When selecting hardgoods for your garden center, it is important to consider the product mix. The plants are always center stage, but there are many other categories of products that are now essential to sell, and plant care is one of the main ones you should focus on. Watering tools are an important part of plant care. All plants need water, and selling the right high-quality watering tools for the job, will not only make it easy for your customer, but it will also help them get the great results that they expect.
High quality sells
As an independent garden center, you are always concerned about finding the right balance between quality, price, and value to the consumer. For the most part, consumers come to your garden center for reasons other than price, quality, selection, and a knowledgeable staff to name a few. Your tool selection should be made with that in mind. Don’t stock just the low-price mass merchant products. Provide the customer an opportunity to purchase higher quality items that have superior quality, function, and will last a long time. Customer satisfaction is a key to repeat business. Your staff’s knowledge of the products and the quality differences can aid in sales. Many companies provide product knowledge information online that you can use to train your staff. Selling higher quality watering tools at better margins is one key to a profitable garden center.
Selling tools in your garden center
Most garden centers by nature are plant centric places. Merchandising products in an area of benches and Isles can be a challenge. By purchasing and using movable self-contained merchandisers you can provide a store within a store, and an impulse buy location right by the plants. Research at Michigan State University, by Dr. Bridget Behe, shows three key points. 68% of garden center purchase are unplanned, displays play a key role, and well-organized displays have the capacity to increase sales 300%!
Housekeeping is key
In an environment as challenging as a garden center, housekeeping of hardgoods and their displays can be difficult. Merchandising 101 — keep the products clean and well organized. This can be difficult as watering and other daily plant care occurs. Water, dust and dirt, not to mention other debris can build up making the products look old and worn. Periodic cleaning and straightening will keep the attractive nature of the products up and the impulse buy from your customers up too!
Having had experience working at garden centers, the owners of Botanical Interests, Judy Seaborn and Curtis Jones, knew the formula for maximum seed program profitability when they started the company. They believe, “That formula has worked—many of our retailers have increased their seed program profitability to levels they had never experienced.”
Margin might not be the only road to profitability; Botanical Interests can help!
Pricing
Since most seed packets are pre-priced, stores do best with a packet line that has a pricing strategy that meets the consideration of two factors: the consumer expectation for impulse sales, and the stores’ need to make a certain number of dollars per square foot of their store. Botanical Interests seed packets are mid-priced to meet both criteria.
Selection
If you don’t have space to display over 600 varieties, carry only what sells in your area. Botanical Interests’ Regional Best™ approach maximizes stores’ sales and profits with well-balanced seed assortments based on sales data, customer and sales representative input, university research, industry trends, and specific regional information. The result is a selection of varieties your customers want that maximizes your sales volume and sell-through.
Availability and Service
Botanical Interests has a track record of 99% year-round availability so you can capture those late-season sales that are often a significant percentage of the store’s seed sales. They also ship your initial orders early in the season, so you can get a head start on spring sales.
Most seed packet companies have a reorder minimum, which forces stores to take a risk of ordering too many that don’t sell, or not ordering enough for customer demand, leaving your display empty. Botanical Interests allows stores to reorder any number of packets per variety—even if it’s just one! They also assign sales representatives to most stores who service your display for you.
High-Quality Product
Gardeners want reliable seeds from a brand they can trust. Botanical Interests seeds are tested for germination to ensure a high-quality product. Every variety is Non-GMO Project Verified and many are certified organic—two designations that consumers look for when purchasing. But it’s not just the high-quality seeds that draw repeat customers; Botanical Interests seed packets are educational and beautiful. Beautifully illustrated, shoppers also get practical varietal information. The front of the packet includes a brief description of the variety and at-a-glance sowing information, so that store staff can help consumers find exactly what they need. Inside the packet there is a plethora of information, including recipes, historical information, and more.
Botanical Interests was built with independent garden centers in mind so you could differentiate from, and compete with, the large chains. It is the independent garden center’s seed packet line!
Each year, Garden Center magazine publishes a list of the Top 100 Independent Garden Centers in North America, ranked by reported annual retail sales volume.
Thank you to the 2019 sponsor, Rapid Garden POS, for making this program possible and for sponsoring the Top 100 list.
They may have taken different paths to get there, but each of these businesses has achieved excellence. Find out what sets them apart in these five profiles of IGCs from our Top 100 list.
With a ‘stick to your guns’ approach and a reputation for offering high-quality plant materials, this IGC carved a name for itself in the Pacific Northwest.
Editor’s note: Greenhouse Management magazine polled its readers earlier this year and published its State of the Industry report in October. These are highlights from that report.
The overall feeling in the industry is positive, with growers reporting good profits, an optimistic outlook and increasing sales. While unpredictable weather and hardships with hiring continue to hinder success for many, profitability is looking good.
With a recession looming on the horizon, next year’s survey may have some different results. Experts are predicting that the possible recession to come won’t be as devastating as the 2009 market upheaval, but a downturn in the economy is always unpredictable.
— Greenhouse Management Editor Kate Spirgen
Landscape trends
Editor’s note: Lawn & Landscape magazine polled its readers earlier this year and published the State of the Industry report in its October issue. These are highlights from that report.
