The Vancouver Sun is reporting that the David Hunter Garden Center at 2084 West Broadway will close on Christmas Eve after five decades in business. Ron Hunter, the owner of the company – which was started by his father, David, in 1953 – says the 10,000 square foot Kitsilano location must close because the lease could not be renewed. And Kitsilano.ca readers know why.
“We are naturally very disappointed. We have been in the location for almost a half century. But the owners of the property want to develop it into a mixed retail-residential project,” Hunter says.
“We’ve been looking for another location for the past two years without success. Either the properties we have found are too expensive or don’t have sufficient space for all the green goods [plant material] and not enough space for parking.
“We’ll continue to search for a new location because we would like to still have a store in Vancouver. If we can’t find one anywhere, we will start to look out in the Fraser Valley.”
David Hunter started the business in 1953 with a store at the corner of Kingsway and Rupert in Vancouver. He called it The Kingsway Garden Shop. In 1960, he took over the store on Broadway, which was then called The Broadway Garden Shop. Soon after, David Hunter gave the stores his name.
Last modified: December 9, 2009
DAMMIT.
where will i get my christmas trees from? 🙁
What a shame, this is bad for Kits. Any update on what is actually going on at the IGA lot now? I see some sort of low rise building there now which seems to be wrecking havoc with IGA/BC Liquor parking – I can’t imagine how bad it would be once they start building other things there!
This is so sad. The speculators win again.
The place served a need but was never particularly well run.
This sucks. I loved David Hunter for all the 24 years I’ve lived in Kits. I got my plants there every season and it was always so busy. The staff were incredibly knowledgeable about horticulture. Where can you even get plants in Kits now? Other centers are stupidly overpriced or far away, often both.
This is a sad loss to the community. I found staff at DH extremely helpful and the plants great quality. Let’s not mention that they are going to tear down the beautiful IGA and expect us to go to the IGA dungeon further west on Broadway.