News, tactics, and views for cross-channel commerce
ISSN 1362-2315 - issue 170 - June 2009
Grow your own
By Miri Thomas
green shoots
“Grow your own”, like “Make do and mend”, an ecommerce site selling vegetable seeds.
has become a mantra for the current economic Although he couldn’t give a launch date, May
times. That makes the horticulture sector one of says the site will have a community feel and offer
the few to be seeing year-on-year growth during handy tips and advice to make growing your own
this recession. vegetables more accessible.
Martin Harvey, managing director of As part of its initiatives to capitalise on
Marshalls Garden Catalogues, estimates that Britain’s hunger for home-grown produce,
UK sales of vegetable seeds are up 20 percent Suttons is a partner in the Grow Your Own
from last year, with new gardeners accounting National Campaign, a coalition of
for about half of that growth. He believes that businesses including B&Q, Dobbies,
the “big four” vegetable seeds companies— and Sainsbury’s and organisations
Marshalls, Suttons, Thompson & Morgan such as the Royal Horticultural
(T&M), and Unwins—are each enjoying a sales Society, the National Trust, and
rise of 20-40 percent and “seeing growth in the Soil Association supported by
sectors where compact, easy-to-grow, high-yield- a Defra-funded project team. The
per-square-metre veg predominate”. campaign encourages consumers to
It’s not surprising, then, that some marketers reduce the environmental footprint
are expanding their offering to take advantage of their diet in part by growing
of the gardening trend. Nor is it surprising that their own. Suttons is also working to
some traditional gardening cataloguers are extend its range of vegetable-growing
tweaking their product ranges and marketing hardware—a selection of gardening
efforts to better appeal to novices. equipment is available on the Suttons
Etailer The Recycle Works launched website in partnership with sister
GardeningWithChildren.co.uk earlier this company Ferndale Lodge—and is
year to encourage food production and increasing its off-the-page advertising.
healthy eating among children. Meanwhile To better appeal to a new, and
Tesco-owned garden centre Dobbies is often younger, generation of
reported to have ramped up demonstrations, gardeners as well as to fend off
workshops, and presentations to customers competitors, Marshalls “radically
and schools following an 82-percent leap in transformed” its catalogue during
annual sales of its grow-your-own range of the past year. It increased the page
fruit and vegetables. count from 124 to 148 and added more lifestyle
Long known for its kitchenware, photography, planting information, and recipes.
Lakeland in March launched a 96-page spin- The new Marshalls catalogue, mailed last
off catalogue featuring more than 350 gardening its initial gardening catalogues. This tie-up September, produced a 34.9-percent uplift in
and outdoor-cooking products. Designed by benefi ts T&M as well as Lakeland, by helping year-on-year sales for the period of September
CHS Creative, the catalogue was positioned the former expand its reach. T&M has formed a to December and helped the company win an
as a logical extension to the Lakeland brand. number of similar partnerships with newspapers ECMOD Award this spring.
“Our challenge,” says CHS’s head of catalogue, and other cataloguers; it supplies seeds to “Will [increased] competition affect the
Scott Marlow, “was to make it feel different gardening etailer Greenfi ngers, The Telegraph, traditional big players? It’s a resounding
from the core catalogues we rebranded over a The Guardian, The Times, The Daily Mail, and News no,” Harvey insists. “Talk to the boys who are
year ago whilst ensuring its look and feel was of the World, among others. Chief executive John established horticulturists, dyed-in-the-wool
unmistakably Lakeland.” May confi rms that T&M is in discussions with direct marketers, and smart traders, and they do
Lakeland partnered with T&M to sell an additional cataloguers and online retailers. not seem too worried about what the new players
exclusive range of its seeds and even included T&M also recently bought the GetGrowing will throw at them—but they do watch each
a pack of easy-to-grow salad-leaf seeds with online domain name and plans to make it other’s each and every competitive move.”
News Tactics Views
pages 2-7 The second coming of EBTM, pages 9-23 Special focus on customer pages 24-35 A review of the Plastic Parts
Empire Direct, and 247electrical; line service, plus calculating lifetime value, Centre website, Q&A with Asco Educational
extensions; overseas forays; and more fi nding new funding, and web analytics Supplies’ MD, plus naked catalogues
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