The evolution of technology has made steady gains within the last decade, and many retailers find themselves re-evaluating their POS systems to accommodate the latest advancements. Smartphones are everywhere, and the boon of contactless payments has been sky-high ever since the pandemic hit North America. From iPhones to Androids, smartphones and watches equipped with digital wallets have made it easier than ever to complete a purchase in the blink of an eye. We talked about the benefit-s of accepting digital wallets (also known as mobile wallets, contactless payments or tap-and-go payments) with three garden centers, and the processes it took to get there.

Bachman’s Floral, Home & Garden —

MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA

Richard McMillian, director enterprise of applications and services at Bachman's Floral, Home & Garden, says they’re always on the lookout for ways to make shopping easier for their customers, and contactless payments were top of mind even before the pandemic struck in March of 2020. They use Epicor Eagle as their management and retail POS system and planned to upgrade in October of 2019 so it could fully support tap-and-go payments.

“We did the upgrade and then we started prioritizing contactless payments because the upgrade came with other features as well. But the onset of COVID actually pushed us to expedite the contactless payments at the end of September of 2020,” he says.

The first thing they had to do was to ensure that their payment terminals and pin pads could support the tactical feature of contactless payment, as the communications technology uses the radio frequency fields to exchange data between the customer’s phone and the pin pad.

“It reads the information, but you have to have the card or the device or a phone pretty close,” he explains. “It’s centimeters away from the reader because it is a ‘near field,’ so you have to be near it, but you don’t have to touch it.”

He recommends that other retailers check with their vendors to make sure they have the retail-based applications (RBA) firmware to support that function if they are going to go contactless.

Upon activation, their sales metrics report 16,000 contactless transactions so far, a number that is only expected to increase, he says.

Signage icons at the register with Google Pay and Apple Pay symbols alert customers that mobile payments are accepted, which is especially appealing to the younger generation. McMillian believes the millennial generation is driving the push toward digital wallets, so businesses must consider the expectations of this demographic.

He also notes that most mobile wallets adhere to official PCI (Payment Card Industry) security guidelines, which is important since the garden center is responsible for protecting credit card data. With the near-field communication/tap-and-go process, payment data is sent to the payment terminal via the radio frequencies. The payment data — whether it’s from a chip reader or a digital wallet — is encrypted, and it isn’t decrypted until it reaches the bank, which makes it just as safe as chip card payments, he says.

McMillian looks at it this way: If customers always have their phones on them, blending the convenience and security of the digital wallet will only ensure continued customer satisfaction.

“Most merchants want to future-proof their process as much as possible. It’s not to say that there’s going to be a cashless society, but at the end of the day, the use of the digital wallet is only expected to grow,” he says.

Coppola’s Garden Center

SOUTH PLAINFIELD, NEW JERSEY

Tony Ambrose, marketing director at Coppola's Garden Center, says the move to contactless payments has been a “godsend” for the IGC since the pandemic hit. The timing was a lucky factor, considering Coppola’s upgraded its POS system, Clover, just a year before. The new terminals accepted not only chip cards, but mobile wallet payments too.

“The upgrade handles Apple Pay, Google Pay, Samsung Pay, you name it. It does everything, from your watch to your phone. It’s just great,” he says.

For IGCs looking to upgrade or switch their POS system, Ambrose advises IGCs to do their research on the machine and get to know the program’s ins and outs.

“It was more or less like a complete swap out. It was the same company, so they kept our store name, and they gave us a new merchant ID number and all that. But as far as user interface for the workers and employees using the system, it was like starting over,” he says.

They worked closely with their bank before upgrading their system, and advises other garden centers to take a close look at the tutorials and instruction manuals offered by the vendor.

“There’s a lot of things that the machine can do that I know a lot of small businesses wouldn’t even use, but it’s good to know that your machine can handle it,” he says.

Clover automatically accepts any type of transaction, so whether the customer chooses to tap, chip or swipe, the customer has full control of the payment process. According to Ambrose, this makes it easier and faster for the staff when it comes to checkout time.

The Clover system provides a breakdown of which credit or debit cards are used each day, as well as the number of contactless payments. They’ve been equipped with contactless pay for about two years, but only fully promoted it for about a year. The uptick of contactless payment methods has been steady, he says.

