Features
Leading with love

In his earliest memories, Rodney Bierhuizen recalls having an affinity for plant life and growing things.

“I was, maybe, in grade three. I remember, my dad had a few spider plants and I rooted 1,000 cuttings, grew them and then he went and sold them for me,” Bierhuizen said. “There was always a passion there for, you know, being like my dad.”

His dad is none other than the founder of Sunrise Greenhouses in Vineland, Robert Bierhuizen. He, alongside his wife, Francis, established the business in 1982 in St. Catharines after the couple immigrated to Canada form Holland in the mid-1970s.

“To this day, I think, I’m still trying to be like my dad, but the reality is I’m a good balance of both my parents,” Bierhuizen maintains. “My Mom is also a tireless perfectionist and her conservative, financial acumen is just as important as my father’s hard work.”

Today, Bierhuizen co-owns the business with his mom, he is also head grower, innovation specialist and maintenance head at Sunrise Greenhouses, an operation that encompasses approximately 1,000,000 sq.-ft. of growing space and produces a wide range of crops, exclusive to Sunrise. 

Earlier this summer, Bierhuizen was also named Greenhouse Canada’s Grower of the Year for 2023.

This award looks to honour greenhouse growers who possess a strong work ethic, who demonstrate effective leadership and initiative and who engage in lifelong learning and innovation in the industry.

Bierhuizen is the embodiment of these qualities and more.

How it started
Robert and Francis moved Sunrise Greenhouses to its current location in Vineland in the latter 80s to accommodate the young company’s growth. In these early years, Rodney recalls working, after school and on weekends, in the greenhouse to help his family’s business succeed.

“One of my first jobs was selling tomatoes. We would grow them in the summer months. I got 10 per cent of sales selling to the public,” Bierhuizen said. “I always built little greenhouses around the properties and liked working in the greenhouses. It’s just how I grew up.”

His interest in horticulture and greenhouses extended beyond the home front and family business, and in high school, he did a co-op placement at Jeffery’s Greenhouses in St. Catharines.

“Back then, it was well known if you wanted to learn how to hand water, you always worked at Jeffery’s,” he said, noting that today, that part of the operation is now largely automated.

Bierhuizen went on to study horticulture at Temple University in Philadelphia after earning a rowing scholarship. He graduated in 2002 from the school with honours and was his class valedictorian. 

After graduation, he travelled to back to his family’s roots and sought work in Holland and Denmark, only to return a short while later to Ontario and his family’s business.

“I did have to work hard and look for my opportunities here (at Sunrise) because a lot of the bases were already covered,” he said. “Eventually, my dad started to pull back. So, I started to cover some of those bases, and look for opportunities to grow the business.”

And grow it did.

In 2003 when Bierhuizen returned from Europe, the business managed approximately 60,000 to 90,000 sq.-ft. of growing space. Today that number sits closer to 1,000,000 and includes their location in Vineland and several rental facilities.

Innovation
While many factors have contributed to the successful growth of Sunrise, innovation and forward-thinking, Bierhuizen asserts, are a major driving force.

“We love technology,” he said. “We are always trying to implement new technologies. In fact, right now we are working on a project with the University of Waterloo for low-cost moisture sensors for greater granularity.”

Bierhuizen has even taken technological and automation developments into his own hands by building his own robotic transplanter.

“It was one of those things where we would put the kids to bed and I came out here to work on it,” he said. “It took about three years to build.

“I wanted to do more, build more, but it just wasn’t scalable for me to manage.”

It was in this time, during a conversation with a supplier, that Bierhuizen learned about two young engineers involved forestry automation looking for space to focus on developing technology for horticultural packaging.

“I asked to connect with them and after meeting with them, I told them I wanted to work with them,” he said. In 2017, he built shop for the team on the Sunrise property, giving Bold Robotics Solutions Inc. space to grow.

“Their first project was a packaging cell, which Pioneer Flower Farms also installed, and from there, they focussed on a UPC application for pot covers,” Bierhuizen explains.

“Right now, we have a fully automated boom that’s being developed integrating our moisture sensing technology and there’ll be several other technologies tied into that boom. It’s effectively a grower. It’s not replacing our growers; it’s increasing our efficiency. From our growers’ perspective, it gives them greater granularity. So, instead of looking at a crop, giving them the capability to look at individual plants, using AI.”

Given the fact that many advances in greenhouse automation are coming out of Europe and further afield, having an in-house, onshore, cutting-edge automation provider is a game changer, not just for Sunrise and Bierhuizen, but for the Canadian greenhouse industry.

For example, Bierhuizen says he believes Bold’s biggest success story to date is their pot-cover machine developed for Koen Pack, a Beamsville, Ont.-based packaging supply company. 

“Whereas pot covers used to come formed over from China in 60 to 90 sea containers a year, Bierhuizen explains, “now they can bring in one sea container of materials for forming. It reduces the carbon footprint. It’s cost savings for the growers because they can do it cheaper here than in China.”

At the heart of the matter

Campanula, pictured at Sunrise Greenhouses in Vineland, are one of the company’s exlusive product lines.

While innovation and automation have fueled growth and ingenuity at Sunrise Greenhouses, Bierhuizen maintains that it’s the team that they’ve built over the years that are at the core of their success.

“We are so blessed to have this group of people around us that that make this company what it is,” he said. “We have people, staff who’ve been with us for 30-plus years. We have a nice retiree wall. We have very little turnover, if any.”

The reason for this, Bierhuizen believes, is that he, and his parents before him, make every effort to lead by example and with kindness, compassion and understanding. 

“I’m a very driven person. And that can be stressful on people,” Bierhuizen said. “I have to remind myself to be gentle at times. And, once in a while, I have to apologize. It’s being mindful of people and reminding yourself that someone always has something going on.”

He also seeks to empower his staff, and others in the industry, by prioritizing education and constant collaboration about new technologies and techniques they are bringing into the Sunrise greenhouses. In fact, he believes the industry, as a whole could, benefit through more education and collaboration.

In addition to his current work with the University of Waterloo, he has a long history of collaboration with the Vineland Research and Innovation Centre, as well as Niagara College. He has also mentored and hired graduates from the college. He is an active member of Flowers Canada and was a founding member of the Greenhouse Growers Alliance of Lincoln. 

Additionally, Bierhuizen consults with other greenhouse growers and welcomes them into his operation to share some of his company’s successes and even failures.

“Like any industry, we’re only as strong as our weakest link,” he said. “We have to work together.”

Where it’s going
Working together, according to Bierhuizen, is the best way for the industry to move into an uncertain future. 

Nonetheless, when asked about the future for his business, it’s pretty clear in Bierhuizen’s mind what it holds.

“I want to be the best, but what’s the best?” he asks. “To me, ‘the best’ is the best you can be, or this business can be. Biggest isn’t always the best. We’re a very niche business in that most of our crops we grow are exclusive to us in North America. We own genetics, we develop our own genetics, we do our own breeding. And I think being innovative is, is at the core of this, this company, and we want to stay that way.”