THE journey from the city to the lush, remote belly of Kranji's farming belt takes around 45 minutes. The one Kenny Eng and his family made took nearly a century.
It has ended well enough - in their flourishing nursery and landscaping business - but only after a difficult trek that started in 1911 when Mr Eng's great-grandfather Eng Hock Lai left China's Guangdong province for Singapore.
He came from a horticulture background in Chaozhou and planted the seeds for a new branch of the family tradition in Singapore by starting a nursery.
The business, Nyee Phoe, has been passed from father to son, evolving along the way. Under Mr Eng's grandfather and then his dad and uncle, Nyee Phoe sprouted a landscaping business and a florist offshoot. The mantle has been passed to 33-year-old Kenny, who is breathing new life into the 'old economy' business.
He is the director of Gardenasia, an arm of the Nyee Phoe group. And while the family firm still runs the old nursery, it is doubtful his great-grandfather would recognise how his modest business has evolved.
The nursery's sprawling grounds play host to stylish outdoor weddings. Families spend languid weekends lunching at its in-house bistro, after checking out Balinese resort-style water features.
Corporations use its manicured grounds and colourful gardens for events and launches.
Moving to the boondocks
BUSINESS is currently blooming but 10 years ago, Nyee Phoe's existence hung by a thread.
It was uprooted from its suburban sites - a nursery in Jalan Kayu and showroom in Bukit Panjang - when its leases on government land were not renewed.
'In 1997, we were told to leave both sites,' Mr Eng recalls. 'So we tendered for this 2ha plot of land in Kranji.
Nyee Phoe had to invest in facilities from scratch. Walk-in business evaporated. The firm survived on landscaping projects referred from longstanding architect-clients. 'Nobody knew we were here, nobody wanted to come here. We almost went bankrupt,' says Mr Eng.
ON THE MOVE: In the 1960s, Nyee Phoe's nursery was located in Dunearn Road, near the old A&W restaurant. They moved out in 1987. Photo/ NYEE PHOE GROUP
The family roughed it out, staging roadshows to lift the firm's profile. It did not help that the Asia financial crisis was unfolding then and few people were in the mood to spend.
It was about this time that Mr Eng, the eldest of three siblings, graduated from the National University of Singapore with a real estate management degree. His mother objected to his joining the business, saying: 'Why would I send you to university to see you toil like your dad?'
But Mr Eng had other ideas. 'For so many decades, the nursery has been in my family, I didn't want to be the one to end it. We had to innovate to survive.'
Cultivating the customers
STEP one was to spin off a lifestyle arm called Gardenasia, which started designing and selling mood-lit water features aimed at 'bringing nature into homes'.
Then Mr Eng had a brainwave from an unlikely source. The firm held its annual dinner on its grounds because it could no longer afford hotel parties and found it had a hit on its hands.
'If people come here for parties and remember us, they will come back again,' he explains. So Gardenasia went into events management.
In late 2004, Mr Eng teamed up with 10 other nearby farms and a pottery, and spearheaded a Christmas 'open house'. About 6,000 people descended upon the Kranji countryside, snapping up koi, vegetables and goat's milk.
'We lost money organising the event but we were very happy. People knew us. There was light at the end of the tunnel,' says Mr Eng.
The light turned dazzling in 2005 when another open house event, this time over five days, drew a whopping 18,000 people.
The 12 firms have since banded together as the Kranji Countryside Association to promote the area as a holistic destination.
'You would never come all the way here to buy a plant,' says Mr Eng. 'But if I ask, do you want to come to a farm and see goats being milked, then buy some fresh vegetables from an organic farm next door, then choose a plant at my nursery and end off with a meal at a scenic bistro? You are likely to say, 'Why not?' '
Mr Eng has also started cultivating the next generation of customers. Armed with two life-sized mascots, Morchoo and Titoy, Mr Eng visits schools to promote a love for nature. The company also regularly holds workshops for busloads of children.
Gardenasia has plans to build chalets for farmstays on its grounds soon.
It is all a far cry from those frontier days but there is one thing Mr Eng's great-grandfather would certainly recognise - the enduring family involvement. Mr Eng's younger brother Andy, 31, works in Nyee Phoe's landscaping arm, while sister Shannon, 28, helps with the florist unit, Petals and Leaves.
The group, with 55 staff, has revenues of around $4 million.
Now that being green is the 'in' thing, Nyee Phoe has come full circle. 'Distance was our liability. We turned it into our strength by marketing the countryside experience,' says Mr Eng.
