Wyatt Landscaping Supplies has taken the opportunity to expand its operation with a new custom-built yard at 371 Woodcocks Road, but the journey hasn’t been short or easy.
Dave Wyatt purchased the site four years ago, anticipating his lease on Sandspit Road eventually running out. What he hadn’t expected was that it would take two and a half years to get a consent to operate from the new site.
With the move-out deadline looming, the team found itself with just three months to set up the whole operation at Woodcocks Road.
It was done primarily in-house, but with some help from concrete layers and a brand new building delivered by Totalspan Rodney.
Dave says Totalspan did a great job with the new build, which houses an office, retail store and a “drive-through” shed.
The new site also has a tipping facility where truck drivers can drop off clean fill or green waste and fill up with new material.
Dave says he had always envisioned shifting the business, which was rapidly outgrowing its old location. He already has plans for further expansion, including 14 new bulk bins to diversify bulk material offerings, which he calls “stage two” of the project.
“This is the just the beginning of the vision. We’re really only half way,” Dave says.
Wyatt Landscaping Supplies has a broad range of products, from household supplies through to bulk loads of bark, wood chip, sand, shell and aggregate, to name but a few.
“Our customers range from elderly gardeners buying a bag of garden mix to civil contractors ordering thousands of tonnes of material to their site,” Dave says.
Dave started the company as a one-man band with a single truck 17 years ago. He grew up in Wellsford and Warkworth and was inspired by his father Doug Wyatt, who drove trucks all of his life.
Today, the company has 40 employees, 20 trucks and four sites across Rodney and Kaipara. Each year, the business moves 80,000 tonnes of aggregate and 5000 cubic metres of gardening mix alone.
Dave’s philosophy has been to source the best quality material from across the North Island for small to mid-sized customers, leaving the large government contracts to others.
Wyatts even supplies customers on Kawau Island with one tonne bags of garden mix, cement or aggregate, which are loaded by a Hiab on to a barge.
Dave sees the setting up of the new site as a commitment to the Warkworth area, which he believes will soon be the highest growth area in Auckland.
The break-neck rate of expansion of the Wyatt’s business may seem incredible, but Dave is known among his employees as the kind of man who never lets the pace slip.
“If we’re having a quiet day, I say it’s time to buy another truck,” he says.
