20
THECOMMERCIAL GREENHOUSEGROWER • JULY 2017
• OPTIMISING LABOUR
RESPONDING TO
THECHALLENGE
include thedemands of the ‘pay by scan’ systemof
retailing and the general margin squeeze that comes as a
result of supplying the ‘value chain’ which is necessary in
order to achieve sales growth.
Issues that limit the capacity of abusiness todevelop
include the availability of investment funds; aging
production facilities; total labour availability; the cost of
appropriatemechanisation; staff engagement, retention
and training; and the complexity of cropping. The
BloomingPlants founder andproprietor, GraceDinsdale,
told the group that the number of crops grown therewas
very high and she estimated that theywere controlling,
growing, packing anddispatching somewherebetween
2000 and 3000products .
Worker availability
Recent political change in theUSA hasmade owners
slightly nervous about the future of their workforcewhich
relies heavily on the availability of immigrant workers from
central andSouthAmerica and, in thePacificNorthwest
andBritishColumbia, also from thePunjab. All businesses
in the sector have a large swing frompermanent staff to
seasonal workerswhichmay be a ratioof 1:5or even six.
Thebusinesses visitedby the study tour groupwere all
very proudof their work force and its reliabilitywhich is
thebackbone of their operations.Many of theworkers
were concerned about their future, living andworking in
theNorthWesternU.S.
If you take this issue together with theproblems facing
some companies of bringing together newbusinesses,
production sites and varyingwork practices, it would
seem natural to look at thepossibilities of improvingwork
techniques andprocesses. This iswhy several businesses
are usingLEAN analysis - first developed in Japanby
Toyota formanufacturingprocesses. This incorporates the
‘just in time’ (JIT) principle of supplying aproduction line
to try and cut downwaste in the use of labour andother
resources by imposing an improved structure on their
TheNorthAmericanmarket for ornamental plants is
valued at $18.3billionof which approximately one third
is annual plants andone sixthperennials. The recent
study tour by theBPOA /AHDB as reported in lastmonths
issue, was toldbyBrianMinter, who features regularly
ongardening and horticultureprogrammes, that the
NorthAmerican industry is just comingout of aperiodof
retrenchment, duepartly to the economic recession, and
starting togrow again. How are growers responding to
this challenge?SimonDavenport reports.
Growing business
The range of strategies employed indealingwith this
growth indemand arewell known. They includemerger
and acquisition (very prevalent in recent yearswith the
consolidationof business); organic growthby building
facilities; vertical integration (raising your own starter
material or usingonline sales); anddiversification into
relatedbusinesses e.g. energy production.
In the growers’ search formore effectivebusiness and
increasing (ormaintaining) profit, no stone is left unturned.
So, businesses in theU.S. have, in commonwith
elsewhere, to look at thebasics of businessmanagement
and are asking themselves how they cando the
jobbetter?
Pressures on thebusinesses arequite intense and
Dawnat Northwest describeshow their labelling system
follows theproduct through the system todespatch.
BloomingNurseryusecolouredflags tomarkcrops for
workandpacking.
