Mad About Plants

Prime Minister's Small Business of the Year - NATIONAL WINNER

Extracted from Australian National Training Authority Press Release:

Located on a 16 acre site just south of Edmonton, Mad About Plants is a wholesale nursery. The business provides plants and materials to landscapers, local councils, resorts, retail nurseries and large department stores from Thursday Island to the Gold Coast and occasionally as far south as Canberra.

Owned by Katherine and Darryl Madder, the business employs a plant sales manager, an office manager, 13 staff in the nursery and a delivery driver.

Mad About Plants encourages its team members to engage in training programs to educate them or expand an existing qualification. Over the last 18 months, Darryl Madder completed a Advanced Diploma of Agriculture (Rural Business Management) the sales manager has completed a Diploma in Production Horticulture, the office manager has completed a Certificate of Office Administration, six nursery hands are progressing through a Certificate III in Horticulture and two new employees are doing a Certificate II in Horticulture.

As a result, staff are continuously looking for ways to improve their work practices and environment. Because staff have been properly trained, chemical usage and spraying time have been reduced ten-fold and stock maintenance and quality have improved dramatically.

The team has also developed a new plant species for registration under Plant Breeders Rights (PBR), which was released in 2004. Without education from the Certificate III in Horticulture, staff would never have noticed or recognised the irregularity in the parent plant which lead to the development of this new species.

Through training, Mad About Plants is working to create a team which will lead the industry in the future.