Annemieke's picking garden

Annemieke started her “pick your own” garden in 2009 with the main reason to introduce people to flowers of the season. In her garden, consumers pick their own bouquets, a concept that did not really exist in the Netherlands. "Everyone likes to pick a bouquet of flowers, fun out there for young and old" Annemieke says. Pluck bouquets are a real trend now and Annemieke is hooked up at the right moment.

Annemieke is a passionate woman, who stands on the ground with two legs and knows what she is talking about. Before she started her picking garden, she was ready for a career switch and she accepted this challenge. Before that, Annemieke worked in psychiatry as a nurse. The company is currently growing from a hobby to a professional picking garden, where she now grows dozens of different organic flowers on almost 4 hectares [10 acres] of land.

Annemieke and husband Pieter, who owns a Scabbiosa nursery, have always been very committed to sustainability. For Annemieke this means being good for nature and for people. It is a matter that you must deal with seriously. When Annemieke decided to sell her flowers on the organic market, she joined SKAL 5 years ago, so that she now officially bears the name 'organic'. SKAL is the Dutch authority that issues and verifies the label 'organic'.

Many people saw no future in organic garden at the beginning. But the concept turned out to be the right decision and her picking garden started to grow. Besides being the only picking garden, the garden also serves as a testing ground for organic plants, because there is still a lot of unknown in today’s world.

For her feeling we now live in a kind of intermediate phase. More and more people now understand that we must go in a different direction with our world. There is more awareness and the demand for organic increases. So, there is also much more demand at this moment than she can handle from all sorts of parties around her. For example, she only sold her flowers directly from the garden and partly on the market. Nowadays wholesalers are also knocking on to be able to export the flowers abroad.

The debate always arises what is and is not organic. Where is the limit now and to what extent should you go? Annemieke sees this as a real challenge for the ornamental plant sector. Professional cultivation of organic flowers in a way that you can live on, but not necessarily more expensive than the regular products. This also makes it more attractive for consumers to buy organically. From the hobbyist to a truly professional way of growing is where the challenge and future lies for the sector.