“With COVID of course it’s gaining more popularity. We do an outdoor checkout at our garden center, so a lot of people are scanning their phones through the plexiglass and everything,” he says. “There are zero cons. It’s so much faster, and the customer doesn’t have to do anything. They already have it on their phone or their watch.”

Bay Gardens

EAST MORICHES, NEW YORK

John Cannarelli, owner of Bay Gardens, set up Shopify in November of 2017, which allowed for a seamless transition to mobile payments when COVID hit. Shopify merges the e-commerce portion of the site with its POS system, allowing for one live, shared inventory.

Even before the pandemic, Bay Gardens had a high amount of phone orders. Cannarelli heard about Shopify from his cousin, so he set to work and put a lot of time into developing it and adding products to their inventory. Over time, more products were added, and it started to build traction.

The system made it easy to accept contactless pay, and they didn’t have to fuss over the lengthy process of product integration because it already accepted digital wallet payments, he says. All it took was the flip of an activator and they were set.

“It was as simple as going into the back-end and clicking a button that says you can accept those payments,” he says. “So, we set up the online business and then obviously that put us in a good position last year. It just exploded.”

Since they can work out of a live inventory, he says it provides customers with more transparency to the availability of their products, something shoppers nowadays have come to expect.

Cannarelli raves about the reporting metrics Shopify provides as well, which can be accessed via smartphone. Retailers can log in and update products, access customer information and view sales reports in real time.

“It’s taken time for us to get where we are at. We’ve put a lot of time into developing it and adding products. It would be tough to move everything over mid-season, but it’s definitely a worthwhile investment because just having an online presence is really important,” he says.

From humble beginnings in an oversized garage to the regional retail powerhouse it is today, Petitti Garden Centers has seen explosive growth since it got its start in 1971. Ranking No. 2 on Garden Center magazine’s Top 100 list, the nine-store regional chain is celebrating 50 years of learning, growing, renovating, educating and changing the way Ohioans garden.

What started as a small landscape company evolved over the years from pop-up shops in grocery parking lots to state-of-the-art, European-inspired garden centers, acres of growing space both indoors and out, and a reputation for quality.

“It’s been a lot of work and it hasn’t happened by accident,” says Petitti Garden Centers founder and owner Angelo Petitti. “It’s a big milestone for us, for the family, for all the employees and the whole organization.”

50 years in the making

Angelo may come from a family of farmers but he didn’t get his first landscaping experience until he came to the U.S. At just 16 years old, he emigrated from a small town in Southeast Italy in 1963 and moved in with his uncle, who was an avid gardener. When the uncle had a stroke, Angelo went to work in his yard and got his first taste of landscaping.

Around the same time, Angelo was working as a busboy at a high-end nightclub and one of the waitresses there became his salesperson as he did some landscaping jobs for customers.

From those customers, he went on to found Petitti Landscape Company in 1966 and spent the next four years building his clientele. When he and his brother Domenico bought a location in Oakwood Village for their landscape business in 1969, passers-by started asking if they could buy the plant material the brothers would set out for their landscape jobs. Landscaping would remain the dominant source of income for the company until 1988, but the retail idea was planted.

Back in the ‘80s, Angelo bought all of his plant material, and would have to order the year before and collect his plant material by April 15. “So every year when it came to April 15, you either took it or you lost it,” he says, noting that inventory in the ‘80s was extremely tight, just like it is now.

“Back then the business was quite different,” Angelo says. “We didn’t have quite the array of varieties and all of the basket and container world was kind of minimum compared to what it is today.”

So Angelo would take the material and deal with the Cleveland area’s unpredictable spring weather.

“It seems like financially, it never really benefitted the company to where you would maximize the profits off of that,” he says. “That’s where the idea of starting to grow our own really came from.”

In 1989, Angelo started working on the nursery side of the horticulture world. One year later, the company had its own plant material to sell out of the renovated Oakwood headquarters. “It was a rough start,” Angelo says. “I knew nothing about growing. I was not a grower, so it was a bumpy start.”

In 1991, Angelo hired a grower and started to build the company its propagation house. By 1994, the business was seeing the financial benefits of growing its own material and never looked back. “So growing definitely opened up our eyes to say this is really the key that really built the business side,” he says.

