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Guy Hands, Miss Moneypenny and plenty of speculation at Chelsea
Crocus chief says garden centres are struggling
Pelargoniums are the Plant of the Month for May
New marketing department spearheads progress and development for Grange
Cloud Controller wins RHS Chelsea Product of the Year
Silver-Gilt for collaborative industry exhibit
Taylors Bulbs Johnny Walkers makes it 23 consecutive gold medals at RHS Chelsea Flower Show
Horticulture reception helps Scotland bloom
HTA to relocate
Flopro adds Cube video to in-store displays
Jim Hagadorn opens new Miracle-Gro offices in Surrey
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Lights, decorate and top off those pots
Running away with the No 1 Veg Plant spot for May
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Golden Wonder!
Expansion Plans for Bell Plantation
It’s gold for Briers at Chelsea!
Taylors Bulbs present Tulip Royal Celebration to Her Majesty The Queen at the Chelsea Flower Show
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Crocus chief says garden centres are struggling

After winning a Gold Medal at Chelsea this week, Crocus.co.uk co-founder Peter Clay told listeners to BBC Radio 5 Live’s Wake Up to Money programme on Wednesday last week, 25th May, that he thought UK garden centres had “significantly struggled over the past five years.” 

He went on to say; “I don’t think it’s been a happy time to be in the garden industry. I think that the traditional garden sector is very dependent on key dates in the calendar so the majority of garden centres really rely on successful bank holiday weekends and all you’ve got to do is have a bit of a wash out of a weekend and that can seriously damage sales” 

Well Peter, we’d like to know exactly who were you referring too?  You certainly haven’t been reading GTN Bestsellers and tracking real sales data.  The GTN Bestsellers All Products Index has risen year on year for four out of the past 5 years with 2015 being 7.1% up on 2011 totals. Only 2012 was a down year when the late spring and summer weather was really cold and wet. 

And this year the weekend of 7th and 8th May – NOT a Bank Holiday – was the busiest on record! 

Perhaps Peter was referring to purely web based garden centres?  I wonder what the Top 20 Plants are sold by Crocus? I doubt they will be selling the huge numbers of looking great impulse buy plants that are clearly driving volumes as seen in the GTN Bestsellers Epos data. 

If you’ve got a message we can get to the BBC to re-dress the balance please e-mail me: trevor.pfeiffer@tgcmc.co.uk

Here's a transcript of the interview:

BBC 5 Live Wake Up to Money -25th May 2016 5:55am

Listen at 42:00 mins into the programme using this link

Shaun Farrington, BBC 5 Live:  How has the garden centre sector been lately?  We’ve got 2,300 of them across the country.  Is it a great time to be a garden centre in the UK?

Peter Clay, Co Founder of Crocus:  I’d say not. I think they’ve struggled significantly over the last five years. I don’t think it’s been a happy time to be in the garden industry

Shaun Farrington:  Why is that?  If Chelsea was booming then surely you’d see people flocking in at the weekend?

Peter Clay:  I think that the traditional garden sector is very dependent on key dates in the calendar so the majority of garden centres really rely on successful bank holiday weekends and all you’ve got to do is have a bit of a wash out of a weekend and that can seriously damage sales

Louise Cooper BBC 5 Live: You are an online gardening shop. How does online work?  Because with so many areas online is growing – grocery, clothing are really beginning to dominate the industry.  With gardening I don’t decide to do the garden until I wake up and the weather is warm by which time it’s too late for me to order anything online.

Peter Clay:  Yes, except you will probably wake up on a Monday morning and decide that you ought to do something next weekend and that gives us plenty of time get an array of plants delivered.



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