Eighteen: You Can’t Do It Alone

Growing a business is very much like raising a child. It is of you but it is not you. All the people who touch it have a hand in shaping it. Customers, vendors, employees, friends, neighbors and family alike, contribute to its character and personality. Everyone affects its course. In the beginning, when cash was unobtainable through the system, it was the generosity of friends and family that sparked the engine—taking a chance on me, co-signing a loan, or giving me a loan themselves. Mentors, mostly customers, shared unlimited time with advice and know-how, helping me expand my ideas and teaching me things I needed to know. Friends became customers and customers became friends.

The loans were gifts of possibility, entry tickets into the great game of business. But the employees who worked at Cactus & Tropicals were the ones who gave it lift. Over the years, hundreds of people worked with me. Some stayed a long time—until life changes stole them away. A few worked there longer than I did and love to brag to me about it. Others came for a summer or a semester and were never seen or heard from again.

When I started growing a staff, there were no experts in the field of houseplants, i.e., ornamental horticulture. I taught people what I had learned on my own and told them to pass it on. I looked for individuals who were more curious than smart and who were up for trying something new; people with creative, problem-solving minds, because we were always doing something for the first time. I wanted folks who were dependable, honest, and true to their word, because these were the traits required for us to work together. I also wanted people who took pride in their work. I wanted diversity too—the richest stew of people I could find, including age, color, gender, and skill set. I had discovered long ago that mixing different points of view on a problem or need produces the strongest solutions.

My mother was my lifelong teacher. She taught me the importance of living an ethical life. She encouraged me to hope and aspire, and would say things like “my daughter the Senator” or “my daughter the lawyer,” filling my head with strange notions. This was her way of telling me she not only had faith in me but she had expectations, too.

My father was a bulldog of a man. On a summer evening, he would lay on his chaise lounge, smoking his Dutch Corona with one hand and massaging his forehead with the other. If anyone came along, he’d say, “Just relaxing.” But we knew that wasn’t true. He was plotting—one idea after another of money-making maneuvers. His odyssey took place in his mind.

One of my first employees was Miriam, a young woman from El Salvador. In 1979, when a left-wing revolution in her country killed thousands of men, including Miriam’s husband, she and her five-year-old son fled to America, hiding under the floor boards of a box truck. She worked with me for twelve years until her own entrepreneurial spirit took over and she opened a Salvadorean restaurant. I attended her Naturalization Ceremony, her wedding, and the birth of her second child.

Mr. George, my seventy-five-year-old greeter (long before Walmart had heard of such a thing), came and hung out with us for a few hours every day. It was good for him and good for us.

Bill—designer extraordinaire—designed many of our work stations and service counters. His artful plant and garden arrangements earned him a clientele of his own. If Bill wasn’t there when one of his devotees came in, they came back the next day. Bill and I got into an argument one day and I don’t remember if I fired him or he quit, but several of the greenhouse staff went on strike. They threatened to stop working until Bill came back. I know when I am beaten!

Matt, the bookkeeper. In understanding financial statements, I made it beyond a Fourteen Column Ledger. I learned how to read income statements and balance sheets, and eventually grasped terms like “liquidity,” “equity,” and “bankruptcy.” But I didn’t have much time for studying the numbers; I was too busy trying to make them. Matt, who is still the bookkeeper at Cactus & Tropicals, is as honest, trustworthy, and loyal as humanly possible.

Francisco Ramos, the facilities manager, is one of those who has worked at Cactus & Tropicals longer than I have. His father was the facility manager at Quality Flowers many, many years ago. Franciso is another employee who received his citizenship while working with me. Today, his sister, two sons, and a daughter work at Cactus & Tropicals.

Kathy started in 1989, right before The Garden Wall opened. She quickly became my right-hand person. She is the General Manager now, managing three locations.

Paula, a gift buyer. After my sister Marilyn’s business grew so successful she no longer had time for The Garden Wall, Paula stepped in. She was the sharpest knife in the drawer, and she didn’t take any guff from me. She saw my rusty metal, barnwood ways and wasn’t having any of it. Paula was another example of an employee better at her job than I could ever be. In the realm of gift shop buying—ribbon, sacks, wrapping, holiday tchotchkes (Paula called them “dustables”)—there was no comparison.