Several years ago, when I worked in the perennial section at Hyannis Country Garden, the manager’s practice was to get on the phone on Monday and ask our vendors what was looking good. Based on their responses, he’d place orders that would arrive on Thursday or Friday for weekend sales. I remember that one week in early June the grower said that the lavender plants were looking great. They were almost in full flower. The perennial manager, Dave Lane, ordered 250 of them and I helped unload and display them on Friday morning.

The following Monday, the owner of the garden center was going through the paperwork from the week before, and he was aghast to see that Dave had ordered so many of one variety of perennial. He grabbed the delivery slip and came out to the yard, looking for that large group of plants. I met him in the perennial section, listening as he complained about the order of so many lavender plants, and asking why they weren’t even on display. “They aren’t here anymore, Mr. G.” I explained. “They were all sold over the weekend.”

We all know the maxim: color sells. Yet as true and powerful as this is, I have seen that there are times when buying plants in full bloom can both backfire and ultimately narrow the range of plants that are available to the public. There is a case to be made for bringing in plants in bloom, and an equally strong argument for not doing so. Fortunately, this doesn’t have to be an either/or decision.

Color up front

“My dad always insisted on ‘color up front,’” says Donna Kutil Ross, co-owner of Scenic Roots Nursery in East Sandwich, Massachusetts. “I still hear him to this day every time I rework the front displays.” Flowers that are visible at the front of the business can bring people in, especially when they’re visible from the street. But Donna doesn’t want all of her stock to arrive in full bloom.

“I prefer in bud, or showing very little color when they arrive,” she explains. “If I’m ordering stock that’s in color, I am always afraid that it might be at the very end of bloom and not looking so great.”

Donna touches on one of the problems with bringing in plants in full flower: the window that you have to sell them is much shorter. Had the weekend when Dave brought in 250 lavenders been raining, or even been the start of a cold, rainy week, those plants would not have flown out of the nursery and they might have reacted poorly to going from the grower’s warm greenhouse into cool, wet weather.

Joe Kiefer, a manager at Triple Oaks Nursery & Herb Garden in Franklinville, New Jersey, hasn’t had a great experience with bringing in plants in full flower. “I think that the ‘bud-n-bloom, flip it quick’ mentality is fine for many, but it’s not my cup of tea,” he says. Joe has seen these plants deteriorate quickly, so he prefers plants that haven’t been grown for in-flower shipping.

The marketplaces can lose good plants

My concern about the ship-in-color programs is that many plants are just not suited for these plans. Perennials that take a couple of years to fill out in a garden, such as yellow wax bells (Kirengeshoma palmata), Solomon’s seal (Polygonatum spp.) or false indigo (Baptisia australis) seldom fill a pot in the way other perennials can.

Yet these are valuable garden plants. Given the choice between the instant satisfaction of a full Shasta daisy (Leucanthemum x superbum) or a Salvia sylvestris ‘May Night,’ compared with a few stems in a pot, most of our customers will go for the quick color every time. Yet if we only fill our yards with those quickly turned plants, many worthy varieties will drop out of the market altogether. Growers will not continue to propagate plants they can’t sell.

The answer is to stock both, but to know where the IGC should put a greater effort in marketing. The plants in color will sell themselves, especially if they’re displayed up front, as Donna Kutil Ross’ father advised. But plants whose appearance in their pots bears no relation to what they can do in the garden need some help, and there are several ways we can promote them.

Using signs and telling the truth

The first way to show a customer why a plant is desirable is with signage that features a full-color photo of that variety in a garden. This is, after all, how such plants are sold online or in catalogs. Those who sell by mail don’t show the plant in a pot; they illustrate the listing with a beautiful photo of how that selection looks when it’s mature in a landscape. Some growers have such signs available, or garden centers can laminate photos to create their own. Another option is to post photos of these plants on your website, and have a QR code above the pots that will take shoppers to inspirational photos and information.

Another way to engage shoppers with an immature plant is to tell the truth. I’m reminded of a dog shelter that had a Chihuahua that was so poorly behaved that most thought he would never find a home. He was called “Eddie the Terrible.” Yet the shelter not only found a home for Eddie, but they also had people lining up to take him. How? They told the truth, saying “Yes, he is a great listener. But inside that innocuous adorable blonde package exists tons — indeed, whole square miles — of naughty.” They explained that Eddie wasn’t right for most households since he didn’t like children, refused to sleep in a crate and went totally bonkers if he saw another dog. Being honest about the dog’s flaws made the right people want to rescue him.

