Garden centres have a duty to display plants during the winter even if it means moving them to an undercover area. That's the view of award-winning stores like Altons and Groves, who believe it would be a mistake to de-stock completely.

Andy Bunker, of Alton Garden Centre in Essex, said: "I don't think garden centres should de-stock but more importantly they should think about what and where we offer plants during the late autumn to early winter period.

"The best place to display plants during this period is undercover. You can fill it with looking good lines in shrubs but you have bedding and seasonal lines like miracle cyclamen and pansies. Other good sellers at this time of year are garden girl heathers, solanum and autumn patio plants.

"But centres should adopt a little and often policy or speak to the growers/wholesaler about offers."

Charlie Groves, from Groves Nurseries in Dorset, commented: "We don’t actively de-stock our plant area with clearance promotions but obviously the amount of stock reduces depending on the time of year.  

"However, you have to be careful about managing and protecting containerised plants particularly if you have a very cold winter and we make use of our nursery to overwinter more vulnerable stock.  

"We do remove sales benches from the sales area and move the plants towards the shop so that the first impression is always that of a well stocked, healthy plant area even if the amount of lines has reduced in reality. I can’t ever see a time that we would clear out all of our plants for the winter, our customers would not be happy with that at all.

 "I can understand there might be a necessity in centres that have a smaller outdoor area and have to make room for Christmas trees. During December these are a lifeline but fortunately we have the space to be able to sell both."

What is your view on de-stocking of outdoor plants during winter?  Use the comments link below or e-mail trevor.pfeiffer@tgcmc.co.uk