Tag: CBILS

Garden centre rooting for reopening

New Hopetoun Gardens, a garden centre in Broxburn, was among many retailers who were forced to suddenly close their doors when the pandemic hit in March last year.

The garden centre, which offers Scotland’s largest range of plants for sale, relied heavily on customer visits and face-to-face trading so the forced closure hit the business hard. With an average of 10,000 customers a month during a normal April and May, it missed out on the busiest trading months of the year.

Profits dropped considerably and 28 of its 36 staff were furloughed.

In April 2020, New Hopetoun Gardens approached Bank of Scotland for support and received a £195,000 Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme (CBILS) funding package. This allowed the business to ensure it had sufficient cashflow, pay suppliers, care for the plants, and provide reassurance to its staff that operations will continue once restrictions have eased.

New Hopetoun Gardens introduced home delivery services for its customers and launched a new website six weeks ago to facilitate a click and collect service.

These measures have helped over the past few months but the decision after Christmas to give ‘non-essential’ status to the centre has hampered business prospects of opening before its busiest trading period in early spring. 

Morag Macrae, joint owner of New Hopetoun Gardens, said: “The past year has been really challenging for us as a business. Most of our trading is done face-to-face and while we’re incredibly grateful to our fantastic customers who have used our click and collect and delivery service, we saw our revenue drop considerably.

“The change that saw us considered as a “non-essential” shop was quite a blow as we hoped to be open to take full benefit of our busy spring trading period.

“Thankfully, the support from Bank of Scotland has been a massive boost. It has allowed us to keep our operations running and keep us out of our overdraft which has been a huge relief.

“While times are still challenging, business has picked up considerably in March and we’re hoping we will be able to re-open soon to make the most out of our key trading period, when it is safe to do so.”

CBIL boost helps recycling business support gardeners in lockdown

  • Bank of Scotland supports green waste recycling firm with six-figure CBILS loan
  • Forth Resource Management triples online compost and topsoil delivery sales as more people spend time in their gardens
  • Working capital injection comes as local authority clients stop garden waste collections and close local recycling centres 

An East Lothian recycling business has seen its online sales more than triple and has stepped up its local delivery service with the support of Bank of Scotland. It is believed that the jump in sales is partly as a result COVID-19, with more people spending time at home and in their garden.

Forth Resource Management recycles more than 100,000 tonnes of organic waste for local councils and landscapers across Scotland each year, retailing subsequent product direct to local residents, builders merchants, garden centres and farmers.

With the UK now on lockdown, the business has increased the output of its online retail offer, supported by a six-figure loan from Bank of Scotland as part of the government-backed Coronavirus Business Interruption Loan Scheme.

The funding comes as a number of Forth Resource Management’s key local authority clients have stopped their garden waste collection services and closed their local recycling centres.

While the business has ultimately had to furlough a small number of its employees, the booming online delivery service – alongside the working capital injection from the bank – is expected to stand it in good stead for when normal trading resumes.

Tommy Dale, managing director at Forth Resource Management, said: “Local authority contracts have always been a key revenue pillar within our company but we’re fortunate that the nature of our business means we can adjust our focus and meet growing need elsewhere.

“Gardening and time spent outdoors is offering valuable respite up and down the country so it’s nice to know we’re positively contributing to keeping spirits up.

“The speed at which Bank of Scotland provided the funding has given us a great deal of confidence to trade through this challenging period and line up investment for growth in more certain times.”

Daniel Burns, relationship manager at Bank of Scotland, said: “Plotting a path against current headwinds is a challenge for almost every business at present.

“As such, we’re committed to being by the side of companies like Forth Resource Management – working with government to enable them to adapt their operations for the short-term.”