Centralised and cost-effective core procurement services for Aylett Nurseries

Case study: Aylett Nurseries

Aylett Nurseries is a long-standing, family-run garden centre in the South East of England. In 2025, they proudly received the title of the 4th best garden centre in the UK, a testament to their commitment to exceptional customer service and community-focused initiatives.

We partnered with Aylett Nurseries to deliver an integrated, cost-effective procurement strategy, as they needed a more strategic approach to managing waste management, payments, and energy procurement.

The challenge

Aylett Nurseries was facing several operational and financial procurement challenges across key areas:

Waste management

• The existing waste management plan was costly for the garden centre
• The waste management strategy didn’t align with the garden centre’s sustainability objectives.

Merchant services (card payment solutions)

• High processing fees with limited control over card processing fees and no visibility into rate structures
• Payment systems needed to integrate with a single on-site EPOS provider, without the operational process remaining uninterrupted.

Energy procurement

• Exposure to unpredictable and volatile energy pricing
• Contract renewal deadlines added pressure to act quickly to avoid market-driven cost increases.

Our solution

We delivered a comprehensive review and tailored procurement strategy across all service areas:

Waste management

• Introduced a new waste management solution tailored to garden centre’s requirements
• Added more waste streams that increased segregation, improving the garden centre’s green credentials
• With the increased segregation, we could introduce a more cost-effective waste management solution to meet the garden centre’s operational budget.

Merchant services

• Implemented a significantly lower Interchange ++ pricing structure that was boarded via existing EPOS infrastructure and integrations.
• Ensured zero disruption to day-to-day operations, no hardware changes, and enhanced cost control.
• Improved visibility over fees and established long-term savings on card processing.

Energy procurement

• Ensured the contract timing aligned with renewal deadlines to prevent sudden rate increases.
• Conducted a market audit and secured an energy contract ahead of rising prices.

The results

Overall, we centralised all three core operational services for Aylett Nurseries and tailored these services to address the garden centre’s requirements. 

Waste management

• Up to 50% reduction in waste management costs
• Improved environmental performance through enhanced recycling and waste segregation.

Merchant services

• Lower payment processing fees and improved fee transparency
• Seamless payment system with existing integration with no operational downtime or additional hardware changes.

Energy procurement

• Energy price stability through proactive procurement and risk mitigation.

The next steps

As we continue to partner with Aylett Nurseries on waste management, merchant services, and energy procurement, our goal is to ensure the core procurement strategy is cost-effective, aligns with the garden centre’s sustainability goals, seamless, and ultimately adapts to the garden centre’s evolving needs.

Looking to streamline and align your garden centre’s operational core procurement services? Let’s talk.