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Bee Keeper
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Bee on Apple Blossom
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Mead Display
For Ed Nowek, owner and founder of Planet Bee Honey Farm & Meadery, a fascination with honeybees goes hand in glove with business acumen.
Since moving his honeybee tourist attraction and country store from his 10 acre farm in Armstrong to more populous Vernon in 2003, business has grown steadily every year, ”with increases in the 15-20% range,” according to Nowek. So much so that the visitor centre/store on Bella Vista Road underwent an expansion in the spring of 2015 to provide a proper tasting bar as well as more space to display a myriad of other products made from BC honey.
Nowek’s passion for the tiny insect started while a high school student in Alberta when he took a summer job working as a bee keeper. “I wanted to share my experiences with these amazing creatures, so often misunderstood and feared, with anyone who wanted to listen,” he says. “Humans stood to learn a lot from honeybees.” Realizing the agri-tourism potential of a farm-based tourist attraction and country store, he opened Bee World in Armstrong in 1997. While failing to make a profit, the operation succeeded in other ways. “Through our efforts to educate children and adults on the importance of bees, we benefitted the industry as a whole,” he explains. The 2003 decision to move to Vernon, a larger community and local market with the prospect of increased visitor traffic, put Planet Bee on the fast track to profitability. All has not been fun and games. “The collapse of honeybee colonies around the world has been the biggest ongoing challenge.” Says Nowek, who lost 80% of his colonies in 2009. “It is a culmination of several things, such as the invasion of varroa mites and the deterioration of the honeybee’s immune system. I see the public and industry’s growing awareness of sustainable and organic growing practices, including research into the impacts of pesticide, as the way forward.”
Currently, the business runs 300 hives, requires a full-time bee keeper and operates a pollination service for a wide variety of agricultural crops, including many fruits and vegetables, in the Okanagan Valley and even the Lower Mainland in some years. There is a lot more to the operation as a visit to the Bella Vista Road facility demonstrates. Surrounded by orchards and vines, it has the look and feel of a country store with something for everyone, including several types of educational tours. Products from the hive have health and healing benefits, according to Noweck. To that end, he has formulated several unique mixtures such as Hive Healer Honey, an aid for people suffering from respiratory ailments and allergies, and a line of all-natural body care products containing honeybee pollen (“life–giving dust”), royal jelly (food for the queen), and propolis (sticky resinous substance known as “nature’s penicillin”) and beeswax. Individually, honey, pollen, propolis and royal jelly, as well as candles and beeswax, are sold in a variety of formats and sizes. Gourmet honeys are extracts from specific floral sources – Okanagan wildflowers and Fraser Valley berries - isolated by geographical regions and seasons. There are a myriad of these available for sampling in the store.
The next step for Nowek was establishing a meadery so people could enjoy and learn about one of the world’s oldest alcoholic beverages. With a land-based liquor license in hand production started in 2010 and the store opened in 2011 with Honeymoon Mead, the first product named after a Norse legend. The list has expanded to a dozen or so meads. “It can be manufactured from numerous different honeys, flavoured (or not) with spices or fruit, and made very sweet or very dry, or anywhere in between,” Nowek says.
Promoting beekeeping in the North Okanagan is an important aspiration for Nowek. “Having recently become a certified instructor for the BC Honey Producers’ Association (BCHPA), he will begin offering an Introduction to Beekeeping course annually at Planet Bee,” says Olivia Nowek, Ed’s daughter. Both Olivia and son James are playing increasingly important roles in the operation as Ed moves closer to retirement. “Dad would like to ensure that his vision is continued by whomever takes over,” she says. ■
