The North End Business Development Centre (NEBDC) announces the opening of a short-term, pop-up Garden Centre at 572 Selkirk Avenue in Winnipeg’s North End for the weekend of June 26 – 28. The Garden Centre will offer bedding plants, shrubs and other gardening needs conveniently in the heart of this North End community where no other service of this type exists.
Richard Halliday, Business Development Manager of the NEBDC advises that the Selkirk Avenue Garden Centre is a social enterprise trial that if successful could become a staple in the community in years to come. It is recognized that without this type of local offering, community residents may not undertake the effort to help beautify the neighbourhood with floral displays. “To the best of our knowledge there is no easily accessible location offering gardening supplies and in a community with limited access to vehicles the desire to lug trays of bedding plants on a bus or taxi is not there” states Halliday.
To make this more of a community event, the Garden Centre will also host a Community Yard Sale Market on June 27 and 28 where local residents can reserve a table to dispose of some of their unwanted goods. Halliday suggests “We know there are a lot of yard sales at this time of year however we also believe that there are many residents that may not have enough stuff to warrant their own sale and so they can join ours”.
As a social enterprise any profits generated from this initiative will be utilized for further business development initiatives under the NEBDC. This project is also creating employment and work experience opportunities for North End youth under the North End Youth Employment Strategy. “We currently have one youth undertaking door to door marketing and three others on-board as customer service agents that will operate the garden centre and administer the yard sale, gaining much needed work experience and helping to build their resume’s “ offers Halliday.
The Garden Centre will operate June 26 from 12nn to 5pm and June 27 – 28 from 11am to 5pm which will include the Community Yard Sale. To reserve a yard sale table call 204-927-2344.
