History

In 1973 Jean & Ivor Wilden, took possession of a run down garden nursery called "Daffodil Way Nurseries" and established within it a small aquatic shop with a total of about 30 tanks. They knew what they wanted to achieve, but with very limited funds they also realised that it would be a long, hard slog. The dream was to create one of the country’s largest and finest aquarium and water garden centres. Few who visited the site back in 1973 could have imagined just how the business would develop, even Jean & Ivor have been surprised at some of the changes.

1976 saw a major change, with Wyevale Garden Centres taking on the Garden Centre side of the business. A new modern greenhouse was erected in place of the old wood framed structure and a new 1000 sq. ft. aquatic shop with nearly 150 tanks was built within. At this time the name of the garden centre was changed to "Golden Vale Garden Centre", whilst Jean & Ivor adopted the name "The Aquatic Centre" for the aquatic business.

1976 was a very hot summer, so hot that Ivor had to carry out much of the construction work at night. Once completed the new shop seemed enormous and spacious, but as trade increased it soon became clear that an even bigger shop was needed, by 1981 the crowds, particularly at weekends, had grown to the point where it was almost impossible to move. In 1982 work started on a new extension which would double the shop size to about 2000 sq. ft. As might be expected the new shop resulted in a lot more customers, and within a few years, it was almost as difficult to move as it had been before the extension.

The mid eighties saw a substantial increase in the number of shops calling themselves "Aquatic Centres". Around this time Wyevale decided to rebrand the garden centre as "Wyevale Garden Centre" & at about the same time we decided that a new name and logo was required to differentiate our business from every other "Aquatic Centre". Thus in 1986 we became "The Aquatic Habitat" and adopted our familiar logo. Also at this time, having run out of space on the existing site, an adjacent builder's yard was purchased and work on what is now the pond section commenced. Access to this area was initially difficult but by 1990 matters had been resolved with the incorporation of the display gardens, previously maintained by Wyevale, into the Aquatic Habitat site. New display ponds were constructed and access to the 3000 sq. ft. pond section greenhouse became much easier. This massive increase in both internal and external area, proved a great help in reducing crowding, and although business has continued to increase, and crowding can still be a problem on particularly busy days, with so much space it no longer reaches the levels of those early years.

In 1996 Ivor's dream was finally realised, when readers of Practical Fishkeeping Magazine voted "The Aquatic Habitat" the best Watergarden outlet in the UK & also the Best Aquarium outlet in the UK

Not wishing to sit on our laurels, the winter of 1996-97 saw our next major upheaval with two additional bays added to the pond section to increase the internal area to over 5000 sq. ft. This enabled us to move all our pond goods to the one area, which in turn increased the area for aquarium goods in the aquarium section.

At the end of 1998, Jean & Ivor retired and ownership of the business passed to their Son, Rob. Since he took over both the aquarium and more recently the pond section have undergone substantial refits.

Quite what the future holds for the site is hard to know, but one thing is for sure, we will continue to improve & update the facilities to ensure that "The Aquatic Habitat" remains one of the UK's top aquatic retailers. You can also be confident that we will continue to offer our valued customers the same high levels of service,quality and selection that they have come to expect from us.

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