Flower Farming Startup Story: A Post-90s Young Man's Dream of a Sea of Flowers

In the depths of winter, what gets Zhang Ting out of his warm bed on time every morning is the flowers blooming in his greenhouse. On December 9, a reporter walked into the Pengduo Garden Center in Zhangxi Village, Jibu Town, Gan County, and met Zhang Ting busy working among colorful potted flowers.

Zhang Ting, born in 1991, is the owner of the Pengduo Garden Center. He studied horticulture in university and after graduation worked in garden management at a scenic area in Ningbo, where both the working environment and pay were good. In 2014, driven by his love for his profession and his optimism about the prospects of the flower market in his hometown, Zhang Ting conceived the idea of returning home to start a horticulture center. He acted on the idea immediately, quitting his job and, with his parents' support, investing 200,000 yuan to rent 30 mu of farmland in his hometown and get to work. Although his garden center is not far from home, he insisted on eating and living at the garden, devoting all his energy to the flower-growing business. The flower nursery currently has no electricity and requires a generator, but despite the tough conditions, Zhang Ting remains tireless and happy in his work.

Hard work pays off. Under Zhang Ting's careful cultivation, the nursery is filled with a dazzling array of cyclamen, cineraria, kalanchoe and other flowers blooming in competition, and visitors coming to admire and buy flowers stream in continuously. "In winter I want to add a touch of spring to my home, so I'll buy a few pots to decorate it -- it's both beautiful and eco-friendly," said Ms. Liao happily as she came to visit and buy flowers.

Having had a taste of success, Zhang Ting is determined to create his own distinctive features. He not only provides "private customized" services for flower retail shops, but also uses the internet to create innovative sales platforms, publishing supply and demand information for various flowers through QQ, WeChat and other channels, broadening communication channels with consumers and providing free flower care knowledge to consumers. "I want to build some leisure and entertainment facilities so that visitors who come to admire and buy flowers can enjoy even more fun," Zhang Ting said confidently.

Nie Quanhong's "Rose Dream" (Photo)

Nie Quanhong (left) inspects the quality of rose tea and dried roses in the processing workshop.

During this year's "May Day" holiday, the Jincheng Rose Garden in Liangshui Village, Shuanggui Street, Liangping County, officially opened to the public, with hundreds of mu of roses blooming in dazzling competition, leaving visitors lingering with delight.

Rose garden owner Nie Quanhong told reporters that the opening of the garden means his entrepreneurial "Long March" is half completed. It will not be until 2017, when the thousand-mu "sea of roses" integrating rose viewing and processing, wedding photography and hotel accommodation is completed, that his "rose dream" will truly come true.

The "Rose Dream" Takes Root

While in university, Nie Quanhong discovered that the rose industry in Yunnan, Shandong, ** and other places was thriving. "Every day millions of fresh roses are shipped to Chongqing from other places, and besides being ornamental they can also be eaten."

"The rose industry fits the broader context of ecological agriculture and is bound to have development prospects," Nie Quanhong said, adding that he had suddenly found his future direction.

After graduating from university in 2010, Nie Quanhong gave up the opportunity to teach at Chongqing Industry Polytechnic College and returned to his hometown of Liangshui Village, Shuanggui Street, Liangping County, where he contracted 400 mu of land and officially began his "rose journey."

A Bumpy Road in Pursuit of the Dream

Like all entrepreneurs, Nie Quanhong's journey in pursuit of his dream was full of setbacks.

At the time, the most advantageous rose variety was the "China Red" edible rose, which had high yields, wide uses and a flowering cycle of 10 months each year. At the end of 2012, Nie Quanhong traveled twice to Yunnan to seek a meeting with "Rose King" Zhu Yingxiong, who held the patent for "China Red." Zhu Yingxiong simply did not believe that this young man could endure working with the soil, and turned him away twice.

Nie Quanhong had a stubborn streak in him. In June 2013, he went to Yunnan for the third time and found Zhu Yingxiong. He talked with Zhu Yingxiong about ecological agriculture, and the more they talked, the more they hit it off. In the end, Zhu Yingxiong said: "You have a persistence rarely seen in young people. I'm willing to give you the new variety."

Shortly after introducing the variety, Nie Quanhong encountered another hurdle -- more than half of the seedlings died the same year they were planted. He consulted multiple experts one after another and finally figured out the reason: Liangping's high temperatures and humidity, abundant rainfall and large temperature differences between day and night made the out-of-town roses prone to not adapting to the local environment.

Nie Quanhong repeatedly experimented on how to make rose seedlings adapt to the local climate. After more than half a year of effort, he developed a "rose seedling re-propagation technology." Roses cultivated through this technology saw their survival rate rise from 50% in the past to 95%, and per-mu yield increase from 600 kg to 800 kg.

At the second Chongqing Youth Agricultural Science and Technology Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition, this technology won second prize in the Joint Growth Group and received 200,000 yuan in funding.

The Ultimate Dream: Driving Villagers' Employment and Income Growth

Through unremitting efforts, Nie Quanhong's rose garden gradually gained fame, attracting more and more tourists, and the dried roses it produces are also sold to Yunnan, Guangdong, ** and other places.

Nie Quanhong is not satisfied with the status quo; he has an even bigger dream: "To build the largest rose base in southwest China, which will give a greater boost to the hometown economy."

In October 2013, Nie Quanhong rented 1,000 mu of land in Jinchengzhai, Jindai Town, and began to go all out, also taking in local villagers to work in the garden.

Chen Yiju, a villager from Group 7 of Liangshui Village, Shuanggui Street, works at the rose garden. "It's close to home, and I earn 50 yuan a day, which is much more worthwhile than going out to work."

The rose garden has indeed increased villagers' income. Tang Renping, director of the Shuanggui Street Office, said that during busy periods the rose garden employs 200 farmers, and usually around 30, with annual labor costs of about 800,000 yuan. It is expected that after full completion it can provide employment for four to five hundred people, making a great contribution to local economic development and the tourism industry. Source: Hualong Net - Chongqing Daily