industry news
Garden centres thanked for Peckish campaign support
Garden bird food brand Peckish has thanked 100 garden centres for their involvement in the ‘hugely successful’ Go Wild With Peckish campaign.
Young people across the UK and Ireland hatched into bird-feeding enthusiasts during the week-long campaign, held over October half term. Activities included fun bird mask and fat ball making sessions and a bird spotting activity with cut out bird characters. Thousands of goodie bags were provided by Peckish for garden centres to issue to participants.
Lots of creative entries were received to the drawing competition which was run through garden centres and online at the Go Wild With Peckish website. Five year old Noah Gilpin from Bangor in County Down won the competition with his bird Magic McGee. He won a family membership to Tayto Park in Ireland. Peckish senior marketing manager Wendy French said: “This is the second year the Go Wild With Peckish campaign has encouraged ‘generation digital’ to switch off their devices and experience the enjoyment of bird-feeding. Once again, we were astounded by the support that we received from garden centres up and down the UK and would like to thank them for getting behind the campaign.”
GCA garden centres’ finest Christmas displays announced
Barton Grange and Castle Gardens have been announced as the ‘dazzling’ national winners of the 2015 Garden Centre Association’s (GCA) annual Christmas competition. Dorset-based Castle Gardens defended their title in the Garden Centre category, having won the prize last year (pictured).
The garden centres were judged to have the best festive displays in the country by the organisation and will receive their awards at its golden jubilee conference in January. GCA chief executive Iain Wylie said: “We announced the regional winners of our Christmas display competition at the end of November and were very impressed with the standard of entries this year.
Following this, the area winners were all judged
for a second time and these two national winners were selected at the end of last week as the duo with the most dazzling displays. “I’d like to heartily congratulate Barton Grange in Lancashire, who won in the Destination Garden Centre category, and Castle Gardens in Dorset who scooped the top prize in the Garden Centre section of the awards.” The garden centres were judged on the innovation, inspiration and excitement created from the way their Christmas products are displayed. The range of products available, accessibility, how easy it is for customers to find and select products and ‘wow factor’ were also taken into consideration in an assessment of the overall commercial proposition.
GCA inspector and judge of the national Christmas displays competition Andy Campbell said: “I last carried out the national judging of the Christmas competition several years ago and since then the creativity and commerciality of the regional finalists has just got stronger and stronger. I have just visited 15 garden centres over eight days and I am hugely impressed by the professionalism of their Christmas merchandising and displays. It is clear to me that garden centres lead the way in this field.”
The runners up in the Destination Garden Centre category were Bents in Cheshire and Whitehall, Lacock in Wiltshire. In the Garden Centre category, the runners up were Burleydam Garden Centre in Cheshire and Pennells Lincoln.
GCU December 2015
EU clamps down on high
risk invasive species A new regulation from the EU will place stringent controls on 37 non- native invasive species from January 1, 2016.
These species have been identified as being “of Union concern”, meaning they have been assessed as posing such a high risk of invasion within one or more EU member states, that a co-ordinated, Europe-wide response is needed to limit their spread. It will therefore become an offence in the UK to keep, cultivate, breed, transport, sell or exchange these species, or release them, intentionally or unintentionally, into the environment.
Eight of the soon-to-be banned species are popular garden plants including American skunk-cabbage, curly waterweed and water hyacinth. American skunk-cabbage and curly waterweed, in particular, are widely established invasives in the UK and can have a devastating impact on native wildlife.
For example, occurrences of curly waterweed in the wild have increased by 41% in 15 years. In Lough Corrib, Ireland, it infested 100 hectares of lake in 160 bays, negatively affecting native fish, invertebrates and plants. Cost of control has been over €1.5 million (£1.06 million).
Plant protection organisation Plantlife has welcomed the new regulations as a mechanism to prevent future invasive species becoming established in the wild. Plantlife’s botanical specialist Dr Trevor Dines commented: “Although harsh, these stringent new controls are one of the most effective ways to stop species at an early stage of the invasion process. It’s much better to ‘nip them in the bud’ – getting on top of the problem now - before eradication at many sites in the wild becomes difficult and prohibitively expensive. As a keen gardener myself, I’m happy to live without a few plants that can wreak havoc on our countryside, and there are plenty of alternatives to choose from.”
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