Can you make an income from your garden?

When I first started creating this garden, I had what I thought was a perfectly sensible plan.

It was inspired by my dearly departed grandmother, Gwyn Masters, who had a magnificent garden. She featured in magazines, and even on a New Zealand gardening TV show. She’d open her garden to the public, usually by having bus tours prebook for a visit. But every Labour Weekend she’d open it for the Taranaki Rhododendron Festival and would have the public come wandering through. They’d pay their entrance fee and spend an afternoon admiring her handiwork.

Photos: my grandmother in her garden near Stratford, Taranaki, and showing off her own ‘Gywneth Masters’ rhododendron. Known to her family as ‘Supergran’.

As a child, I was appointed to the very important position of Labour Weekend Gatekeeper. In reality, this mostly involved sitting at a folding table collecting money from visitors and hearing approximately 47 people a day tell me how lovely my red hair was. Now, if you’re under the age of about 40, you’ll probably struggle to appreciate just how unusual that was. Being a redhead in the 1980s wasn’t considered particularly glamorous, but these days people pay good money to achieve my hair colour. Back then though, the only people who seemed genuinely enthusiastic about red hair had an average age of about 83. I’d smile politely, take their fee, panic about whether my maths had been correct when handing them their change, and wonder whether my grandmother had any biscuits left inside. I’d even soldier on when manning the gate required a raincoat, an umbrella and a heavy-duty rug because I knew that a good portion of those gate takings would come my way, enabling me to make sensible financial investments in such things as the latest Wham or Madonna album.

Years later, as my own garden started taking shape, I naturally assumed I’d do the same thing as my grandmother. Open the gates, charge a small fee, and use the money to support my increasingly expensive habit of buying “just one more plant.” It sounded perfectly logical. But then Instagram happened. As more people discovered my garden online, I started getting messages asking if they could come and visit.

At first, I was flattered but then I actually pictured what ‘opening to the public’ would look like.

People wandering past my kitchen window while I was eating breakfast, someone admiring the roses while I was hanging my washing out (or not hanging my washing out because of visitors), visitors strolling up onto the deck while I was still in my dressing gown wondering whether I could get away with pretending I wasn’t home.

I also realised something else. If people are paying to visit your garden, they quite reasonably expect… well… a nice garden. And here’s the problem. I know everyone says, “People don’t mind a few weeds.” But I mind. If I charged someone to visit and there was a section I’d ripped out because I’d changed my mind (which happens with alarming regularity), I’d spend the entire day apologising.

“Oh yes… ignore that bit.”

“The hedge normally looks much better.”

“I haven’t deadheaded those yet.”

“Please don’t judge me by the bindweed.”

The visitors probably wouldn’t care, but I’d care enough for all of us. Instead of gardening because I loved it, I’d end up gardening because I’d feel guilty. That wasn’t the dream. The whole reason I want to spend more of my life gardening is to escape stress, not invent an entirely new category of it. So, I parked the idea. Not forever… but just slightly to one side.

Then one day, while scrolling Instagram instead of doing something sensible, I saw another gardener selling digital garden guides. She appeared to be doing incredibly well and I remember thinking, “Well… I can write.” I’ve certainly got enough photos, and I know a thing or two about gardening after twenty-five years of making mistakes, so others don’t have to. So, I wrote my first guide, then another, then another. It’s been one of the most interesting learning experiences I’ve had. Have I made money? Yes. I’ve sold a few thousand dollars’ worth of guides. Would I recommend it? Also, yes. Has it replaced my salary? Not unless someone accidentally forgot several zeros.

Check out my very colourful online store

The reality is that Instagram is absolutely awash with guides these days and everyone seems to be selling one.

Sometimes I think the only people making serious money from guides are the people selling guides about how to make money selling guides

For those of us simply trying to share useful gardening advice, it’s a little more competitive than the social media gurus would have you believe. But it wasn’t a failure, rather, it taught me something far more valuable. I’d been asking the wrong question. Instead of asking, “Can garden guides make me money?” I should have been asking, “How many different ways could one garden generate a little income?” That simple shift in mindset is, I think, changing everything. Now I don’t see my garden as one garden guide business, I see it as lots of little businesses, all growing from the same patch of soil.

The guides are one piece, and Substack is another with the two complementing each other beautifully. Some people just want to buy a guide on landscape design tips or clay soil, download it once and refer back to it whenever they need it, while others enjoy the ongoing conversation. Substack gives me room to write the stories that don’t fit inside a guide...the philosophy, the spectacular failures, the ridiculous experiments, the lessons gardening quietly teaches us about patience, resilience and accepting that the weather has absolutely no respect for your carefully constructed plans. It’s less polished but more personal and I rather like that.

