Diaco’s named 2026 Horticultural Retailer of the Year
Greenlife Industry Victoria has named Diaco’s Garden Nursery the 2026 Horticultural Retailer of the Year. The award is judged by the industry itself, by the growers, suppliers and horticulturists who know what goes on behind a nursery’s front gate, and that is what makes it mean something to us.
What the award recognises
Greenlife Industry Victoria is the peak body for the state’s nursery and garden industry, and its awards program recognises businesses across growing, retail and the allied trades. Retailer of the Year looks at the whole operation, not one part of it: the quality of the plants and how stock is cared for on site, the depth of horticultural knowledge on the floor, how a business trains its people, and what it puts back into the industry around it.
It is not a popularity vote. That is why it matters to us.
Three generations, three garden centres
It started with our grandparents, who came to Australia. Then our parents. Now it is us, our families and our team, right across the business.
Heatherton is where it began, as a four-day plant market in 2000. Twenty-six years on it is our flagship, with one of the largest plant ranges on this side of Melbourne and Fred & Peg’s cafe on site. Mornington opened onto the sandy, free-draining soils of the Peninsula. Geelong sits on the Bellarine, where the wind comes off the bay and gardens ask a different set of questions again.
Three stores across three soil types means our teams give different answers to the same question, and that is deliberate. What holds up in the heavy clay through Melbourne’s south-east, a Buxus English Box (Buxus sempervirens) hedge or a Weeping Lilly Pilly that will not sulk through a wet winter, is not what we would put in Peninsula sand or a windy Bellarine front yard.
The people behind it
A special mention to Bianca, our store manager at Heatherton, who has been with us for seven years. And to the team at Fred & Peg’s, our cafe at Heatherton.
An award like this belongs to everyone on the floor, in the yard, on the trucks and behind the counter at all three sites. Our team is the reason customers come back, and the reason the industry noticed us.
Thank you
Thank you to Craig Taberner, Carl Soderlund and everyone involved at Greenlife Industry Victoria for supporting the industry and running an awards program that recognises the hardworking individuals, families and teams in an industry we love so much.
And thank you to our customers. Twenty-six years on from that first plant market, you are the reason there is a business worth recognising.
Come and see us
Our garden centres at Heatherton, Mornington and Geelong are open 9am to 5pm, seven days a week. Bring a photo of your patch and a rough measurement, and our team will tell you what will actually grow in it.
