GROWING PAINS

ON A grey weekday morning, the car park of a garden centre on the edge of town is already busy.

- ADITI RANE

Pensioners drift in for coffee and cake, parents negotiate muddy shoes and seed packets with toddlers and seasoned gardeners pause to debate compost like old friends comparing notes Somewhere between the bags of bark chippings and the cafe queue, advice is exchanged, community happens and time slows.

For many Britons, garden centres are far more than mere retail spaces. They are places of ritual and reassurance, where the seasons are marked not by calendar dates but by the arrival of snowdrops or the first trays of bedding plants.

"Garden centres are no longer just places where you buy plants," says Jennifer Pheasey, director of policy and public affairs at the Horticulture Trade Association. "They're community hubs." There are around 1,500 garden centres across the UK, welcoming more than 200 million visits a year.

Nearly seven in 10 adults visit at least once annually.

Jennifer points to the way people them: grandparents bringing grandchildren, friends meeting for coffee, customers lingering rather than rushing in and out. "They're destinations," she says. "Not just retail stops." Yet while many a weekend for Britons involves an impromptu family trip to a local garden centre, there is growing concern in the industry after a spate of closures across the country.

They leading include firm Dobbies, which shut eight stores last year following a restructuring major plan that earlier involved the closure of 17 centres and the loss of almost up from a 500 jobs. The national retailer announced pre-tax losses of £131million in 2023 £21million loss the year before.

Meanwhile, Homebase closed 13 stores last year after selling off 74 outlets in 2024 when it fell into administration.