Merrifield Garden Center showcases 'state of the art' facility
By Dan Roem
The Virginia Nursery and Landscape Association does not make annual Field Day pilgrimages to Northern Virginia often.In fact, VNLA president Duane Shumaker cannot remember a time in the last 10 years when he's attended the event in a 703 location.
That changed last week when about 400 members of the trade association came to Merrifield Garden Center in Gainesville to check out one of the newest and most modern gardening sites in the commonwealth.
"It's pretty much state of the art from what I can tell," said Shumaker. He later added, "They're more up to date with the things that are current going on. As you get more (toward) Southwest Virginia, things aren't as current."
The first Merrifield Garden Center store opened in Merrfield, Fairfax County in 1971 and the second came online in stages eight miles away between 1988 and 1991. With roughly the same time frame having passed since the last store opened, Warhurst explained that having a western location 14 miles away in Gainesville could help the company penetrate a whole new market.
"We have customers from all over the region that will come here to this store," said Kevin Warhurst, whose father co-owns the company.
Despite differences between Fairfax and Prince William, Warhurst has not found that Prince William gardeners overwhelmingly prefer anything different to their eastern neighbors. The Gainesville store is larger than the Fairfax facilities. The Gainesville operation boasts an 11,000-square-foot facility and 37,000-square-foot greenhouse stationed on 40 acres of property.
That means the company has room to sell both home decor items and traditional plants.
Warhurst listed dogwoods, crape myrtles, evergreens and flowering plants as among the most common items sought by home gardeners with some of the biggest differences being between those who live in townhouses and those on larger properties.
"Gardening products are pretty universal. So we certainly tried to make this a destination garden center by offering the things that we offer at our other stores, but again, we have a little bit more room here," said Warhurst.
That room allows Merrifield to host seminars, a weekly farmers market and an on-site recycling center for gardening and landscaping waste like concrete, shrubs, pruning scraps and other debris.
According to Shumaker, other garden and landscape centers across the commonwealth can learn from Merrifield.
"If somebody finds out more information about this, maybe in Central Virginia, maybe they open something like that,” he said.