GREECE, N.Y. — ​What's a long time to be firmly planted? For the Frear family, it's five generations. That's how long they've tilled their soil and grown vegetables and fruit along Stone Road in Greece.

"And it's always enjoyable," said Linda Freer. "The change of seasons."

Every geranium Kathy Termine's ever planted has come from Frear's Garden Center and Christmas Wonderland.

"A lot of veggies too," Termine said. "All spring, all summer long. Great place."

Linda and Warren Frear have made it a way of life for all of their 60 years together, not long after Warren would come home from high school each day and sell his dad's flowers on the family's front lawn.

"I would set up all the plants on the bank of the lawn and I'd sell them retail," said Warren.

Frear's father would truck farm curly lettuce and radishes in the 1950s for STAR Market and Wegmans. Ever since, Frear's nursery has brought beauty to families and even holiday magic with its Christmas gift shop.

"Working with Mother Nature and all of the customers we've had over the years that've been so loyal," said Linda.

It is a proud legacy that took years to establish; a labor of love that Warren admits wasn't always fun.

"We'd start here and until all the way to Maiden Lane, try to make straight rows," Frear said. "Sometimes I wasn't too good at it."

But this spring's breezes turned on the Frears. A March windstorm appears to have dealt a knockout blow to one of the Rochester area's oldest family businesses.

"We think it was a microburst. And it took one side of the greenhouse off on us," Warren said.

And with the farm, once 100 acres now down to just four, and the post-pandemic supply chain keeping some of what the Frears sell from making it to their shelves for an entire year, Warren and Linda have decided to plow under.

"We just didn't have enough time to recoup. And you can't find the help today to do it, neither," they said.

"It's just sad after all of these years, we have to close," Linda said.

So sometime between now and the end of summer, when their inventory finally runs out, Frear's Garden Center will shut down for good.

The thought can bring a tear to the eyes of the Frears' daughter, Kerry, who works the register and shares the news with the family's most loyal customers.

"They're crying as much as we are," she said.

A lot of customers think John Nicholson is Frear family. John's worked here since age 16. He'll be the general manager to shut it down.

"You don't always work for a place you can feel good about,” he said. “Sometimes you work for a paycheck. And here, I feel good about where I work. And that's what counted to me."