For more than four decades, Garry Grüber has worked in international horticulture. As a graduate engineer (FH) with a degree in horticulture from Geisenheim, he combines in-depth plant knowledge with decades of practical and international experience. His professional career has taken him from cultivation work and applied research to breeding, selection and plant health management, as well as product development, plant breeders’ rights, licensing and international markets.

Garry has not only worked in an advisory capacity, but has also spent many years in leadership roles helping to build structures himself: further developing breeding and trial systems, supporting elite and source material systems, developing new plant ranges and concepts, building international networks, and helping shape production, licensing and marketing structures across national borders.

As a result, he is familiar not only with individual stages of plant development, but also understands how decisions are interconnected. Promising genetics must later be capable of being produced in a healthy and economically viable way. A good variety needs the right partners. And a successful product must fit the market, trade and consumer.

It is precisely this perspective beyond the individual work step that shapes his consulting today.

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Broad plant knowledge creates new perspectives.

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His studies and early professional career were already deliberately broad in scope. Over the course of his career, Garry worked with a wide range of plant groups – from hardy perennials, ornamental shrubs and bedding and balcony plants to ferns, hydrangeas, houseplants, cacti and succulents.

This breadth of experience is particularly helpful when a challenge can no longer be solved using familiar approaches. Experience from other crops or production systems can open up new solutions and help to view a situation from a different perspective.

For Garry, however, this is not about replacing existing expertise. Breeding companies, production businesses and specialised partners in particular already possess a great deal of their own specialist knowledge. Rather, he sees his role as complementing this expertise with additional experience, an outside perspective and new approaches to finding solutions.

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Between markets, cultures and people.

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Born in Washington, D.C. and raised in the United States, Garry has been at home in Europe for many decades. This connection between both worlds also shapes his work: he understands different ways of thinking, expectations and working cultures and is able to bridge them.

Especially in international projects, this – alongside extensive language skills – becomes an important advantage. Because it is not only markets that differ – the way decisions are made, partnerships are built and products are evaluated also varies. What appears self-evident in Europe may be viewed differently in North America. Producers ask different questions than breeders, licensing partners or retailers.

One particular strength therefore lies in bringing different perspectives together. In many projects, Garry becomes the link between breeding and the market, between companies, plant sectors and international partners.

In the past, this has resulted in new product ranges, international plant concepts, producer and licensing networks, as well as market access for new plants and varieties. Rarely was the focus on a single measure – instead, the key question was how a good idea could be turned into a viable solution for everyone involved.

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Close to practice instead of consulting from a distance.

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His professional beginnings were directly within horticultural businesses, followed later by research, crop management and responsible roles in product development, trials, breeding, international structures and company management.

This close connection to practice remains important today. Because an idea may be technically interesting and still fail due to production, logistics, the market or a lack of suitable partners.

For this reason, consulting does not begin with a ready-made concept. The first questions are: Where does the project currently stand, where does the real challenge lie, and which experience can genuinely help at this point?

Not every project requires support throughout the entire process. Sometimes the focus is on an individual selection, sometimes on plant health management, plant breeders’ rights, a licensing partner or entering a new market.

What connects Garry’s work is therefore less a specific service format than an approach:

listening, recognising connections, bringing different perspectives together and contributing experience where it can genuinely help move a decision or a project forward.