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Today, #FloralFriday is all about the Children!
Today (Friday 29th May), as its National Children’s Gardening Week, Greenfingers Charity would love to see photos that reflect the great way that children and families are embracing time in the garden, particularly during these challenging lockdown times. And this week, all photos shared, which include the hash tags #NationalChildrensGardeningWeek and #FloralFriday, will be entered into a prize draw to win £100 National Garden Gift Vouchers...
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Grow your sales with Evergreen Garden Care’s GYO best-sellers
GTN Xtra promotion
Good weather coupled with the COVID-19 lockdown has boosted Grow Your Own search and sales across the UK. Evergreen Garden Care recognises that garden spaces are one of the key sanctuaries for households during this unprecedented time, with more people using their own safe, green retreat to exercise, relax and learn new skills...
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"Open For Business: Lessons Learned from Lockdown and The First Week of Trading". Watch the webinar replay now
Last week we joined Boyd Douglas-Davies, Mike Burks, Adam Wigglesworth and Will Blake for the "Open For Business: Lessons Learned from Lockdown and The First Week of Trading" webinar. Watch the complete hour long webinar now and hear how Adam is now a web trading convert, how Will's team at St Peters greatly enjoyed being able to re-open, how Mike believes some of his operational changes will have long term benefits and Boyd thanks suppliers for their great efforts and says as an industry we should not be looking for discounts from growers...
Watch the webinar replay here
GrowNation stores take 40% of sales outside business hours. Online garden sales booming.
GTN Xtra promotion
As the rush to online continues in the garden retail sector, GrowNation (grownation.co.uk) reports that almost half of sales are made whilst garden centres are closed for the day...
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Covid-19 Safe - Barton Grange Style
While some garden centres are managing their customer numbers by controlling the number of trolleys in at any one time Barton Grange are only allowing 100 cars at a time to park up, with other cars waiting in a queing system on the remainder of the sites car parking space. GTN's North West corespondent Steve Myatt took the short trip up the M6 to bring you this GTN Xtra photo tour...
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Post-Lockdown trading re-starts at 48% down year to date
GTN Bestsellers Analysis
The first set of Epos data for GTN Bestsellers after 7 weeks of lockdown showed total volume sales of barcoded products only 17% down on the same week last year despite two less days of trading and many less customers as a result of Social Distancing restrictions...
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Bump Up Your Colour Pot Sales
With the increased demand of Perennials over the coming weeks for premium pot colour in Garden Centres, Ball Colegrave have ensured there is good availability on many of our most popular varieties for immediate delivery...
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Good TV coverage for gardening
Last Tuesday saw viewing figures for Monty Don & Joe Swift On BBC Chelsea at 1.9 million & a repeat of a ITV Love Your Garden with Alan Titchmarsh & David Domoney at 2.4 million...
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#FloralFriday was a great reminder of RHS Chelsea
Once again Greenfingers Charity and friends shared their #FloralFriday photos on social media. And last week, many used the occasion to celebrate days gone by at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show. ..
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Four Oaks Trade Show 2020 Cancelled
Last week it was announced that the Four Oaks Trade Show for 2020, the 50th anniversary event, has been postponed due to the Coronavirus crisis...
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lunch! postponed until September 2021
lunch! organiser Diversified Communications UK has confirmed that this year’s show has sadly been postponed due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The UK’s leading trade event for the café, coffee shop and food-to-go sector will now take place on 23-24 September 2021 at ExCeL London...
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Catering Design Group's ten top tips for reopening your catering facilities safely
- Review restaurant layout and flows to promote social distancing
- Think about zoning and reorientation of areas – use screens for divisions and segregation in high risk areas
- Introduce protective screens around counters and till stations
- Minimise ‘touch points’ within high risk areas – introduce ‘hands-free’ operation wherever possible
- Increase Hygiene/sanitisation points – consider additional technology...
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Get your own copy of GTN Xtra
with all the news direct to your e-mail inbox...
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HTA Launches Virtual New Plant Awards
The New Plant Awards are usually one of the highlights of the National Plant Show, held by the HTA in June each year. Due to the coronavirus crisis, the plant show was cancelled, but the HTA has decided to run the New Plant Awards as an independent online event in 2020...
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GIMA confirms Consumer & Design Trends webinar series
Due to the Covid-19 lockdown, GIMA’s Consumer & Design Trends seminar was sadly cancelled, however delegates – including GIMA members, non-members and for the first time, retailers - are being offered a second chance to learn more about the trends that are expected to influence consumer shopping decisions regarding interior and exterior products with the launch of GIMA’s new webinar series...
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The UK’s Infrastructure Capacity to Reprocess Post-Consumer Plastic Needs to Double by 2022 to Meet Plastic Packaging Tax Demands
The UK could be set to face significant challenges in its ability to recycle household plastic packaging, with reprocessing infrastructure potentially needing to double, according to new research...
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The best of last week's
If you missed last week's GTN Xtra, below are the most-read stories...
Garden Centres back on the right track - UPDATED - New comment from Barton Grange, Newbank, Langlands and Green Pastures
Trading records broken as garden centres in England and Wales get back to business
GTN Xtra asked garden centres how their first real Saturday of the season had been and how their teams had coped with the “new normal.”
"We’ve sold almost as much in the last 4 days as we did all through the shutdown online!”
"Sales have been between 50 and 60% up on the same days last year. Stocking up again hasn't been straightforward as suppliers are also having to catch up."
"What a docile and well behaved nation we have become in six weeks. I can’t imagine anyone standing in a queue for twenty minutes, back in ‘normal’ times, without there being confrontation."
"“We are expecting 10 days of bank holidays! Pent up demand, money saved up, no holidays this year, time off work furloughed, new interest in the garden!"
Read comment from Coolings, Hilliers, The Gardens Group, Rosebourne, Blue Diamond, InExcess, British Garden Centres, Klondyke, Dobbies, Perrywood, Bosworths, Planters, Bents, St Peters, Baytree, Barton Grange, Newbank, Langlands and Green Pastures
Making garden centres friendly, safe and accessible again
GTN Xtra promotion
Some garden centres have already taken massive steps to reopen safely. Many in the garden industry, and in retail at large, will be keenly watching and evaluating what works and how customers respond. No doubt over the coming weeks there will be refinements and many improvements as it becomes clear things will stay ‘different’ for a long time.
Green Magic Co (Sign-Holders.co.uk) has been beavering away during lockdown to discover, devise and deliver new solutions...
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Smart Face Masks
Smart Garden have tapped into their extensive Chinese supply chain and are importing a large quantity of 3-ply disposable, medical-grade, face masks...
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Orderly queues form as garden centres in England re-open
This was the scene at British Garden Centres Osterley garden centre just before 9:00am on Wednesday morning.
Send us your pics and videos of your re-opening experience, thanks to the team at Downtown Garden Centre (below), and we'll publish as many as we can in GTN Xtra at the weekend...
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Solex Exhibition – Cancelled
Solex has been cancelled for 2020...
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Garden Centre Photo Tours
If you've missed one of our popular photo tours of garden centres then click on the links below:
Haskins Snowhill re-opens after £15m re-vamp
Haskins Garden Centre in Snowhill, Crawley, has opened its doors to customers following a 12-month refurbishment costing £15m...
Read more and see GTN Xtras photo tour of the new centre
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