Despite everything the weather and the economy can throw at it, garden retailing is proving amazingly resilient, as new analysis by GTN Bestsellers demonstrates.

Because the industry is so dependent on the weather, we tend to focus on the problems we face when the weather is bad rather than the bonus we get when the sun shines.

The graph pictured here is an attempt to ‘normalise’ the weather, just as Dobbies CEO James Barnes tried to do in a presentation at last year’s HTA conference. Take the periods of bad weather out of the equation and we can see the industry has been doing rather better that we might imagine.

The graph takes the start of the 2012 sales season, when the weather was good, and adds on recent 2013 sales volumes. The result is minus 0.5% on 2011 sales volumes and plus 5.8% on 2010 sales volumes. Despite what the Met Office described last week as the coldest March to May period since 1979. Not all bad, then.

“This kind of proves that while growth may have been stunted by the economic situation, if the weather had been at least ‘normal’ or average, gardening retail sales will at least be holding their own,” says GTN Bestsellers analyst Trevor Pfeiffer.  “We’d better get praying now for a ‘normal’ spring in 2014....”

While weather forecasting is still a notably inexact science, take heart from the MetCheck website, which suggests that the weather at Nottingham for the the first Ashes Test next month (11-15 July) is, well, not perfect but OK by average English summer standards – temperatures in the range 18-23C, light winds, minimal rain showers – and a bit of cloud cover to help our bowlers (but not the Aussies).

And, of course, if England do well, the national feel-good factor will put consumers in the mood for a few barbecues and summer parties. And in our book, barbies and parties mean prizes…