Most places that sell plants have a stated guarantee policy on their plants. Some nurseries have absolutely no guarantee on live plants. Some places offer up to a year on any plant you buy. Buy a tomato plant, pick 42 beautiful tomatoes from it and when it dies bring it back with a receipt for a full refund.  Our guarantee policy tries to be fair to our customers but within the bounds of reason.

There are two Plants For All Seasons Nurserys. The Louetta Road store is owned by my brother Brian. I own the original store on Hwy. 249 near Louetta.  Back in 1987 Klein Nursery came up for sale and my brother was in a position to buy it. I helped him to negotiate a satisfactory price. Plants For All Seasons had a good reputation and Brian asked to use the name. I agreed. I wanted him to have the best chance to succeed and we could advertise together to cut expenses. Since Brian knew little of the nursery business he ran his store in a similar manner to ours. We weren't exactly the same but he was using the template that I had set up. The more experience Brian has the more different that we have become. Different hours of operation, different products, different prices and different suppliers. It is somewhat confusing to everyone. They want us to be exactly the same in every way. That's impossible with different owners and management styles. Here is my view on this subject. I think the customers that shop both stores are able to tap into the strengths of each store. Since we compete for sales we both do our best job and the customers make their choice. I mentioned that we do not have uniform pricing. That means that we do not sit down and fix prices, meaning keeping them artificially high. Brian will sometimes call me and ask what is going to be our standard price on 3 gallon shrubs or flat prices for color plants. I will tell him what we are planning. He will then make a decision to price those items above or below me or exactly the same. It is his call because it is his nursery. To prove that we are completely different, when he has a great year and I have a bad year he does not share his profits with me. That's proof positive for me.

     I saw an advertisement, a couple of days ago, of a garden center that sells plants in Houston. They stated that their plants are better. I have to believe that they are stating that my plants are inferior to theirs .  Plants For All Seasons Nursery buys products based on quality. We pay what we need to pay for the best quality that we can find. We never, ever, ask our suppliers what they have to sell that is of inferior quality and below market price. When you try to fill your nursery with the best plants, that you can, that question would never be asked. It is not at my nursery.

        From the title of this article you might be expecting to read about a tragic accident or a horrific criminal act. Neither of these things occurred. This is simply a story of enduring love. No plant stuff, no crazy question stories or me whining about how hard retail is. 

        April 30th 1971. My dad passed away that day. Pancreatic cancer. My mother was strong. All 5 foot 2 inches and 100 lbs. of her. She finished raising her last 2 children.

        Mom never dated or talked to other men even though she was only 52 when my dad passed. She wasn’t interested in another relationship. 

       In the Fall of 1998 mom was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer. Radiation had little effect and she refused chemotherapy. It was just a matter of time. We took another family trip to Vegas. All new it would be the last one.

       My youngest daughter, Sherri, moved in with my mom. She was now my mom’s companion and mom loved the time they spent together. Mom’s symptoms became more serious in March 1999. Breathing was harder and the least bit of effort caused breathlessness. Mom did not want to die in a hospital. We called a hospice for help. They prepared us and my mom as best they could. We asked Sherri to be mom’s caretaker for her final days. She did not hesitate. Sherri is strong just like my mom. She would be there to do the things a nurse should do but with the love and tenderness of a grandchild. She protected my mom’s kids from something that I can’t describe and I won’t try to.

       Before mom completely lost conscienceness she confided to Sherri a secret. Mom was going to meet my dad for a date. She was ready to be with him again. 

       Mom had asked that we keep her sedated so the end was not a pain fest. Sherri did what my mom wanted and my mom was not fully conscious much and could barely breathe. She held on. We could not figure out  how she was doing it. Sherri finally told us of the date she had planned with my father. We now understood. She wanted to die on April 30th. 

      Mom labored to breathe day after day. She was suffering. We whispered to her that it was OK to die. She had our permission.... but she refused. 

      The minute April 30th arrived my sister Pat had arranged for a priest to give my mom the last rites.  Pat then told my mom what the date was. Mom had reached her goal. She passed away about an hour later. She was not early nor late for the date with my dad. Right on time!

        I will meet one brother and my two sisters at the cemetary this and every April 30th. We will clean their headstones and honor our parents.  We will then go to dinner at Amalias and like all good southern Irish we will have a margarita and toast the strength of the human spirit and the love that our parents shared.

          In my last blog I mentioned my father's business and his relationship with his employees. That is where I learned how important it is to sincerely respect others. No matter their station in life. 

        I started in business  in 1973 when I was 21 years of age and.... I had heroes. First of all, I had my Father. He owned a printing company located in downtown Houston. He owned a square city block close to where the George R. Brown Convention Center is located today.  He employed over 100 people back in 1972. I worked for him as a teenager in the summers and then when I left college in 1971.  I was in the lowest level of management (night shift) when he passed away in 1972. My career ended because my Mom had to sell the business. Federal estate taxes have to be paid. 

      I am very lucky to have my kids helping run my business. They understand how important our obligation is to our customers , our suppliers and to the other employees. That has been one of the keys to continuing in business all these years.

     We answer many questions about plants, insects, weeds, fertilizers and more. We do our best to answer these questions so the customers can obtain the results they desire. Usually, the inquiries are relatively common. Sometimes, though, we don't know how to answer the questions asked of us.  For example:

            Trying to field a full team (employees) at our nursery is a challenge. I do not have firm statistics on this but to my recollection I have not had a full time employee give their notice before quitting in over 7 years. Last Friday it happened again. A cashier that I hired in early February did not show up for work Friday.

        I noticed google had a black screen yesterday. I didn’t like it but I wanted to know why they did that. I read that March 29th between 8 and 9 PM that, to bring attention to our high energy use, everyone should turn off our lights in our homes.

I got home from work about 7:20 pm. I feed the ducks most every night on the pond behind our home. That helps me decompress after work. I ate dinner and at 8pm my wife was watching Country Music Television and the Grand Ole Opry. 

I mentioned the blackout, to my wife, and how we needed to turn the television and the lights off. She said that we could go out on the driveway and sit and see if any of the neighbors might join us. I was good with that. I didn’t have to listen to bad singing and watching people dressed funny.   

        I had to prepare quickly. We turned the lights and television off. I went to the ice maker to fill my cup for my drink. I turned off the front porch lights that come on automatically everynight. I push the garage door opener and the light comes on in the garage ...drat. I push the controler that operates the wrought iron gate on my driveway. We pick up lawn chairs and walk out of the garage on the driveway and the motion detector on the security light picks us up and the light comes on...double drat. That will be on for 5 minutes. 

We sit down and have a nice conversation. We watch the cars down the street run the stop sign. The street light next to my driveway comes on and showers us in light. We can hear the lighted fountain on the pond behind us spraying water 15 feet into the air. Planes are in a pattern over my neighborhood this night.  All our neighbors were in their homes, at their tv’s or computers. None came outside for that hour.

We can’t get away from high energy use in our society without giving up all the things that we have worked very hard for. The only way we will do without energy is if it runs out. I don’t think that will happen but I could be wrong. The sustainability of any energy source and/or the sustainability of our political will will be the keys.    

I hope the grandchildren, that I love so dearly, don’t suffer from my generations addiction to energy. If there is no energy in their future they would then have to live the life of my great grandparents. How bad would that be?  I can only imagine.