The Avant Garde'n Story Sustainable Urban Greenhouse Gardening and Hydroscaping
Avant Garde'n
The road to sustainability and health
Avant Garde'n is based on helping people practice
small-scale agriculture in urban settings with focus on sustainability. Much
attention and research is used to progress the green movement on the most local
level, the people in the home. The best way to affect change in the world is,
truly, to work our way out from ourselves. Perfecting our habits and ways of
life is the first level. From there we better our homes, our homes our
neighborhoods, our neighborhoods our communities, our communities our cities and
so on, increasingly bettering the world at each step of the way. We are the
foundation. We can be the change.
In February of 2009, Avant Garde'n was started by Dan Powers and Dan Hartsough
("The Dans", as everyone along this journey has so readily referred
to us). Avant Garde'n is located in beautiful Estes
Park, Colorado. When this brain-child of ours started emerging, not
everything was clear. In fact, the list of the things that were clear is
far shorter:
One) We wanted to progress the green sustainability movement.
With resources dwindling and changing climate conditions, it is no wonder that
the world is turning to alternatives in energy, new building methods and the
three R's (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle). With just the right conditions, Dan and Dan
came together at a time that could not have been more perfect. The fires burn
bright in the Dans, and it was time to take our ideas, both as businessmen and
eco-conscious young adults, to a new level.
Two) We wanted to be avant-garde, that is, we sensed a need for a change in the
way business and gardening are traditionally done.
From dictionary.com:
a⋅vant-garde [uh-vahnt-gahrd]
-noun
1. the advance group in any field, esp. in the visual,
literary or musical arts, whose works are characterized chiefly by unorthodox
and experimental methods.
Tack an "'n" to it and the name practically defines our mission,
reminding us where we want to be and how we want to gear our decisions at every
step of the way.
Three) We wanted the opportunity to share our gifts in business, gardening, and
community with the world.
Not only did we sense a need for an avant-garde shift in agriculture and
business, we decided that we were bold enough to throw it all out on the line
even if just for a chance to share our company mission with the world. We
decided that we would be the change. With the help of our employees, customers
and community, we hope to continue pushing the bill for positive,
groundbreaking change at every turn, wherever this endeavor may take us.
Four) We wanted to make sure that we always remembered how lucky we are to have
these opportunities in our lives, and to constantly push ourselves and our business
into the future, the avant-garde.
It took a lot of long nights and there will undoubtedly be many more, but we
are constantly refining the process by which our company directs its profits.
Things like employee benefits and healthcare, community projects, and
research/development to push our products and services to be the best for
everyone involved, are the focus of the profits from our business. I don't
think that either one of us could really imagine or justify taking a salary
like some CEO's can.
With these principals in mind, we trampoozed on! Set on making a better world
for everyone, we evolved into Avant Garde'n, a sustainable urban gardening and
agricultural hub.