As we head into a new decade, Lawn & Landscape’s State of the Industry survey shows some signs that revenue growth in the industry may be slowing down, but contractors remain confident. Hiring and retention issues continue to plague the industry.
The median revenue for landscape contractors is down once again decreasing from $287,000 in 2017 to $273,000 last year. The mean revenue decreased from $1.13 million in 2017 to $1.05 million last year.
Of the concerns that the survey asked contractors about, only two increased — bad weather and a slow housing market. With rumblings of a recession, Lawn & Landscape added that in its list of concerns to rank, but it barely cracked the top 10 with a 4.9 score out of 10.
From 2011 to 2015, the Smith family had to deal with arid temperatures and drought, but on top of that the family lost Curtis W. Smith, founder of Smith’s Gardentown. Luckily, they forged ahead.
ALL PHOTOS COURTESY OF SMITH'S GARDENTOWN
The 100-degree days started in early May 2011. They stretched on and on until 100 days over 100 degrees had been recorded. Many all-time heat records were set. Like 56 consecutive days above 100. From Aug. 16 through Aug. 31, every day was higher than 105 degrees.
Even worse for the garden centers and homeowners were the nighttime temperatures.
Steve Smith, my brother and co-owner of Smith’s Gardentown in Wichita Falls, Texas, remembers that we went for weeks where the night temperatures never fell below 90 degrees. “Because there were never any cooler temperatures, the heat stress on plants was tremendous,” he says. “Even watering three times a day, we could not maintain trees and shrubs in containers.”
From my desk, I could watch every day as our staff filled pallets with dead shrubs and used the forklift to carry them to the dumpsters. By the time we had logged $100,000 in dead plants, we quit counting.
To add to the distress in the family, my father, Curtis W. Smith, who had helped found the business in 1949 and managed it for more than 60 years, passed away in June. My siblings, Steve and Doug and I inherited the garden center.
Little did the people of Wichita Falls realize that the summer of 2011 was only the beginning. That same year, the reservoirs that supply drinking water to the city and the surrounding areas were at 60% capacity — probably enough to last for a while, everyone thought.
The area receives an average of 25 inches of rain per year, making it semi-arid in the best of times. Imagine the impact of a 22-inch rainfall deficit in 2012-2013. And as homeowners began to heavily water their landscapes to combat the extreme heat, the lake levels dropped.
Katherine and Steve Smith, co-owners of Smith’s Gardentown, persevered through rough conditions.
By 2012, city leaders became concerned enough about the reservoir levels that they instituted rationing that became progressively more severe. A stiff increase in the cost of water was also designed to curb use.
“When they began talking about outlawing any outdoor watering, our plant sales basically stopped,” Steve says.
That shoe dropped in late 2012. No outdoor watering was allowed except for hand watering of containers. Homeowners began to place water buckets in their showers to catch what water they could to try to save some of their plants. Many invested in rain barrels. Most just had to watch their landscape plants suffer and die.
Signs urging citizens to “Pray for Rain” sprang up all over town.
For the spring of 2013, we greatly reduced the number of bedding plants we grew. By May, after a dismal spring, we decided to close up shop until the rains returned.
We held a closing sale at the end of May, not knowing if we would reopen. Our loyal customers wanted to help us out, and we sold all the merchandise in the store — plants, chemicals, hard goods. Then we laid off most of our employees and closed the doors for the summer.
By fall, still hopeful rain would come, we reopened the store with several truckloads of pumpkins and a small number of mums. Instead of 30 greenhouses, the company had one-third of one greenhouse full of plants. Our family stopped drawing their normal salaries, living on savings and credit cards, while selling off any equipment or other assets we could spare. Soon, my brother Doug left the business to open a landscape operation in the Texas Hill Country, where the drought was not as severe.
An SBA disaster loan helped keep the doors open but could not begin to make up for the losses.
The rains held off and the reservoirs continued to drop. Wichita Falls became known as the city drinking “potty water” because the city instituted its Direct Reuse project. Water coming from the sewer system was diverted to the water treatment plant to be treated and immediately returned to the drinking water system. There were grumbles at first, but soon citizens were thankful that the system bought them a little more time.
“By the spring of 2015, we knew we could not hold on any longer. If we did not have a good spring season, we had decided to close down for good at the end of May,” Steve says.
Smith’s Gardentown almost shut down for good in May 2015 when it seemed Wichita Falls wouldn’t bounce back from intense dry spells.
March, April and most of May passed with sales 75% lower than a normal year. Then, in mid-May, it rained. And rained. And rained. Within two weeks, runoff water filled reservoirs to capacity. Crowds flocked to the dams to watch blessed water pouring over the spillways.
The watering restrictions were lifted, and our customers immediately began flocking back to the nursery as we scrambled to find plants to satisfy the pent-up demand. In June, we held a Thanksgiving party on our grounds with bands, food and prayers.
As things returned to normal, Smith’s Gardentown marked record sales in 2016 and every year since. And for four years, local reservoirs have stayed about 90% capacity. Still, residents are all about water conservation.
“Folks who lived through the Great Depression changed the way they thought about money. Anyone who lived through the Great Drought here will never take water for granted,” Steve says.
And I’m trying to find out if any other business has ever taken out (and repaid) three SBA disaster loans for three different types of disasters.
The author is co-owner of Smith’s Gardentown in Wichita Falls, Texas.
