Le Migrateur Garden Centre: A True Local Business

In recent years, we’ve often heard about the importance of buying local. This year, political and economic circumstances are motivating us even more to buy local.

Indeed, globalization, which creates economic interdependence between countries, is more present. These days, the majority of us buy products that have been produced outside Canada, for a variety of reasons: cost, quality, accessibility, and so on. While there are many upsides to globalization, the fact that we are interdependent with other countries carries a risk when there is friction between countries, as we saw at the start of 2025.

To protect our economy, it’s important, whenever possible, to buy local and encourage local producers. Le Migrateur Garden Centre is proud to be a truly local business that has been operating in the horticultural sector for 3 generations now.

However, there seem to be different definitions of what is considered a local business. So here’s our definition of a local horticultural business:

A local horticultural business grows, by itself, the plants it sells. For example, Le Migrateur Garden Centre produces 100% of the annual plants in the greenhouses that are located 100 feet from our store. It doesn’t get any more local than that!

Being a 100% grower of annual plants has several advantages for our customers:

• By supporting our company, you’re also supporting the environment, since we use little or no large-scale transport, we heat our production complex with biomass, a renewable energy source, and we recycle our containers by reusing them year after year.

• We ensure the quality of our products by controlling the entire plant production process from A to Z: water, light, soil, fertilizer and humidity.

• As growers, we can offer you competitive prices.

In short, if buying locally grown plants is important to you, Le Migrateur Garden Centre is the place to go. In this article, we describe our production process, which begins in the fall and ends with the sale of our plants.

Our production complex

First of all, our production complex and our store are both located at the same place, in Cumberland, a village at the eastern end of the city of Ottawa.

In 1987, Jean Parisien, 2nd generation of greenhouse growers in the Parisien family, moved his greenhouses to Cumberland on Regional Road 174. In the late ’90s and early 2000s, Mario Parisien, 3rd generation, took over from his father Jean in Cumberland. It was then that Mario decided to move his production greenhouses to Bourget, where he worked with his older brother Daniel. Together, the Parisien brothers sell wholesale and have a sales point in Ottawa’s Byward Market.

In 2008, Mario opens his own garden centre in Cumberland, Le Migrateur Garden Centre. In 2017, after 149 years, the Parisien family decided to stop selling their horticultural products at the ByWard Market. In 2018, Mario relocated all his production greenhouses to Cumberland to concentrate solely on his store.

Today, we have a production complex that includes 12 greenhouses of various sizes, and our annual production covers more than 40,000 ft2. All our production is handled by Mario Parisien, owner, and Éric Boulanger, business partner. Mario and Éric are responsible for making improvements and repairs to our facilities, preparing our potting soil, and producing and maintaining our annual plants. They are also supported by Mario’s daughters, Gabrielle and Noémie, for production and sales. That’s right! You counted right, there are only 4 of us to do all this hard work.     

To recap, our production and sales are all done in the same place. Our annual plants and vegetable plants are grown in our greenhouses by experts Mario and Éric, who together have over 70 years’ experience in the field. When you visit our store, you’ll have the chance to be served by the 4 people in the business who are involved in our horticultural production. In short, if you’re looking for quality plants produced locally by a small, family-run business, you’ve found it: Le Migrateur Garden Centre !     

The next sections of this article present our horticultural production process through the seasons.

Fall

Even before our garden centre closes its doors at the end of the summer, production for the following season begins.

To begin with, we store mother plants for some of our annuals. Then, we clean and disinfect all our greenhouses so they’re ready for the next production season. 

Definitions

What is a mother plant?

A mother plant is a mature plant from which cuttings are taken. 

What is a cutting?

A cutting is a piece of stem with a few leaves that is cut from the mother plant. Once detached from the mother plant, the cutting is placed in a location to encourage root production. From there, the cutting becomes a plant. 

It’s also in the fall that we take the time to renovate and expand our production complex. For example, the plastic of a greenhouse must be changed every 4 years. So, on fall days when it’s not too windy, we take the opportunity to change the plastics of our greenhouses. We also are constantly striving to improve our facilities and store to ensure that they are accessible to all, and that we can work efficiently.