We can sell many plants the same way. “This Epimedium doesn’t look like much in the pot. It’s short and the flowers are small. It might take a couple of years for it to fill out in your shade garden, but if you show this perennial some love and plant it anyway, you’ll be rewarded for years to come. What looks like a wimpy, thin plant in the pot becomes a weed-smothering groundcover with sweet, heart-shaped leaves. And oh yes … the deer and rabbits don’t eat it.”

People love secrets, and to be in the know. So talk up those plants that will never make it into a bud-n-bloom program by telling your customers the inside story. Write them up on your company blog and give them the spotlight on social media. “This plant is like the unassuming guy who takes off his glasses and becomes Superman.” “Those who underestimate this perennial miss out on a great addition to the garden.” “This shrub is small now, but think of how you looked in 7th grade. Give this plant a chance to show what it will do in adulthood.”

The best plant for the job

The bottom line is that when we provide our customers with the best plants for their yards and gardens, everyone wins. Sometimes that’s a plant in full bloom whose mission is to occupy a space in the customer’s landscape and to fill a place in their hearts. On other occasions, we’re providing the varieties that solve problems and create beautiful gardens … and although it’s not immediate gratification, these also become cherished plants.

In Norway, the world leader in abandoning physical currency and coins, only about 3% or 4% of all transactions use banknotes and coins. While it may take a while before things reach that point here where the government, like that in Norway, requires banks to offer “cash services,” there is no question that cash is well on its way to being “old school.”

Consumers and businesses are voluntarily moving toward credit and debit card payments at a remarkable rate. In fact, those cash-dispensing ATMs may be on borrowed time as studies show consumers are increasingly embracing technology for transactions and moving towards a cashless society.

But it is not only consumers flocking toward a cashless society; businesses are too. Any garden center that ignores developments such as the EMV smart card technology, Apple’s mobile wallet and other mobile payment vehicles may see a sales decline. It is a similar story for any business that ignores electronic payments, cyber currencies and other payment options and may also face an impacted bottom line. Will your garden center be prepared for a cashless society?

A look at cashless

There was a time when a credit card was the only non-cash alternative for most people. In fact, those with good memories may remember a time when credit cards were used only for large, special and emergency purchases. Today, consumers are distancing from paper money and are comfortable using cashless payment methods for small, day-to-day purchases. And, boy, do those payment options exist. Consider:

Peer-to-peer payments. The use of person-to-person (P2P) payment apps has surged dramatically for sending money to loved ones in need, paying back neighbors for groceries or sending rent to landlords during the pandemic. P2P payments have become so popular that at least one P2P service provider, Venmo, was forced to increase its sending limits for person-to-person payments by 40%.

Cash App, Developed by mobile payments company Square, Cash App allows users to send P2P payments, make donations and even tip professionals. All that is required is a phone number or email address to create an account and link a debit or credit card before sending and requesting money with anonymity (if desired). For an independent garden center, Cash App is a free point-of-sale (POS) solution that allows the operation to manage multiple types of transactions without having to wait for a bank to process or withdraw them. Naturally, Cash App isn’t the only POS option.

Smartphones are facilitating complete transactions and removing the need for cash or a physical card to interact with a POS terminal. Online payments are completely remote while proximity payments are used in both attended and unattended businesses. Of course, most proximity payment methods are still backed by credit and debit cards, which are often stored in an e-wallet.

Mobile wallets, or digital wallets, are smartphone apps for storing credit and debit card information and allowing so-called contactless transactions.

Apple Pay, designed for users of Apple devices, is one of the most popular mobile wallets. While debit card payments are free for the merchant, credit card transactions incur a 3% fee.

Google Pay allows Android users to pay for purchases using their phones anywhere that supports near-field communications (NFC). Users can also perform P2P transactions as well as pay for in-app and online purchases. Debit card payments are free but credit payments currently incur a fee of 2.9%.

Samsung Pay is the third major mobile wallet option. It works similarly to both Google and Apple Pay but is meant to be used by Samsung Galaxy owners. It can be used anywhere since it employs magnetic secure transmission (MST) technology that allows payments wherever traditional magnetic cards can be swiped.

