Like the plants and flowers he grows in his nurseries, David Fell knows, businesses need to be pampered and won't sprout overnight.

Fell and his wife, Sandy Kasman, started their wholesale plant business in 1978 in the backyard of their Wilhelmina Rise home. At the time, Fell was a horticulture student at the University of Hawai'i — his third attempt at getting a degree — and the couple operated as plant brokers on a "very small scale."

"I put a shade house together. We handmade the shade cloth," Fell said. "It was a ridiculously tiny place, hung together almost with shoestrings. But that was our start."

From humble beginnings in a rented house, Fell and Kasman have seen their Hawaiian Sunshine Nursery grow to become one of the state's top producers and exporters of tropical plants and flowers. The company leases 10 acres in Waimanalo and has close to 16 acres in Hilo, Hawai'i, where Hawaiian Sunshine Nursery is based.

The nursery grows hundreds of varieties of plants and is the largest bromeliad grower in the state. The company has grown from two employees — Fell and Kasman — to nearly 60 full-time workers today.

Fell, 58, admits that he never envisioned owning a successful plant business as he struggled to find a career in the late 1960s.

The Pennsylvania native began his college career as a chemistry major in 1967 at the University of Hawai'i, but dropped out after two semesters to join the military. After a stint in Vietnam, Fell went back to UH and spent three years as a psychology major.

But Fell left school again without a degree, moved back to Pennsylvania and got a real estate license. He realized that he didn't like the profession, but didn't have many other options.

"It's just one of those things where I was drifting around, didn't know what to do," Fell said.

At the suggestion of his older sister, Fell began to sell ti log plants, because "that was a huge craze at the time." Fell soon discovered that he enjoyed working with plants and returned to UH in 1977 to major in horticulture.

The third time was a charm for Fell, who got his degree and also launched a business with two other students. With a $300 loan in hand, Fell and his partners started a plant rental company and used a 3,000-square-foot shade house at the Pearl City Instructional Facility to grow some plants.

His partners pulled out of the venture, but Fell and Kasman stuck with it. They moved from the facility to their Wilhelmina Rise house and then to a small greenhouse in Pupukea on the North Shore.

In 1982, Hurricane 'Iwa destroyed the facility and forced Fell to move to an old orchid nursery in Kahalu'u. With the cost of real estate placing a burden on the business, Fell moved his Hawaiian Sunshine Nursery to the Big Island in 1988 and the business began to flourish.

Fell was able to line up a steady customer base and expand his inventory to include all types of foliage, landscape and house plants. Hawaiian Sunshine Nursery also specializes in "Hawaiian Volcano" plants — dwarf anthuriums that grow out of lava rock.

His major clients include hotels, garden shops and florists. About 25 percent of the company's sales are in exports to the Mainland, and Hawaiian Sunshine Nursery has a variety of proprietary products that Fell has licensed to growers in Belgium, Holland and Costa Rica.

Fell's business accomplishments recently were recognized by the U.S. Small Business Administration, which named him its 2008 Exporter of the Year.

Not bad for a guy who had no business background or any intentions of starting his own company.

"I guess I was a little stubborn and stupid," Fell said. "I didn't know any better so I did just fine."

Fell said it took a lot of "baby steps" to get the business on solid ground. In addition to just the cost of doing business, Fell and other nursery owners have had to deal with ever-changing agricultural regulations regarding pest control.

But Fell has positioned himself as a leading expert in horticulture and holds four patents in plant breeding. He's also respected for his marketing strategies and ability to overcome the obstacles that face most small businesses.

Fell said the secrets to his success are consistent quality and quantity.

"Consistency is extremely difficult to do in reality. We try our best and it's not that we don't make mistakes or have problems — everybody does. It's how you handle the problems that count," Fell said.

"Our business philosophy is to do things well," he added. "We don't compete on a price basis. We compete with our quality. We also do things a lot of other people don't do. We look for newer, more interesting products or a different way to do the product."

Fell said his latest challenge is to develop a 10-acre parcel in Hilo that he's leasing from the state. Once that facility starts producing plants in a couple of years, Fell said he has no definite plans, except to continue growing Hawaiian Sunshine Nursery.

"I like the plant business," he said.