CAN (QC): St-Lazare grower celebrates 50 years

The Van Egmond family today is continuing the long-held dream that their father (and grandfather), the late Jan Van Egmond, brought with him when he and his wife Catherine emigrated from the Netherlands in 1949.

Van Egmond opened his first greenhouse in 1968, and today the business is recognized by flower-shop owners and garden centre experts everywhere as one of the finest wholesale operations in the area.

Always a family enterprise, Jan Van Egmond established it as such to include his immediate family – his sons, and his wife Catherine.

Today it is operated by John Van Egmond, with daughter Lisa, a recent graduate of McGill University, preparing to take over the reins. They are aided by a slew of efficient part-time workers who step up smartly whenever the season demands.

This venture, which began slowly with four greenhouses and where work was all done by hand – everything from seeding and planting to packaging and delivery — is today a horticultural model of efficiency and preparation.

Read more at the Montreal Gazette (Bill Young)