A garden centre acquired by the Cherry Lane chain just four months ago has been severely damaged in a major blaze.
Cherry Lane Garden Centres' parent, QD Stores, bought Bradmore Garden Centre outside Nottingham in January and changed its name to Cherry Lane a few weeks ago. But, with the worst possible timing, a fire broke out at the centre last week - coinciding with the official relaunch and the distribution of thousands of publicity leaflets.

"The blaze was on Wednesday, and the day we were expecting people to come in was from Thursday onwards," QD Stores group managing director Justin Farrington Smith told diyweek.net.

He said six fire appliances had attended the scene of the fire, which has left two-thirds of the retail centre "un-shoppable. The outdoor centre and car park are okay but everything in the middle has got some damage. We're waiting for the insurance assessors but it wouldn't surprise me if we had to knock down the whole building and start again," he said.

However, he added: "We've put in a very big plant offer and have some pretty extensive watering facilities, and the fire service said if we hadn't had those we would have lost the entire centre."

He said he did not know the cause of the fire. "And I don't think we're ever going to find out, but it started in the roof of one of the newer buildings."

The garden centre - the refurbishment of which has cost QD hundreds of thousands of pounds - has around 20 employees, none of whom were hurt, and for whom Mr Farrington Smith was full of praise.

"You've got to hand it to the staff to get the centre re-opening," he said, describing their efforts as "Herculean".

"We had staff who said, I'll work all night. Twelve hours later we were trading the outdoor plant centre and the gardening offer, and yesterday we were barbecuing food and using the outdoor cafe area. It's just been fantastic to see a real Dunkirk spirit."

He said customers had been queuing to buy smoke-damaged stock at 25% off.

It hasn't all been bad news for Cherry Lane Garden Centres over the last few days. Mr Farrington Smith added: "We had a successful relaunch of our Roman Way centre in Towcester!"