THE Old Railway Line Garden Centre was recently crowned as a 'centre of excellence' as the family run, independent garden centre, farm shop and restaurant combined entered the UK's Top 10 Garden Centres for the first time. The result was announced at the Garden Centre Associations 50th anniversary dinner in Brighton and was the icing on the cake after being awarded Best Garden Centre in Wales and the West for the fourth consecutive year last summer.

Garden centre owner, Mark Cleary said; "To be named as the eighth best garden centre in the UK by the GCA is a fantastic achievement for a garden centre of our size. It is a true testament to our hard working team to be amongst garden centres three or four times the size of us. As a family-run business our focus is to offer the best, personal customer experience possible and to receive official recognition as well as positive customer comments is great.

"This is the icing on the cake as we complete our 25th year in business since Christina and I started from a small greenhouse in the layby the garden centre sits behind today. We would again like to express our thanks for the continued support from our amazing customers and staff."

The GCA represents over 200 garden centres nationwide. The annual awards are decided by the results of the annual inspections, which take place at all GCA garden centres. Garden centres have no advance warning about when their inspection will take place and they do not have the option to turn away the inspector.

The award-winning, independent, family-run garden centre was established in 1990 by owners, Mark and Christina Cleary. It provides customers with quality plants, gardening products, indoor and outdoor living goods, pet care products and giftware. The Old Railway Line is also home to a farm shop stocking products from over 60 local and Welsh suppliers and a 150 seater restaurant offering delicious home cooked food seven days a week.