Then there’s my cutting garden. People might assume I’m planting it because I like having flowers in the house. Well…yes, that too…but that’s not the only reason I’m doing it. The other dream is to build a beautiful flower stand.

I’m picturing an old stained-glass window at the back, bunting fluttering in the breeze, buckets overflowing with flowers, handwritten labels and the sort of little roadside stand that makes people instinctively slow down because it’s too pretty to drive past.

I’m still deciding where it will go…perhaps at the end of our right-of-way, or perhaps, if the local school likes the idea, somewhere safer where people can pull over without causing a traffic incident because they spotted a bunch of snapdragons. Maybe I’d even donate a percentage of the sales back to the school’s Garden to Table programme. At this stage it’s mostly ideas….and lovely ideas at that. But doesn’t every real project start life as somebody staring into space thinking, “I wonder if…”

Photo: inspiration.

The project I’m most excited about though, is my living chapel, partly because I simply want to see if I can grow one.

Gardeners are funny creatures. Sometimes we don’t need a reason. We just decide growing a tunnel made entirely of living plants sounds like an entertaining way to spend several years.

Originally, I imagined weddings. How magical would that be? But then practicality arrived wearing sensible shoes. Parking, toilets, wet-weather plans, insurance. Suddenly I wasn’t picturing romance, I was picturing myself directing traffic while someone asked where the nearest bathroom was. So perhaps not full-scale weddings. Tiny elopements, though? Maybe. Or photographers looking for somewhere unique to shoot engagement photos or family portraits. That feels much more manageable….one afternoon, a beautiful setting, no seating plan, no Uncle Barry complaining about the weather and no bride sobbing into my hydrangeas because the norwester wrecked her hair, delivered her veil to the neighbour over yonder, and ruined her big day.

One feature I’d absolutely love to include is a stained-glass window at the end of the chapel. I looked into buying one, saw the prices, then quietly closed the internet. So, naturally my next thought was…“I wonder if I could learn to make a stained-glass window?” Apparently, this is how my brain works…if I can’t afford something, I immediately start wondering whether I could simply teach myself to make it. Sometimes this works brilliantly and sometimes it results in an impressive collection of tools and several educational mistakes. Either way, it’s entertaining.

Photo: my inspiration comes from the Tree Church, which is located in Ohaupo in the Waikato. You’ll find it online if you’re every passing through and want to have a gander.

Fortunately, my husband is wonderfully practical and enjoys making things. Between his building skills and my inability to leave perfectly good ideas alone, I can also see us creating handcrafted obelisks, timber planters and perhaps the occasional piece of garden art once welding joins the growing list of hobbies we’ve accidentally acquired.

None of these ideas are intended to make us millionaires but if they do, you’ll find me writing future newsletters from an enormous greenhouse with heated pathways.

Realistically, though, that’s not the point. The point is diversification….a few guide sales, a growing community here on Substack, a bunch of flowers from the flower stand, the occasional handcrafted planter, and perhaps a photographer hiring the chapel for an afternoon. And maybe even opening the garden one or two weekends a year when it’s looking particularly fabulous and I’ve had sufficient warning to remove every visible weed before anyone arrives. None of those income streams needs to be enormous. Together, though, they might eventually become something meaningful.

I’m 51 now and I know this isn’t going to happen overnight. Gardens have taught me many things over the years, but perhaps the biggest lesson is that worthwhile things take time. Trees don’t apologise for growing slowly so neither should I. So, if my paid subscriber numbers are still relatively modest, that’s okay because every garden starts with a single plant and every business starts with a single customer. This whole adventure is simply another long-term gardening project. The difference is that this time I’m not just growing flowers…I’m quietly growing a future that, hopefully, lets me spend a little less time sitting in front of a corporate computer and a lot more time with dirt under my fingernails. And if, by the time I retire, all these little ideas have woven themselves together into a modest supplementary income that helps fund this gloriously expensive obsession of mine…I’ll call that a blooming success.

I’d genuinely love to hear from you. Have you found creative ways to turn your garden into an income? Do you sell flowers, plants, seeds, workshops, art, produce… or something I’ve never even considered? Because if there’s one thing gardeners are exceptionally good at, it’s cheerfully stealing each other’s ideas, calling it “inspiration”, and then generously sharing what we’ve learned afterwards. So, tell me. What have I missed?

Hi free subscribers and followers, if you want to follow along with this garden journey of mine, full of crazy ideas and ambitious projects, then consider upgrading your subscription. I promise there’ll be a lot of laughs, interesting projects and plenty of inspiration along the way. Will I succeed at growing a living chapel? Is it even possible to make your own stained-glass window? Every paid subscription gets me closer to having the funds to get this project underway. If an ongoing paid subscription isn’t something that fits your budget right now, then consider a one-off $5 donation via the ‘help me build the living chapel’ button below. Every little bit helps.

Help me build the living chapel