Sundance Orchids & Bromeliads was founded by Lee Behrhorst in 2001.  After retiring in the mid-nineties he decided to move from his home in Pittsburg to sunny Southwest Florida.  However, he soon found that the gated community he lived in was not a great place for his post retirement hobby- gardening.  With little chance to have a large garden, he shifted his interests to orchids and began collecting them on his lanai.

Shortly his new orchid collection went from a few to a lot.  Then, one day while reading the paper on the lanai, his wife was unexpectedly soaked by his automatic sprinkler system that he had installed for the plants.  After that malfunction she strongly suggested he get the ever growing collection out of the lanai. So his search for a nursery began. In summer of 2001 he found a rundown greenhouse, made all the necessary repairs, and in November he opened a little retail orchid business called Sundance Orchids.

Just like his orchid collection grew rapidly so did the business.  Opening with approximately 3000 orchids, the business now has grown into a collection of approximately 25,000!  As the business grew, more greenhouses were added. As years went on, Mr. Behrhorst also became interested in bromeliads, and decided to add them in to the collection.  The once little orchid nursery now also carries a huge selection of approximately 20,000 bromeliads! In what has went from approximately 9000 square foot of greenhouse space to 70,000 square foot of greenhouse space.

In 2016, Mr. Behrhorst was ready to retire again.  However, he wanted Sundance Orchids & Bromeliads to continue on.  After many talks with his long time employee and orchid enthusiast Jacki, Mr. Behrhorst agreed to sell the business to Jacki and her other half Elijah.  In January 2017 the ownership change took place. However, that first year for the first time business owners proved to be a challenge, as nine months later Hurricane Irma wrecked havoc on the nursery.

Greenhouse roofs were ripped off, plants were destroyed, and half of one of our buildings was put out of commission completely.  While the cleanup process has been long and slow, Sundance Orchids & Bromeliads is finally starting to get back to normal. The garden landscapes have been redone and most of the needed repairs to our greenhouses have been fixed.  We hope that if you have been here before you will come back to see all the new changes that have been made. If you haven’t seen the nursery before, we hope you can find the time to come out and enjoy the surroundings at Sundance Orchids & Bromeliads.