[SNEAK PEEK] Leading Women of Horticulture: The women of Fairview Greenhouses & Garden Center

Editor's note: March is Women’s History Month in the U.S., and March 8 is International Women’s Day.

That’s why for the second year in a row, we’re focusing our March magazine on the excellent women doing great work in our industry through the GIE Media Horticulture Group's Leading Women of Horticulture article and video series.

We’ve been interviewing women at all levels of the nursery and greenhouse business about their work and experiences in the green industry. Their stories are amazing and inspiring. Enjoy these sneak peeks before you read the full articles later this month. 

The women of Fairview Greenhouses & Garden Center

Jo Ann Dewar is a rarity in an industry where multi-generational businesses are most often traced back to fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers. As the 94-year-old owner of Raleigh, North Carolina’s Fairview Greenhouses & Garden Center, she’s a founding great-grandmother.

With more than 50 years in business, Fairview is thriving, with garden center retail and plant production situated on 12 acres. What started as a modest growing operation surrounded by tobacco fields is now a bustling enterprise surrounded by Raleigh suburbs, as if the city wanted to bring eager customers right to the company’s doorstep.

To serve those customers, Fairview grows a wide variety of annuals, herbs, vegetables and seasonal plants like poinsettias under plastic in 2 acres of gutter-connected greenhouses. They sell plants, as well as decor, pots, statuary and plant care items, out of an airy, barn-style, 24,000-square-foot building, plus just over 5 acres of retail greenhouses and tidy grounds showcasing trees, shrubs and perennials.

Jo Ann is the heart and soul of the business. She still comes to work every day to “play.”

Jo Ann passed down her love of growing to her daughter, Susan. With her daughter’s help and some good old trial and error, Jo Ann began to develop the skills of a grower

Susan (now Rollins) is Fairview’s current president. 

Keeping production and sales on track is a 12-member leadership team, nine of whom are women. Working with Jo Ann and Susan are Susan’s son Brad Rollins, vice president; daughter-in-law Heather Rollins, marketing director; and sister-in-law Phyllis Rollins, assistant general manager, personnel manager and floral designer. Women also hold leadership positions as department managers for perennials, nursery and hard goods. In the greenhouses, Carmen Hernandez is the production manager.

“That’s what sets us apart. We all work together, and we all have a passion for it,” Heather says. “And that’s all from what we see Jo Ann and Susan doing every day, taking care of everybody and every plant and doing it all with a smile on their face.”