Growing a garden as a business: the example of Alnwick

Back in November, I wrote about my disappointment with Alnwick Gardens.

This week, the Duchess of Northumberland has written in the Financial Times about her current and future plans. Alnwick has not grown any more attractive to me with longer hindsight, but I do admire her focus on promoting the gardens.

A lot of thought is going into keeping Alnwick firmly on the map and other garden owners might benefit from taking note on how she is attracting visitors.

When I visited a couple of years ago, in July,the 350 Tai Haku Japanese cherry trees were looking pretty uninteresting, being callow and, at that time of year, obviously unadorned. Slumbering beneath them were one million pink tulips. In full flower, this is earmarked as “an instantly recognisable image” with which to represent the garden and help bring in visitors.

The whole Alnwick "experience" is being considered, which is where Christian Perdrier, the ex-Disney executive hired to raise the profile of the garden, comes in. Everything that affects the visitor is regarded as important, even the sandwiches (I remember the soup as enjoyable even before he arrived), and, cunningly, she is also thinking of those who bring the visitors to the garden. After all, if the coach drivers are well looked after, they’ll feel benignly towards Alnwick and be keen to include it on their tours. Alnwick has already gained a trade award for “coach-friendliness” and a centre for the coach drivers is being built, with showers, sofas and Sky TV.

Alnwick has already created forty new businesses, and brought in an extra £50 million to the area, according to the Duchess. Running a garden as a successful business takes more than an eye for plants and a touch of topiary, and it strikes me that, if anyone can, the Duchess of Northumberland is going to grow Alnwick into something even bigger.

Of course, most garden owners don’t have the money that has been drummed up for Alnwick, but engaging the public demands creative thinking, which everyone can have a go at.

The Duchess of Northumberland certainly thinks laterally. With the Poison Garden as a major feature and gothic novels so popular in the teen market, she’s put the two together and The Poison Diaries by Maryrose Wood, stories based at Alnwick, will be released later this year in both hardback and ebook formats. For a sneak preview, hear Maryrose reading from the Poison Diaries.