Pick up the slack

Yale Youngblood, editor

This go-round, we offer kudos to friend and green industry “playa” Gina McCauley, who has crafted a great idea to boost business during slower times at local garden centers. Some of you might know Gina for her work as a principal with the Washington State Nursery and Landscape Association. Now, the owner/president/CEO of Creative Endeavors has a new project and new way to market it.

Supply, meet demand. First, the former: Gina introduced Snooter-doots to the market about a year and a half ago. The whimsical, felted, stuffed toys have a growing following, not to mention a Web site that helps ensure the following grows some more.

But that’s not the only point of this missive. Gina also has conceived a marketing strategy that could work practically anywhere:

Retail nurseries could get on the “buy local”/“farmer’s market” bandwagon by holding their own version of a farmer’s market on a smaller scale. Events like this would help differentiate them from the box stores and potentially bring in customers that may not usually shop there.

If a retail nursery scheduled a well-promoted event once a month or quarter (or around the big gift-giving holidays), they could offer their customers a unique, fun, different experience that would help connect ornamental plants with this ever-expanding, and hugely popular, concept of buying local, fresh (even organic, if you must), and direct from the producers.

The nursery could invite local agricultural producers/artisans to set up booths on the nursery grounds. The nursery could charge a small booth fee, or collect a commission. All they would have to provide is the space and the promotion. The retailer could offer a new and diverse product mix without having to stock/inventory a thing; the vendors would bring and remove it all, including their own display paraphernalia!

Winner, winner! Chicken dinner! As my grandfather Don used to say, “Sounds like a plan, Stan.” Why he called me Stan, I’ll never know. I do know this, though: He would have jumped at the chance to use Gina’s idea to better market his business. I do suspect this, also: You would jump at that chance, as well.

Only, you would probably jump higher than Don. He was pretty old.