/or research and have some aesthetic.
- Records of plants must be kept.
- Maintain at least a staff member – paid or unpaid.
- Provide plant information for visitors through informative markers or maps
Bringing the Garden to Life
The team should have regular meetings and always agree on the next steps to take. At this stage, your team member in charge of reaching to the public should find out the regulations for establishing a public garden. Wherever space is available in the community that is considered appropriate for the botanical garden, should find out the cost of land, permits, etc and possibly if the city will make a partial or full donation of space or any other resources.
To avoid duplication of efforts, team members should work closely and augment the work of one another. As soon as your design for the garden is out, the marketing team member should publicise, promote and start organizing and hosting public events such as seminars and explain the reasons for the garden’s creation, mission and other benefits; creating platforms to bring people in and make their contributions in cash or in kind.
Opening Your Botanical Garden to the Public
Towards the completion date of the garden, choose a date and start promoting and publicizing the opening event. The sponsors’ names should appear in all materials. Reach out to some public speakers including some prominent in the community such as the mayor and anybody who made some contributions to the project.
The opening ceremony should begin with a ribbon-cutting, with the local media and people with specialized knowledge about specific plants to explain why the plants and how botanical garden design guidelines were adopted throughout the planning stages of the garden. At the end of the opening ceremony, the marketing of the botanical garden will begin in earnest.
Some basic ways to promote & market a botanical garden business
The best way to promote botanical garden business is to create and maintain a good relationship with community leaders irrespective of the reason/s why the botanical garden was opened. So it doesn’t matter why the garden exits, it is necessary to enlist the support of community leaders and institutions since there the conservation element is always included in the garden. In addition to this, you should also invest in an attractive and interactive website as well as engage in online promotion including the use of social media. Be ready therefore to embrace the support community leaders and other influential figures in the community if you hope to achieve some measures of success in this business.
How to keep customers coming back
To get members of the public to use the garden continuously does not happen suddenly, it begins with good quality cultivation and layout that is well organized. You should remember that your garden may not be the only one in town, there might be some others that are built more efficiently, so to attract more potential clients, make it attractive. Always treat visitors with respect and don’t be discriminatory irrespective of colour, race or social class, because such things are likely to spark off public discontent and the news of it will spread like wide fire. Also, organise and execute all events in a professional way as this will lend credence to your botanical garden.
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Conclusion:
Preserving native and the value of different plants has become the main reason for creating and growing many botanical gardens. The major difference between a botanical garden and others is that it is grown for exhibition, research, information, and public relaxation and enjoyment. It is also intended to keep wide-ranging collections, labelled with their scientific and common names, together with the place of origin, aimed for the education, culture and preservation.
With the above information, it is not usually an attractive business to venture into since it takes a long time to start yielding fruits. Unless you have all the passion, you are a professional (Botanist), or you have other cogent reasons to be dragged into the botanical garden business, it is not likely you will put in your utmost as well as being patient to earn a living from this business.