Longstanding floral company to close after more than 100 years in the Bay Area

Bay City Flower Company, located off 2265 Cabrillo Highway South in Half Moon Bay will close after 109 years in business. Bay City Flower Company, located off 2265 Cabrillo Highway South in Half Moon Bay will close after 109 years in business. Photo: Google Maps Photo: Google Maps Image 1 of / 3 Caption Close Longstanding floral company to close after more than 100 years in the Bay Area 1 / 3 Back to Gallery

The Bay Area’s high cost of living has pushed a longstanding floral business in the Peninsula to close for good after operating in the region for more than a century.

Bay City Flower Company, located in Half Moon Bay, will permanently close its facility on Nov. 10, as first reported by the Half Moon Bay Review. The company’s CEO, Harrison Higaki, made the announcement in a press release.

“It has become increasingly difficult to run a flower farm and compete nationally while operating in the costliest place in the nation,” Higaki said. “After four generations and 110 glorious years in floriculture, we at Bay City Flowers Co. have decided that the time has come for us to wind down the selling of our flowers.”

In the statement, Higaki also said that the company was looking for “alternative uses” for the facility.

The company property, located at 2265 and 2275 Cabrillo Highway South in Half Moon Bay, was first posted for sale on Sept. 22 and is listed for $42.5 million on LoopNet. Chuck Allen, real estate agent with the agricultural division at KW Commercial, told SFGATE that there’s a pending transaction for the acquisition of the lot as of Friday.

“We’re in the process of the appraisal,” Allen said.

The Half Moon Bay property has 50 acres and a greenhouse area of 925,000 square feet. One of the descriptions mentioned in the listing is that the property would be “excellent for cannabis or hemp,” but Allen said the interested buyer will not use it for that purpose.

“They’re buying it for the facility that exists, and it’ll continue to be a horticulture property.”

When news first broke about the pending closure, The Daily Journal reported that 195 employees would be affected by the Nov. 10 closure. We reached out to Bay City Flower for comment but did not hear back.

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In 1910, company founder Nobuo Higaki, who emigrated from Japan, opened Higaki Nursery in Redwood City where they grew a variation of flowers like carnations, roses and gardenias. During WWII, Higaki and his family were forced to relocate to Idaho under executive order 9066, according to the Bay City Flower Co. website. Higaki was later arrested and survived imprisonment at a Japanese internment camp.

It was during that time in the 1940s that a local farmer and a banker made sure to secure the nursery on behalf of Higaki until his return. By the time the war ended, Higaki’s son Harry took leadership of the company and renamed it Bay City Flower Company. The company moved to Half Moon Bay in 1960 and in 1986, CEO Harrison Higaki took ownership of the company.

Editor's note: This article has been edited to note that the Half Moon Bay Review first reported the Bay City Flower Company closure.

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Susana Guerrero is an SFGATE digital reporter. Email: Susana.Guerrero@sfgate.com | Twitter: @SusyGuerrero3