Every so often my mother would grow a large
patch of one type of flower. I remember one year she grew a
large patch of brilliant orange tiger lilies with black spots on the petals. I was amazed at the beauty of these
flowers en masse. I asked Mum how you grew them and I saw
that they produced seed and little black bulbs up and down
the stems and the clusters of bulbs in the ground could be
subdivided. Wow the beauty of tiger lilies could be expanded
exponentially
and you could quickly have as many as you wanted. I was now
interested in propagating plants.
At 7, I decided to get a job and I went door knocking. I
think I knocked on 70-80 doors before I landed my first real
job. This was for an elderly lady, Kay Runndel, a successful
photographer who had retired, to build a cottage garden in
the hills. At the time, the world seemed a bit sad. Other
boys at school were talking about Atom Bombs and how we
could be destroyed by them and our teachers were talking
about over population and starvation with the world being
unable to support its populations. But Kay lived in her own
world where the important things were the arrival of the
petticoat daffodil boarder with hundreds of dwarf yellow
petticoats emerging in Spring, directing me to crawl around
the lawn to plant more and more English daisies into the
lawn. Spending a whole day directing me up a ladder to
carefully clip her enormous Sasanqua camellia obelisk, a
large topiary on a mound of lawn that dominated the garden.
When we stopped for tea, we would discuss our dreams. At
home or at school I was always in trouble for being a day
dreamer but in Kay Runndel’s garden, the only thing that was
important was gardens, flowers, dreams and stories.
Here I learned one of the most important things that propels
our business today, this is, “The story is as important, if
not more important than the plant itself.”
I would be working away in one corner of the garden and I
would |
hear Kay say ‘I bought this Sasanqua
camellia because it’s called ‘Cornish Snow’ but ahh… I
should have known better, the snow is never any good in
Cornwall, what a sad little camellia ‘Cornish Snow’.
Every plant in the garden had a story and Kay’s friends
would be enthralled and beg her for a piece of each plant,
so they could have them in their own garden. I realized they
were really taking home a piece of her story.
At the time, my father had been one of the top insurance
sales people in Australia and I was very proud of him.
I used to take “sickies” from school and go and help him
while he was out making a sale. I would read his sales
books and discuss opening sales, closing sales and cold
calling as he drove from client to client. I quickly became
the number one seller of Anzac Day badges, poppies and
raffle tickets at the school and able to sell 5 times as
much as the other kids.
 I
realized that selling was a very worthwhile and valuable
profession as it made things happen, but I rather disliked
the dryness of selling life insurance.
I started a roadside stall where I picked and sold black
berries. I loved it so much that I found products to sell
all year round, cut flowers, autumn leaves and berries. I
loved it when my roadside stall became crowded and busy and
I loved selling a living product that people could admire
and derive joy from. |
When I went to high school, I went to St
Josephs in Ferntree Gully, right at the time Nigeria was at
war with Biafra. I read about the Biafran agricultural
system where Biafrans had fairly small farms with a complex
multi layered agricultural system with their animals in pens
eating waste product from their perennial and annual crops.
The Biafrans were able to feed themselves and sell their
surplus production and thus giving them money to invest. The
adjacent Nigerians grazed the land and grew annual crops.
Their land was suffering from degradation and they would
barely be able to feed themselves.
I realized that agriculture and horticulture essentially
gardening could reverse environmental problems, create an
abundance of food, shelter and clothes and create a
beautiful environment and above all create a world where a
person could have daydreams and maybe turn them into a
reality. These are the products I would sell.
The goal for Hello Hello is to become a national and maybe
one day international nursery chain, a brand like Harvey
Norman, that sells garden plants, pots, garden art and
outdoor living products as well as, through franchising,
gardening and outdoor services. Hello Hello will promote
great horticulture to solve environmental problems, create
abundance and beauty.
Hello Hello will create and support adventure for its
customers, staff and suppliers.
Above all, Hello Hello will encourage people to have dreams,
and help them to come true for the home gardener, assisting
with information, great deals, service and great products.
For a gardener to have a far better or more productive
garden than they ever dreamed possible.
For our staff members, by nurturing, educating and training
will help you fulfill your dreams in life by achieving your
goals through being successful at work and as a person. |
A person looking at our business from the
outside one day and seeing that we are strong and successful
and achieving our goals as a group might decide that it’s OK
to follow their own dreams and therefore contribute to a
better society that exists above the level of doing what you
have to do to get by.
Creating a future with our goal, we are a small and rugged
band and the fact that we have survived drought, water
restrictions and economic downturn and have emerged bigger
and stronger (when many of our wealthy and powerful
competitors have fallen and closed down) shows the power of
courage, hard work and a dream.
We have kept communicating throughout the difficult times
and now have the strongest nursery brand in Victoria. We
must take our rusty trucks and tired potting machines and
produce. Service every customer, take every opportunity and
build a beautiful strong empire that can provide successful
employment for thousands, beautiful gardens for millions.
In terms of fulfilling our goal we have done but 1percent.
This means all the great adventures are ahead. Perhaps we
can tissue culture the Bodi tree, the fig that Buddah, sat
under, while he achieved enlightenment, and disseminate all
over the world with a message of peace. That we can
alleviate environmental degradation in Melbourne by
encouraging the planting of trees. Perhaps we can find a way
of making gardening fun for kids, and get millions of kids
to learn a
bit about horticulture.
We have survived the toughest times ever in the nursery
business; we are ragged, but strong. We can build a
beautiful nursery network that spans Australia.
We can foster dreams….. and the great adventures…. the ones
that go beyond just getting by are all ahead of us.
Chris Lucas. |
