thompson & morgan
The home of innovative plant breeding THOMPSON & MORGAN PLANS TO GROW ITS WHOLESALE BUSINESS IN 2011
Thompson & Morgan is well known as a leading UK mail order brand for seeds, young plants and retail sales in garden centres. Lesser known, but increasingly important are its wholesale activities, with Thompson & Morgan proud to say it’s the only mail order seed and plant company in the UK to support its own breeding program. This provides it with a competitive edge both in the mail order and wholesale markets by providing them with their own unique and exclusive products for the wholesale sector. These involve breeding new varieties for the T&M group, seed production, worldwide seed sales of their own varieties to other packet seed companies and the direct-to-grower business supplying UK growers with seed and young plants.
T
he grower range consists of a mix of T&M breeding and other mainstream bedding varieties supplied in seed and young plant form. The range is growing year-on-year, with T&M reporting repeat orders from almost all of its customers on the popular 144
tray which T&M has established as a great value mid-size plug for growers to ensure a good start and rapid results. 2011 will see the introduction of a wide range of varieties in 60-plug trays. This is due to demand from modest grower retail customers looking for a wide range of varieties in a large-plug format but in smaller quantities, particularly in perennial plants.
DIGITALIS POLKA DOT COLLECTION As a breeder, T&M continues to research extensively across a wide range of species for the seed market particularly in the perennial sector. Recent introductions include the Digitalis Polka Dot collection, all of which are hybrids with a longer flowering period and amazing results in the garden. The Hollyhock Halo series, which started this year with two colours, will come to completion next season with a range of six single-flowered varieties in unique stunning bi-colour. Aimed more for the 1-litre pot bedding and container market is the new highly scented Agastache Party Mixers series in a range of Raspberry, Lavender and Peach. These produce a lovely aniseed scent and flower over a long period, providing interest to borders and containers and attracting a range of beneficial insects. And it doesn’t stop there! Behind the scenes T&M is working hard to produce more new varieties, but not from seed. These are all vegetative varieties produced by cutting and micro propagation. T&M doesn’t propagate these varieties itself, but licenses its breeding to other
30 Garden & Hardware News - Retail Plants & Shrubs
it’s own breeding programme.
well known distributors. In many cases UK and European growers are often unaware that they are using a variety originated by Thompson & Morgan. Many people reading this could be selling Bidens Pirates treasure which is licensed to PLA and produced in the UK by Delamore, or Cosmos Choca Mocca licensed to Proven Winners for Europe and distributed in the UK by Kernock Plants, for example, without ever knowing that they originated from Thompson & Morgan breeding.
NEW AWARD-WINNING COMPACT VARIETY A huge breakthrough for T&M is Buddleia Buzz, the new award- winning compact variety in a series of five colours. The branching habit and long flowering season make the first Buddleia truly suited to smaller garden borders and containers. Demand for this is strong in the UK and Europe with worldwide interest growing rapidly.
“Thompson & Morgan support
Kernock Plants is handling UK sales of this variety for Proven Winners Europe. With many exciting projects in the pipeline Thompson & Morgan Breeding is worth looking out for! For more information call 01473 695274 or visit
www.direct2grower.com
”
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