Today we’d like to introduce you to Amy Gailey
Hi Amy, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstory with our readers?
Like many people, my love of gardening started with my grandparents. Each summer they tended a large vegetable garden and many beautifully manicured flower beds around their home in Tennessee. I have so many wonderful childhood memories in their garden, and after I moved to California, I’d look forward to a garden tour every time I’d travel back to visit them. When my grandparents passed away in 2018 and 2019, they left me a bit of money that was almost exactly the same amount as the price of the Floret Online Workshop, which I took as a sign.
For those who may not know, the Floret Online Workshop is a very popular and comprehensive flower farming workshop. I don’t own land, so I wasn’t sure exactly what I was going to do with the knowledge that I’d learn from the workshop, but I knew that I was happiest when I was in my garden, so I took a leap of faith. As I spent more and more time in my home garden, I realized that growing flowers was not only a hobby, it was also a calling.
In time, I maxed out the growing space in my yard and started looking at other options. During that time, I was walking quite a bit in my neighborhood, and I would notice many yards that were either overgrown or underutilized. I’d walk past them and think, “I could grow flowers there. Is anyone doing that?” After a quick internet search, I found Rachel Nafis of Psalter Farm Flowers who was not only growing flowers in her neighbors’ yards, but also growing the local flower movement in San Diego County.
Inspired, I posted on the Nextdoor app asking if anyone in Poway had any land that they couldn’t or didn’t want to take care of, and if so, would they consider letting me grow flowers there. One amazing woman (I call her my fairy landowner) responded to my post, and with a truly humbling amount of kindness and generosity, she offered to open up her heart and her home to my flower dreams. With an initial plot of 3000 sq. ft. of growing space, Greeny Flower Garden Farms was born.
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
It actually has been a surprisingly smooth road so far. Flower people are the most wonderful people in the world, and the flower community in San Diego is really special. I’ve received so much support over the years from the growing community in general and from other flower farmers and florists in particular.
That being said, with farming, you’re always going to have certain struggles. There will always be pests that are trying to eat what you grow, weather that’s not cooperating and expenses occurring at times you might not have a lot of money coming in.
I’ve found that growing in an organic and regenerative way allows you to work with the natural ecology of a given growing space instead of always trying to fight against it in a way that isn’t sustainable.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
Greeny Flower is a collection of residential garden farms in San Diego County. We grow specialty cut flowers for floral designers, event florists, farmer florists and wholesalers.
When it comes to cut flowers, not all flowers are created equally. Most flowers that you’ll find on the market are imported, and they’re bred specifically to ship well and last a long time after harvest. Unfortunately, this often means that the characteristics that make a flower truly unique, like fragrance, form and color, are uniformly sacrificed.
Local flowers retain all of the qualities that make garden flowers so beautiful, and they aren’t being shipped across the world, so they arrive to the customer within days (and sometimes hours) of being harvested. Just like the farm-to-table movement seeks to forge a stronger bond between the consumer and their food, so too does the farm-to-vase movement seek to forge a stronger connection between people and their flowers.
I am most proud of Greeny Flower for our commitment to our mission – to share the beauty, joy, peace and healing power of garden-grown flowers with our community. This farm is the result of my lifelong love of all things that grow, and I hope to spread that love to as many people as I can.
Can you share something surprising about yourself?
I’ve spent most of my adult life as a professional writer, and I’ve written just about everything from advertising copy to screenplays. For a writer, writing isn’t just a thing that you do, it’s also who you are. While I still consider myself a writer, I’ve gladly traded in my meetings and deadlines for seeds and soil.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.greenyflower.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/greenyflowergardenfarms/
