This 'n' Data

Here’s what industry folks have been telling us in recent online polls. Be sure to check
www.gardencentermagazine.com each week to cast your vote on various pertinent topics.

A quote to note (& share!)
The plant tagged “May require support” means your daughter’s engineering degree will finally pay off.

– Anonymous

// yalesmanship 101

Planter here, pal

I hope you’ve had a chance to read our story on container trends (p. 12). It’s no secret to anyone who sells home/lawn products that the decorative planter has become a statement-maker in the garden. Today’s sophisticated customer looks for planters that team with the plants to say, “Sha-zam!” Hey, sometimes, she even discards the plants and leaves the container filled with other items—the pots are that interesting.

How interesting are they, you ask? The other day, I heard a couple of petunias raving about all the new planter options, with one even stating: “I just can’t contain myself!” OK. That didn’t happen. This did: Over the past five years, according to the National Gardening Association’s national Gardening Survey—say that five times fast—an average of nearly 30 million plant containers were purchased annually in the United States. That’s not even counting the pots’ “kissing cousins,” window boxes, which were bought at a 4-mil-per-year clip.

And, bear in mind, we’re not talking about those round terra cottas that once served, in nested stacks in the corner, as your container section just a few years ago. Today’s planters do come in the shape of round, but they’re also oval, square, tall, short, fat, skinny and “other.” They come in basic colors —as well as exotic hues, such as Tangelo, Limoncello, Sea Bluff, Silverado and Espresso. Some are high-grade; others biodegrade.

Almost all are hot these days. For those who don’t speak Gomer Pyle, that’s the next best thing to “Sha-zam.”

– Yale Youngblood, editor