Finally, during the fall, we prepare our potting soil for the coming season. All our plants grow in potting soil that we prepare ourselves. To prepare our potting soil, we start by making our mixture, which is composed of:

• Black earth (our supplier is located in Casselman)

• Horse manure (our supplier is located 2 km from our production complex)

• Top soil (the top soil comes from our own land)

• Peat moss and perlite mixture (Berger BM6) (our supplier is located in Quebec)

  
  

Next, we sterilize our potting soil. By sterilization, we mean the elimination of weeds and other contaminants. All our potting soil, around 200 yards of it, is put through machines that heat the soil to a temperature of 85°C, sterilizing it in the process. Not only do we have the best plants, we also have the best potting soil!

Winter

After the holiday season, around mid-January, we receive our order of rootless cuttings. These rootless cuttings generally come from Mexico and Guatemala. These countries are favoured by their climate and the length of their days, due to their position close to the equator. We then have to plant the cuttings in trays of peat moss and perlite mix (Berger BM2) so that they can root. Around mid-February, we receive our order of rooted cuttings from our supplier in St. Catharines, Ontario.

Then, once the cuttings have developed roots, we transplant them into their sales format, that is in individual pots. They are also used to create our colourful arrangements, such as hanging baskets, planters, bowls and flower boxes.

Our production starts with cuttings and seeds. In January, we start sowing seeds for a variety of annual plants and vegetable plants. Around 4 to 8 weeks after sowing, we transplant the annuals into their sales format. Generally, the annual plants, which come from seeds, are the flowers that we sell in packs of 6. As for the vegetable plants, once they are ready, we transplant them into individual pots and packs of 6.

Spring

At the end of March, we plant the bulbs for the perennials we buy from our Canadian supplier. All bulbs are planted in 1-gallon pots, which are then sold in stores.

In spring, we carry out our second phase of planting. In fact, since our sales season is spread over 3 months, we always have two batches of production so that our annual plants and vegetable plants are not too far advanced for our customers who start their gardening around the beginning of June.

In March and April, we create our arrangements: hanging baskets, planters, bowls and flower boxes. The plants we use in our arrangements come from cuttings taken in January. These cuttings, once rooted, were transplanted into individual pots and 6-packs to allow them to continue growing in a larger container. So, when it comes the time to prepare our arrangements, the plants we use are already well advanced. This technique allows us to optimize the use of our facilities (space, heating, etc.) and ensure that we offer quality products.

Did you know that…

We produce over 4,000 hanging baskets a year.

At the beginning of May, we receive our shrub order. In all transparency, shrubs are the only products we sell that we don’t produce ourselves. The production of shrubs requires different facilities from those used for the production of annual plants. We had already tried to produce our own shrubs with the facilities we have, but the quality was not optimal. That’s why we buy our shrubs from a supplier located just 200 kilometres from our store. Shrubs represent less than 2% of our sales volume, and we produce everything else ourselves!

Finally, in late April or early May, depending on the weather, we open our store for the season. That’s when all the hard work we’ve put in over the last few months comes to fruition.

Did you know that…

We don’t receive any orders during the selling season, since all our plants are already on site! If a product we sell is no longer on our shelves, it’s because it’s not yet ready for sale, or because it’s sold out for the season.

Summer

Throughout the summer, from June to August, we continue to sell our plants. At the end of the summer, we prepare the mother plants and clean the greenhouses to be ready for the start of production next season.

Support local growers!

For us, still being 100% grower of the annual plants we sell is our greatest pride, and our main objective is to offer quality products to our customers. We put this whole production process into action so that, at the end of the day, we can see you leaving our store with a smile on your face, with your flowers and vegetable plants, ready to cultivate your garden and decorate your home.

By being growers, we ensure that we provide you not only with quality products, but also with quality service. We’re always here to answer your questions.

In conclusion, for locally grown plants, there’s one place to visit and that’s Le Migrateur Garden Centre!

3431 Regional Road 174, Cumberland (Ontario)