Bowood Farms is greening up its Central West End neighborhood in
“We want to be a positive force,” said John McPheeters, owner of Bowood Farms, a finalist for the 2008 Garden Center Innovator Award. “The city of
Bowood’s neighborhood is perhaps best described as “transitional.”
“We’re half a block from the beginnings of a good, old
Bowood Farms is in its third year in retail. The first year went well, and sales were up 60 percent the second year.
Bill Ruppert, owner/manager of the
Ruppert described Bowood Farms as a “most unique retail garden center” supporting a previously underserved market area in urban St. Louis. “Bowood is totally in a league of its own: from the finely crafted facilities, to a unique product mix closely tailored to their market niche to inclusion of a café as an integral part of the business (no other garden center in the Gateway region can boast a café as part of their business), to a highly knowledgeable and motivated support staff.”
Extreme makeover, Bowood edition
Bowood’s building was a diamond in the rough. Very rough. Built in 1920, it was an auto repair shop before housing plastics and cabinet manufacturing.
“When we found the building, it was not for sale, and it was a little difficult to tell what was going on,” McPheeters said. “It was in pretty rough shape -- structural damage to the roof, hundreds of windows broken out, everything boarded up, basically no heating, virtually no plumbing. It was a complete gut-and-rehab situation.”
But that didn’t deter McPheeters and his family. “This was a significant project. But we’ve built buildings on our farm [Bowood’s growing division], built a house, rehabbed an apartment building and rehabbed a historic building in Clarksville, so it’s not a totally new thing for us,” he said.
“I could tell that the building would be interesting for what we wanted to do,” he said.
McPheeters’ son Alex and son-in-law Dave Rickard were heavily involved in the rehab work, which took over a year. It was financed internally.
Bowood initially bought two buildings, joined by a common wall, that totaled about 15,000 square feet. One is used for the gift, hard goods and indoor plant space. Light and airy, the building has big multipaned steel windows, a large clerestory and an arched ceiling.
“The other building, the roof was completely shot and one of the walls fell into the alley about two weeks after we bought the property,” McPheeters said. “So in order to close that breach in the wall up, we built a greenhouse. We tore the roof off that whole section, and most of that is an open courtyard. We built a café into that space.”
Bowood also bought the nearby auto graveyard, turning part of it into an approximately 12,000-square-foot tree and shrub lot. Part of the property was a long-gone Sinclair station, which now rehabbed serves as storage space and houses a police substation in the old office. Bowood is also rehabbing a smaller warehouse on the property for back offices and storage. And it planted a vegetable garden, the fruits of which will be used in the café, on 1/3 acre across the street.
Throughout the construction process, Bowood incorporated green building practices, including environmentally friendly construction materials, permeable pavers and buffalo grass in the employee parking lot, lots of natural light, in-floor radiant heat and a living green roof for the café. The roof can grow herbs for the café.
“The green roof took a little more structural engineering, and getting the materials up on the roof is more complex,” McPheeters said, explaining that building “green” was not overly challenging. “We’ve used a lot of radiant heat in floors in the past. It works very well for the situation where it can be a 50-degree day and the doors are open all the time. It’s a much more comfortable and efficient heat.”
The green practices tacked on an extra 5 percent to 10 percent in costs, but in the long run, should save money.
A good neighbor policy
When Bowood decided to move into retail, it looked at several
“We lived in this neighborhood for 11 years during the ’70s and ’80s when our children were younger. All of our children went to school in this neighborhood,” McPheeters said. “The city of St. Louis does not have a lot of retail nurseries. We liked this neighborhood. We thought there was an opportunity here, and we liked the real estate.”
In the last six months to a year, at least half a dozen houses on the block behind Bowood have been fixed up.
Between the store and the farm, Bowood employs 25 to 30 workers. “We have a very good staff -- friendly, knowledgeable, dedicated people. And we have a facility that people find appealing. People like to be in our space. It’s a very bright, airy, welcoming sort of spot.”
It’s not exactly what one might expect from an old automotive repair shop.
Farm to market
Bowood began in 1989 as a wholesale plant supplier in Clarksville, Mo., on a 500-acre farm that has been in the family for four generations. “Our main focus is perennials. We grow a lot of herbs. We do a lot of shrubs and roses and ornamental vines. It’s basically hardy material in containers from a pint to 3 gallons,” he said.
