Well it looks as if the UK Team really messed it up this time.
Such a shame they are all working on Very Large scale Commercial Nursery projects. We could have sown seeds by hand and cut with produce with scissors like real Gardeners do ( I think Not)
Canada: Failure of high-tech rooftop greenhouse leaves $4-million trail of debt
The failure of the Alterrus rooftop greenhouse has left investors and creditors holding the bag for about $4 million and the city’s parking corporation EasyPark out of pocket for at least $13,104 in unpaid rent.
EasyPark’s liability could rise if the company is forced to remove the high-tech enclosure and mechanized vertical growing systems left on a downtown parking garage by the bankruptcy of Alterrus and its operating partner and marketing arm Local Garden Vancouver.
But EasyPark would much rather see a new tenant step in to run the greenhouse, according to company spokesman Drew Snider.
“Bowra Group [the bankruptcy trustee] may be able to find somebody to keep the greenhouse in place,” said Snider. “As the lessor, we are going to work with them to see if we can keep it running in some way.”
For the city, the financial hardship is unlikely to be significant. EasyPark collected $26,000 in rent from Local Garden for ten months ending in August, for a property that generated no income the previous year.
LGV’s costs were exceeded by its revenue, said trustee Martin Hyatt. According to bankruptcy documents, LGV is owed only $29,153 by its customers, while wages owed by the company to employees and payroll deductions owed to Canada Revenue Agency total $36,000.
Total liabilities listed for the twin bankruptcies of Local Garden Vancouver and Alterrus are about $4 million. The largest secured creditor is Vancity Capital Corporation, which loaned Alterrus $1.2 million, according to Hyatt. Venture investor and Alterrus director Clay Haeber — a former IT director for Lululemon Athletica — is out $940,000.
Neither Vancity nor Haeber are likely to recover anything from the bankruptcy proceedings, said Hyatt.
Read the complete story by Randy Shore at vancouversun.com
