landscaping Growing sales and nurturing talent
Improving product quality and growing trade skills are key trends within the landscaping category
Plant quality, as well as quality hard landscaping products, is important for those operating in the landscaping sector
Plant quality is of increasing importance to end customers, and therefore to landscaping providers too.
Adam comments: “Supplying commodity plants at the lowest possible prices is not where a lot of the landscape market is at any more; it feels as if the industry is growing up and it’s an exciting time to be at the forefront of it.”
W
ith rising house prices in recent years, consumers have been incentivised to adopt a ‘don’t move, improve’ mentality, and one category in the garden retail market which has benefited is landscaping. That applies both to hard landscaping products in store, but also to those supplying to the professional landscape market. Hereford-based Wyevale Nurseries recently announced that its landscape/amenity sales were up 20% year-on-year from July 2017 to the end of December 2017.
Wyevale Nurseries sales and marketing director Adam Dunnett says: “We’re delighted with our recent sales figures – it’s a huge increase on last year. Our retail sales also saw a 3% year-on-year increase from July 2017 to the end of December 2017. It’s great news for the industry as a whole.
“A number of our key accounts have increased their turnover with us significantly and are taking a wider range of products too - from trees and transplants to container shrubs and herbaceous plants.”
He continues: “A key reason for our success in the amenity market has been to identify the areas of the market with growth trends and making sure we are working closely with the customers who operate within those parts of the industry. We have then been doing a lot of work on our production programmes to make sure that we are growing the type of plants our target markets need.
“Product innovation has been at the forefront of our strategy for the past few years. We want to offer the very best plant solutions for our customers and give them a point of difference over their competitors. If the completed scheme ‘wows’ their clients, then we have succeeded, we know they will be back for more and probably can’t find that solution from anyone else.”
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He adds: “Biosecurity and ensuring that plant stock is coming from a known source without the danger of importing pests or diseases seems to be very much the focus of our customers both on the retail side and increasingly on the landscape side.” Wyevale Nurseries is investing in its own propagation unit to supply ‘UK sown and UK grown’ trees and plants to counter the pressure of Brexit and biosecurity issues, providing a controlled and closed supply chain loop with traceability of all stock.
landscapers, encouraging them to engage with high profile projects.
Four of the best young landscapers in the country, all aged under 28, will form two teams, to display their skills. Designed to champion skills amongst young people and nurture emerging talent, the competition will see the contenders working in pairs to build two challenging Show Gardens packed with an array of landscaping elements. The Show Gardens designs, each at over 30sq m, will require the landscapers to show off a variety of skills to the very best of their ability. The gardens will be assessed by the BBC Gardeners’ World Live Show Garden Assessment Panel plus two dedicated judges from the WorldSkills Assessment Panel, with one duo to be crowned as BBC Gardeners’ World Live Young Landscapers of 2018. The Young Landscapers Award is made possible through the support of the show’s top
Supplying commodity plants at the lowest possible prices is not where a lot of the landscape market is at any more
Adam adds: “We have invested heavily in improving efficiencies of production and distribution. New product development, better marketing, reducing wastage and replacing inefficient production with new products has been our focus.
“Our complete solution home grown plants approach is also exactly what the market is now demanding. At Wyevale Nurseries we grow more than 80% of the stock we sell and we cover all the key plant groups a landscape/amenity customer is likely to need - trees, transplants and container grown shrubs and herbaceous. The small amount of stock we do trade is with partner nurseries where we have agreed the plant specifications and we know the supply chain for their plants.” A further signal of the momentum in the landscaping market is the introduction of the BBC Gardeners’ World Live Young Landscapers Award, supported by the Association of Professional Landscapers (APL). This new competition at BBC Gardeners’ World Live (June 14-17 at The NEC) is a platform to promote excellence in the landscaping industry and support up and coming
sponsors – The APL, Marshalls, Landscape Skills Academy and JA Jones Nurseries. APL manager Phil Tremayne said: “We are proud to be supporting these gardens at BBC Gardeners’ World Live. There is a well- documented and growing skills shortage in the sector and it is great to be able to link the work we are already doing in organising the WorldSkills UK Landscape Gardening competition and delivering our very own APL apprenticeship. This will help to form a pipeline into what we hope will be a great competition. We look forward to seeing the results.” Marshalls group marketing director Chris Harrop added: “The Young Landscapers Award is a fantastic opportunity for the landscapers of the future to showcase their skills, and BBC Gardeners’ World Live is the perfect stage for them to do so.
“We believe it’s vitally important to nurture the next generation of landscapers, and give them opportunities to explore their own creativity. Show Gardens are the perfect setting by which to show our product’s full potential, and we look forward to seeing what ideas the competitors come up with.”
GCU March 2018
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