It is difficult to be a boss. I never liked the terms “employee,” “staff,” or “team.” They all imply the noun “tool” or the verb “to use,” but I haven’t found alternatives. It’s an uncomfortable situation, telling others what to do. There is an art to it. Having had a “bad boss,” kind of an anti-mentor, I knew how I didn’t want to be, but I needed to develop positive skills, to be good at it. It took my entire working life to create a better, kinder voice and a more even temperament—specifically, not to be too “bossy.”

While the staff was growing, a mission statement was writing itself in my mind. One day, five lines popped up like mushrooms after a rainstorm. The first line, Create beauty, was obvious. It was the very essence of Cactus & Tropicals, the purpose of our existence. The second line, Live a customer consciousness, was critical to me. It simply means to always have the customer at the front of your mind. Make the shopping experience warm, fun, easy, and memorable. Make customers want to come back.

The third line was Create a happy, healthy learning environment. Work is work, I know, but it’s up to us to make it fun and interesting. We owe it to each other. Four, Commit to corporate responsibility. In the mid-eighties the phrase “corporate responsibility” was trendy. Companies like Ben and Jerry’s ice cream, Anita Roddick’s The Body Shop, and the Smith & Hawken garden stores led the way in this conversation. Today there are many companies committed to social responsibility in a variety of ways, so while the term is relevant, it is not unique.

Five, Increase the economic well-being and quality of life for all stakeholders. (I must have been hanging out with a business club.) This was a fancy way of saying pay everyone a good wage and give bonuses when possible. Everyone brings unique skills and has a distinctive position in the company. Even delivery drivers make a difference to the bottom line. Like musicians playing in a great orchestra, if we each play our part well, we make beautiful music together.

When the current owners of Cactus & Tropicals decided to add a blog to the website, their webmaster, Darla, called to ask if I’d like to write one. All these years later, my MO is still the same: leap before you look. I immediately said yes; I would write the company history. I didn’t know a blog is not a history or a story. A blog does not have chapters. A blog does not last twenty-eight years.

Nevertheless, when Darla first called a year and a half ago, I went to both the Salt Lake City and the Salt Lake County recorders offices. I was able to get copies of most of the documents I was looking for: deeds, permits, variances, abstracts of finding, even a writ or two. I lined them up running across my living room floor and into the kitchen, and with the documents in order, made a chronological chart of the steps taken to create Cactus & Tropicals. It was Darla’s suggestion to name my blog The Greenhouse Odyssey. Darla and my sister Marilyn drew physical maps so people could see how it expanded over the years.

To make sure I understood the meaning of ”odyssey” correctly, I googled it. One definition read, “Odyssey: a long, eventful, and often challenging journey, particularly one that is filled with adventures and hardships. It is a journey representative of self-discovery, learning, or any significant life experience.”

All journeys end up at a Rest Stop, don’t they? Twenty-eight years is a long time to live a dream. But in my little corner of town, there was no more property to buy and no space for another greenhouse. If there had been, I might have been compelled to stay. No. I would have stayed. I didn’t set out to buy five lots—or six—but now that there were none left available, it felt like the fun was over. Nothing left to build. Nothing left to destroy. I needed a nap.

Cactus & Tropicals didn’t need a new direction; it was on a good path. But it was time for an upgrade. The company had gotten too big for my antiquated britches, too big to navigate by stabs and hunches. It needed entrepreneurs who understand data management, computer programs, websites, bar codes, spreadsheets, electric vehicles, palm pilots, and policy handbooks.

The new owners (of twenty-two years now) came with exactly what Cactus & Tropicals was ready for: new skills and fresh ideas. They expanded, added to every program, and tripled the number of employees and service accounts. They don’t keep records in a recipe box and they no longer communicate with two tin cans and a string. They’ve opened two more locations in the Salt Lake valley. The greenhouse odyssey continues.

As for me, I have retired to a small mountain village in central Utah, built a greenhouse—and don’t be surprised—filled it with cactus.