Not too surprisingly, the success of mobile wallets has encouraged others to enter the online payment market. PayPal, for example, has its own contactless payment app.

PayPal is particularly useful for P2P transfers. Since the money is coming from one individual’s PayPal account or a linked bank account there is no charge. If a linked debit card is used, however, a fee is charged. PayPal’s merchant fee has a base rate of 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction.

Venmo is one of the three most popular P2P payment platforms and only recently opened up for selective business use. Venmo is accepted almost everywhere that accepts PayPal, its parent company. Unfortunately, independent garden center retailers and other “merchants” must route Venmo payments through a third party for all business transactions. It charges the same fee for merchants as its parent company — 2.9% + 30 cents per transaction.

Zelle is another payment app for transferring money to someone using their email or phone number. Zelle has transformed from a consumer-only service to a B2B and P2P mobile payment application. Garden center operations with a small business checking or savings account can begin using Zelle immediately since many major banks have incorporated Zelle into their mobile banking apps.

Facebook Pay, available only on Facebook, Facebook Messenger and Instagram, allows users to send and receive money through the Messenger app. Compared to a bigger payment processor such as PayPal, this is best suited to small online businesses without an official storefront that relies on one-on-one contact with buyers through social media or occasionally sells in person (at farmers markets and art and craft fairs, for example).

Square’s Cash App, as mentioned, is just one of the many products and services offered by Square. A garden center can use Square to accept mobile credit card payments from their customers and create a seamless selling process from anywhere. Square’s standard processing fee is 2.6% + 10 cents for contactless payments, swiped or inserted chip cards and swiped magstripe cards. Payments that are manually keyed in have a 3.5% + 15-cent fee. Square’s other services include Square Register and Square Point Of Sale.

NOTE: Naturally, those merchant fees are likely to rise, or may already have.

Cryptocurrencies, such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, are an increasingly popular tool used for money transfers. There are, however, risks and regulatory hurdles that make them impractical for most everyday transactions.

Electronic business payments

Many independent garden center retailers in the U.S. are familiar with the Electronic Federal Tax Payment System (EFTPS) for making tax payments to the IRS. Few, however, are aware that all federal benefit payments must now be paid electronically.

However, taxes and the payment of government benefits aren’t the only possibilities for electronic payments. The movement toward cashless has created a number of alternative forms of payment including:

• Electronic check conversions, which give businesses faster access to customer check payments
• Electronic payments, which ignore checks altogether by permitting the exchange of funds through paperless methods
• Wire transfers, unlike direct deposits, are not free. While direct deposits are most often used for recurring payments, wire transfers are only used occasionally.

Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), or direct deposit, is the electronic transfer of a payment from a customer into the garden center’s checking account — or vice versa — used daily by governments and businesses to transfer millions of dollars.

Automated clearing house (ACH) payments move money from the customer’s bank account to the merchant’s account electronically. Direct deposits are made through the ACH system. Most major accounting software platforms currently offer an option that allows small-business owners to turn on the ACH invoice payment feature.

Best of all, there are no processing fees for ACH payments, resulting in a cost-effective tool for many independent garden centers.

The unbanked

Although going cashless may be inevitable for a garden center business while appearing to be a “win-win” situation, that’s only true if the operation — or consumer — is financially secure. There are definitely downsides, particularly for small businesses, start-ups and certain segments of the population.

Labeled as the “unbanked,” many individuals and businesses don’t have access to affordable banking services, relying instead on check cashing services and payday loans. In other words, while there may be a cashless society in the future, today there are many who are unable to make digital payments because they lack a bank account, credit or debit card or smartphone.

A cashless future

The widespread use of credit and debit cards, and the recent explosion of digital payment options has given the average person little reason to touch cash. The launch of innovative cash-free (and cashier-free) stores, such as Amazon Go, may make it appear we’re heading for a truly cashless society someday.

Going cashless would, obviously, move us toward a more efficient, convenient and even hygienic society. Today, consumers are comfortable using cashless payment methods for small, day-to-day purchases.

However, along with the convenience offered by a cashless society, comes a growing awareness of security concerns with all types of digital payments.

Love it or hate it, cash is playing an increasingly less important role in society. Unfortunately, the decreasing use of coins and currency may be at the expense of many, both individuals and businesses. Will your garden center continue to profit in that new, cashless society?

The author is a financial writer based in Pennsylvania.