About Us
We are Hawaii’s Premier Producer Exporter of Anthuriums, Tropical Flowers and Foliages. We are most known for our Beautiful anthuriums that are available in a multitude of colors and sizes and have a large selection of tropical flowers, foliages and ornamentals.
Green Point Nurseries is located on the Island of Hawaii (Big Island) right outside of Hilo in Panaewa and also in the Kurtistown area. We ship within the state of Hawaii, to the Mainland (Continental US), Canada and Japan. We believe in sharing the beauty of Hawaii with the world.
Our History
Harold Tanouye, the founder of Green Point Nurseries, started in the flower business when he returned to Hawaii from college. The year was 1957, and Hilo’s economy had not yet recovered from the impact of WWII. People were moving away.
Harold wanted to live in his hometown and needed work. He recognized a demand for anthuriums, which military personnel and civilians were sending home to parents and girlfriends during the war via airmail and special delivery. Harold realized at that time this was going to be his life’s work.
Growing anthuriums in Hilo was only a part-time, backyard-type industry then. “I decided I wanted to do it as a business,” he (Harold) said. So, he proceeded to take a big risk, and broke ground at our Panaewa nursery in 1976. It was a risky endeavor with him having a wife and four children, but he believed that flowers grown in the islands are intrinsic to Hawaii’s “sense of place.” In essence, when you send flowers to a client, you are sending the beauty and romance of Hawaii. To bring his dream to fruition, he personally made sales calls throughout the islands and in states across the country. Harold was an entrepreneur, a consummate professional and an innovator. He got along well with people and all of these qualities were reflected in the growth of our nursery.
Eric Tanouye, our current President, and Harold’s son, brought his marketing background to Green Point Nurseries in 1977. He remembers when starting out that there were trips where his father was gone for as long as a month. His mom held a job to help make ends meet. Eric knew that being the eldest, he needed to make sure his siblings got home from school and that everyone did their homework. That, in a nutshell, is how Green Point Nurseries got its start. It was a family endeavor from day one. With Harold and Eric being the third (Sansei) and fourth (Yonsei) generations of the Tanouye family to farm in Hawaii.
What Makes Green Point Special?
Eric remembers an early lesson decades ago when a group of mainland wholesalers toured the farm, and then told his father that the reason they decided to buy from Green Point was because the farm was so neat and clean. We still maintain a very clean environment on our farm, and that’s only one aspect of our insistence on quality.
- We also focus strongly on our customer service; for example, we arrange our shipping schedule not for our convenience but for the convenience of our customers.
- We are founding members of the State Department of Agriculture’s Seal of Quality program, which has exacting standards for its farmer members.
- We take leadership positions in trade and flower associations.
- We educate on issues relating to the flower business in Hawaii.
We’ll never stop looking for new varieties and efficiencies without sacrificing quality to provide you with the best selection and value. Helping you succeed is our ultimate goal, now and into the future.
At Green Point Nurseries, we do not sit back. We are innovators. We came up with the hermetically sealed, gusseted polyethylene bag inside the carton, which changed how flowers are shipped and is now the industry standard. At Green Point, we were among the first to put up large shade houses for growing. We were the first at large-scale use of cinder as growing material, and to start irrigating here in Hilo. Our Founder Harold Tanouye always said, “We have made it because of innovation, we won’t be here for very long unless we continue innovating.”
We have made it because of innovation, we won’t be here for very long unless we continue innovating.