Choice Plant Nurseries, Stockbridge Road Timsbury, Romsey, Hampshire, SO51 0NB

Choice Plant Nurseries is a long established & respected business with a range of income streams, including Poppies Café, Poppies craft and pottery centre, homemade ice cream parlour and large plant centre.
The owners are looking to retire but will be leaving a thriving business with development/ expansion potential.
The freehold site is around 4 acres with a broad frontage to the A3057, the main road heading north out of Romsey.
The site has established retail use for many years and occupies a large site that may hold considerable longer term value in its potential for further development or alternative use. We understand that the site is not Greenbelt or AONB.

Choice Plants Nursery is located on the main A road between the local centres of Romsey and Stockbridge. The site has a prominent position and substantial road frontage and occupies a highly sought after location in the Test Valley and on the end of the New Forest National Park, a major tourist attraction. The larger cities of Winchester (13 miles), Southampton (16 miles) and Salisbury (17 miles) are all within easy motoring distance.
The latest census data shows there to be 572,554 people living within a 20km radius with the key indicators showing this to be an excellent demographic for a garden centre with above UK average employment levels and population health, higher social class sector demographics and significantly above UK average property values.

The site is broadly level and roughly rectangular in shape with the exception of the corner occupied by the detached house. There are a large number of buildings on site, in all offering just over
50,000 of retail and café buildings, poly tunnels and storage units. The garden centre sells a wide range of plants, garden accessories and tools, horticultural chemicals and compost as well as garden ornaments and pots. There is significant scope to increase the range of products available, including gifts, farm shop and food items, outdoor living and barbeques etc.
A number of the poly tunnels are now not in use so offer considerable potential to be developed or repurposed to enable the owner to increase the revenue potential of the site.
There are c. 25 customer parking spaces to the front of the main building, beyond this is space for additional overflow customer parking.

Services - The property has mains water and a private septic tank. There is no mains gas.

On the northeast corner of the site is a substantial detached house which sites on a generous plot of around ¾ of an acre. The house is free from any agricultural tie. The owners would be willing to sell the property with the commercial property, subject to separate negotiation.

The site has developed over time from a horticultural business towards the retail and hospitality business that it is today. The garden centre sells a wide range of plants, garden accessories and tools, horticultural chemicals and compost as well as garden ornaments and pots. There is significant scope to increase the range of products available, including gifts, farm shop and food items, outdoor living and barbeques etc.
There is also potential for the incoming owners to develop the craft centre to offer fully catered birthday parties, holiday clubs and special occasions. There is also significant scope to rent sections of the site to complementary businesses, perhaps including garden designers, pet care or aquatics.
The broader context of the site is that it is located close
to a number of industrial and retail parks and, subject to
obtaining the necessary consents, a similar use could
be pursued on this site.

The business is run by a husband-and-wife team with the assistance of 17 part time 3 full time staff. The wage bill for 2023 is anticipated to be in the region of £185,000.
Staff will transfer with the business under TUPE rules.

Full trading information is available to seriously interested parties.

The business has a rateable value of £22,000 with the rates payable for 2023/24 being circa £2500 after small business rates relief is applied.