In 2004, Bowood set its sights on expanding into the St. Louis retail market, about 30 minutes away from the farm. It launched its Central West End location April 15, 2006. “We were strictly a wholesale nursery before,” McPheeters said. “We thought we could capture that extra margin for the plants we were growing if we were selling them directly to the public.”
The move proved so successful, it prompted a change in company focus. “We now basically do not wholesale to anybody else. We grow the vast majority of our plant material for our own use. Our whole business has changed pretty dramatically, and it just sort of evolved that way once we got started on this retail project,” he said.
Although Bowood Farms is very much an urban garden center -- both in location and feel -- it also has a homegrown benefit. “We grow a lot of the plant material that’s at the store, so there’s a very direct local connection,” McPheeters said. “We’re able to bring plant material down on a weekly or really daily basis if we need to. And plants that get a little tired or haven’t sold, we take them back to the farm. … It’s sort of a combination of urban and the direct farm-to-market connection that is our focus.”
A product mix targeting urban gardeners
Other than its own green goods, Bowood also sells plants and trees from other growers, maintenance items, organic products, garden tools, bison from its farm, containers, pottery, ornamental items for home and garden, birdfeeders, books, gifts and more.
“We want to have things that work for anyone in any sort of situation, but we’re in a city environment so we have people with smaller yards, a lot of shade, balconies, rooftop situations and lot of interior situations,” he said. “So we try to provide a broad range of plant material that’s suited to the type of environment we’re in.”
McPheeters’ wife Connie and daughter Lizzy Rickard, who is a store manager, search out the “interesting” as they shop for gift items. Bowood buyers try not to stray too far from its gardening roots, and they look for things with an environmental focus.
This spring, Bowood is also launching an on-site café. “We want to be a resource for horticultural information. We also want to be a neighborhood focal point and gathering spot, and the café will help with that,” he said.
What’s ahead for Bowood
Bowood Farms plans to continue its work in the neighborhood, perhaps with some of the other property it owns.
“We have a fair amount of vacant property and we have some houses that are in need of help,” McPheeters said, though there are no set plans at this point. “The nursery now is probably a pretty decent size. I don’t see expansion of that. … I do see us moving on to other projects in the neighborhood. We are very interested in architecture and building and improving the neighborhood in that fashion and landscape. All of those things are going to have a bearing on changing the neighborhood.”
Bison roaming on Bowood’s range
Though it was historically more of a mixed-use farm, Bowood phased out cattle and began raising bison exclusively several years ago (except for the 15-20 acres dedicated to nursery plants). Now it has a herd of about 130 head.
“They’re obviously the native grazing animal for this part of the world,” said John McPheeters, Bowood owner and a trustee for the Nature Conservancy in Missouri. “We have grown a lot of native plants on our farm for the wholesale side of the business, but we’ve also planted warm-season grasses. Bison are a herd-grazing animal that is well suited to our territory.”
The approach is hands off.
“There is a whole social structure and hierarchy that is built into the instincts of herd animals, and if you allow them to function as a herd, they can pretty well take care of themselves. And that’s been our experience,” McPheeters said.
Bowood maintains fencing, provides plenty of water, gives an organic mineral, throws hay in the winter and opens gates to move the herd between pastures.
“We don’t interfere with them very much,” he said. “We don’t feed any grain. They don’t get any supplements other than the mineral. No hormones, no vaccinations, no chemical interaction. We don’t wean the calves. We don’t castrate. We stay out of their way.”
Bowood sells its bison at the garden center and will use it in the café. It also sells to a local grocer and does some wholesaling of live animals to another small producer.
“As the café gets rolling, I’d like to raise poultry and other kinds of livestock,” McPheeters said.
Cafe in the courtyard
Bowood Café opened in mid-May, serving breakfast and lunch.
“The café’s focus [is] on very good, fresh, high-quality products as local as we can source them,” said John McPheeters, Bowood owner. “We hope that it will become a neighborhood gathering spot.”
The café features produce from Bowood’s vegetable garden across the street, herbs from the café’s green rooftop and bison from its
“The menu will not be static. It will reflect what is in season -- what vegetables and produce and meats and so forth are best and freshest at the time,” McPheeters said. “We don’t profess to be aspiring to Alice Waters’ restaurant in
For more: John McPheeters, Bowood Farms, (314) 454.6868; www.bowoodfarms.com; johnmcpheeters@earthlink.net. William T. Ruppert, National Nursery Products --
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- Rachel Stowe Master
Rachel Stowe Master is a freelance writer in
August 2008