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I like Calwest Orchid Supply. Unfortunately, their shipping cahrges are kinda high. I live about 100 miles or so away from them but I still get ripped on shipping. I mostly use them for sphag and baskets. Fertilizers and media are heavy and will probably incur a higher shipping fee. I think you should try to find a hydroponics store in your neighborhood first to see if they have any supplies you might need. I can usually find any fertilizer I want there and most carry hydroton (a cheap substitute for PA). But if you want PA, I think Ray ships from Long Beach, CA now as well. I haven't found anyone that sells cheap pre-drilled sh containers other than Ray. If you ever order from Oak Hill they also carry tags. I usually buy my tags from Home Depot. Good luck with your supply hunting.

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Farmers markets are a good research tool. Watch what people look at, which tags they read. Keep a good count of what you sell. FMs are a pain. If you rent, say, 4 tables 8' x 2.5 feet, then you can get 12 flats per table. You can have 48 flats out at a time. Bring twice that many. This will require some form of layering setup for hauling. You can't get full retail. At an FM you have to offer one of: * stuff you can't get elsewhere. * much better quality than elsewhere * much better prices than eslewhere. When we were trying to do trees at an FM we found that no one wanted little trees. We found that all day's work sold $100-$200 worth of product. Still worth it to see th interest. The bedding plants beside us did really well. They brought 2 SUVs rigged with plywood shelves to haul their plants. Came to two markets in our area every week, and were making a sale every few minutes, usually $20-$40. Competing with the big box stores is tough. They are buying by the semi-load from outfits that are producing in multi-acre greenhouses. So try as much as possible not to go head to head. If you sell tomato plants, sell heirloom varieties, or siberian varieties that do well in the cold. Sell lilies that you forced 6 weeks early, or potfulls of daffodils of weird colours. Where you have to sell things that aren't in bloom yet, try to have a few that you started early enough to be in bloom duirng the bedding plant planting season. Tag them not for sale until last day at the market, but put them where people can see what the younger ones will look like in a few weeks. Doing this for a full set is nice but you may have to start them when it is too expensive to heat your greenhouse. FMs are also an opportunity to let people know about your nursery. One of our long term best local nurseries is both a wholesale and a retail operation. This is a win, as it means they can move people from retail during slack times of the day. Allows them to give decent shifts to people, and long term work for about half of them. (Spring thorugh fall.) They don't go head to head with the box stores, but instead sell to other small nurseries with an outstanding selection. Don't trash your leftovers. Instead use them to make baskets. Labour is the big problem with the hort trade in general. Pay 10-20% over minimum wage so you are a sought after employer. Change it up a lot so people aren't spending two weeks at 40 hours a week transplanting pansies. The more they know, the more useful they are in a crunch. They will also take pride in what they know. Spend half your day working with your people. Tell them when they do a good job. Take them aside to tell them when they screw up. Corrections should be of the form "This is a problem. This is why it's a problem. This is how it should be done. Ok?" Criticism should be directed at the task, not the person. If it's the start of something new, I will often use a line like, "I screwed up. I didn't make myself clear." Young people especially do well form example. I like hiring young people. I can hire a bunch that work afternoons only, or mornings only, and have the other part of the day for tasks I can't easily delegate. Often it will take me a couple hours to get everything ready to have 4 people work all afternoon. I fire people for only a few reasons: A: chronically not showing up when they said they would. (I hire a lot of high school kids after school, so I have to be flexible about basketball, homework, prom prep.) B: chronically failing to follow directions. C: lying to me, trying to hide what they did.