GROEN-Direkt has started the 2023 garden season with a good feeling thanks to the positive trade mood at its Spring Fair.

On 7 and 8 February a large international public found its way to the largest green market in Europe. On top of the fair’s more than 5,000 unique sample batches, concepts, novelties, trend plaza and 170 growers’ stands, GROEN-Direkt used the opportunity of this Spring Fair to introduce its own Mediterranean imports. All this combined to create the most complete range of products ever. The positive feeling was further enhanced by the consistently good trade and a visit from the Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation.

Trade mood

GROEN-Direkt looks back on the two busy days of its Spring Fair with great satisfaction. An extremely high percentage of the public attracted to this edition was once again international in character, including many visitors from Germany, Eastern Europe and Scandinavia in particular. Impressive was the high number of returning visitors, having found their way back to GROEN-Direkt after a couple of years’ absence due to Covid. So trade was once again the main focus of the Spring Fair.

The good trade mood among the European visitors reflected the refound positive outlook of the professional garden plant buyers and traders. “I’m terribly satisfied with the sales. We haven’t repeated last year’s turnover, but then that would have been like comparing apples and oranges. The market has meanwhile changed, and customers understand that things won’t readily go wrong for them this spring. So there’s less pressure to buy things early. And the weekly updated seasonal ranges make GROEN-Direkt the ideal purchase channel,” says Hans Cok, GROEN-Direkt’s assistant director.

Visit from the Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation

The focus on international garden plant retail did not go unnoticed. GROEN-Direkt’s Spring Fair was also visited by Liesje Schreinemacher, Minister for Foreign Trade and Development Cooperation. She talked to various standholders and was taken on a tour of GROEN-Direkt’s beautiful sample batches by Hans Cok, who discussed international aspects of the trade in garden plants with her.

New: GROEN-Direkt’s own Mediterranean imports

New at this edition were the Mediterranean plants imported by the company itself such as herbs and shrubs from Southern Europe. Visitors from all over Europe were very enthusiastic about the new wide range of Mediterranean plants, in which they showed a remarkably keen interest – so, all in all a great success! The large range of Mediterranean products will remain available at GROEN-Direkt after the Spring Fair too.

Largest range of green products ever

The more than 5,000 sample batches, concepts and novelties offered both the fair visitors and the webshop visitors plenty of inspiration. The already huge range was further supplemented by the 170 growers’ stands and the trend pavilion of the first spring edition of PLANTARIUM|GROEN-Direkt that took place in the same hall and at the same time as the Spring Fair. As usual, the fair visitors were invited to vote for what they considered the best novelty. And the winner of this Visitors’ Favourite contest was the Rhododendron Hybrid ‘Grifie’ developed by N.V. Jules Block from Lochristi (Belgium).

About GROEN-Direkt

In its capacity as the largest green market in Europe, GROEN-Direkt has been combining the supply and demand sides of the garden plant market for more than 25 years. The company’s 30 annual sample fairs supplemented with its webshop showing frequently updated sample photos offer interested buyers a tremendous seasonal range from which to order garden plants all the year round. This GROEN-Direkt is able to do by working closely together with 500 specialist growers in the Dutch Boskoop horticultural region, and also far beyond. Since 2022, GROEN-Direkt has been part of Green Retail Events, the organisation responsible for the PLANTARIUM | GROEN-Direkt fairs.

For more information on GROEN-Direkt, its sample fairs or webshop go to www.groen-direkt.nlor call +31 (0)172 21 15 76.