At the end of January, 2018 Pam and I traveled to the Atlanta, Georgia area to visit with our Backyard Growing Members from the south. I’m not sure how many people actually attended this get together but I think it was around 50, maybe a few more.
A birthday party in a hoop house?
Because this visit took place just a few days after my birthday they got together and got me a huge birthday cake. Two things about that . . .
- The cake was awesome! Some of the best cake I’ve ever had.
- It was super thoughtful and kind of them to do that. We were there to visit them and tour the nursery of one of our long time members, Mrinali Goswami of Pixie’s Plants in Conyers, Georgia. Mrinali runs this nursery with her husband Balaji and son Rohan.
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The day was a sea of photo opportunities for all of us. That’s Donna Vincent taking the photo and in the purple jacket on the left is Patricia Crowder. The lady in the middle is Charla Ingram. She traveled from Oklahoma!
My wife Pam with Patricia Crowder.
It rained. It rained hard, all day, never let up. Didn’t stop us. We still did the nursery tour and enjoyed ourselves immensely.
Pam Lee, a long time member of our Backyard Growing Family.
It’s so nice to finally be able to meet in person people that we’ve been interacting with for years. This is the first time that Pam and I have traveled to the south to meet members. For years, at least 15 years, we’ve been hosting our Famous Backyard Growers Shindigs here at our place in Perry, Ohio.
Backyard Grower Ed Gallagher.
Posing with Roslyn Johnson.
Not sure who I’m with here, but he’s most certainly a Backyard Growers because he’s hold bare root plants.
To those whose names I don’t recall, I’m really sorry. I wish my memory were better.
Nathan Strange showing off her comfrey roots.
I’m not sure how many Comfrey roots Nathan sold that day, but I think it was quite a few because I saw lots of people walking around with them. Nice job Nathan!
Backyard Growers Abby Flint and Jack Stark.
Notice the potted plants sitting around for sale. Mrinali has plants everywhere! And I mean everywhere. And once you walk down the hill all you can see in all directions are plants, plants and more plants. I think everybody enjoyed the tour. I sure did!
Abby Flint and Pam McGroarty.
You can see it in this photo but Abby has money in her hand. I think she was fixin to go shopping in the rain!
Rachel Craighton, Gerald Wells chatting with Pam.
Rachel and Pam again.
Pam and I with Greg Lewis and Karina Olsen.
I will Share this in Our Members Area and see if I can get help with the names that I missed.
with our host Bala Goswami.
Mrinali and Bala invited Pam and I over the night before the event. There were a bunch of people working really hard getting ready for the event with name tags, food etc. Bala was busy in the kitchen cooking up a storm and he share with us some awesome Indian food. That’s Bala!
Mrinali and Bala run this backyard nursery with their son Rohan. It’s what they do, they have no other jobs. Mrinali is the plant maker, making baby plants on a daily basis, potting, weeding etc. She also works “down back” doing all of the shipping for the plants that she sells in Our Members Area. Mrinali has a stellar reputation among our members! She always sends top quality plants and is often accused of not being very good at counting because she often sends extras. She can count! She just likes happy customers!
Bala sells plants online. Larger plants, more expensive plants. And at the event he generously gave us a crash course in selling plants online. How to get started, how much to charge, what expenses to expect and how to get the most orders online and repeat orders. The members truly loved his presentation.
Rohan Goswami loves his commute to work. All he has to do is step out the back door and he’s at work!
Rohan does a little bit of everything around the nursery, helping customers, making sure the irrigation and other things are working as they should. He also ships packages of plants. Lots and lots of packages of plants. In the spring it’s not unusual for them to have 80 or 90 packages a day to ship. This is one busy little nursery!
And they really ship year round. Backyard Growers don’t really have a plant buying season. They’ll buy anytime of the year that plants can be safely shipped! And for the most part, that’s pretty much all year.
Finally! At the end of the day Pam and I get a photo with Mrinali and Pixie.
Couple of things about this picture.
- Mrinali is awesome! She’s a fantastic grower, a wonderful person and we were both pretty excited to finally meet. She’s been a member for more than ten years if I remember correctly. And I’m pretty sure that she is coming to our event in August so don’t miss it!
- The little dog is Pixie and the nursery is named after her. Pixie’s Plants. She’s 16 years old now but a great dog!
- The guy hiding in the background is Leslie, I don’t remember his last name but I sure enjoy chatting with him. He’s also a member and since he lives in the area he too came over and helped them getting ready for this event.
- Mrinali is really a trooper for allowing me this photo. It was the end of the day and she was soaked to the bone from the rain!
It’s too bad it rained, but we’re growers right? We can handle it and we did!
Words cannot explain what these people mean to me.
Our Backyard Growers Family is Huge! We have members from one end of the country to other, quite a few in Canada and a few other countries as well.
When I put up my first website Freeplants.com 19 years ago I had no idea that what I was doing would change lives. But I truly had no idea how much it would change our lives. It has been an amazing ride and I feel like I am at the very beginning of the journey. Pam and intend to travel and visit with more of our members in different parts of the country as time allows.
Stay tuned!
In the meanwhile, if you are not a member, what in the world are you waiting for?
Membership is Still Open, but only for a few more days.
Questions, comments, mean thing to say? Post them below and I will reply appropriately.
Greetings! Hello from Georgia! It looks like and event I would have enjoyed and would have learned something from the activity. I didn’t see the notice. Maybe I should check my Members Area message area more closely. Is that where it was posted? I don’t want miss the August event. Please make sure I am on your list. Your long time follower and member. Best regards,
Clara,
Meetings like this are opening discussed and posted in the members area http://backyardgrowers.com/join, but we do not email about them until after they happen. Why? Because we can only accommodate so many people we always end up with plenty of active members for events like this. These things are discussed months in advance. We’ve already posted about the August Shindig.
Hi Mike and everyone at the event –
I don’t think any of us knew what this forum would mean to our lives. I sometimes wonder if Mike is some kind of seer and knew that one day these plants would mean so much to the world. In a world of patented plants – we have the old classic originals. What are they worth now??
You know Cathy, I’d like to say that I had that much vision but I really didn’t. All of what I know do evolved over time and when I started online 1999 patented plants were not a huge thing. There were plenty of them out there, but most growers were still growing mostly non patented plants. That has changed dramatically and leaves us Backyard Growers charged with making sure these awesome, sometimes superior varieties of yesterday never go extinct.
Thank You Mike
In #13 that’s me there in the pink plaid.
Karina
Karina,
Got it and it’s fixed. Thank you and sorry that I did not remember.
Well, there is no Roger Higgins in any of the pictures?
Next time you need to have a cardboard cutup of him.
Because he is in every picture up north here that I see.
Looks like everyone had a great time.
Dennis,
He’s in this post teaching us things at our summer shindig. http://mikesbackyardnursery.com/2018/02/family-backyard-growers/