Branding - at the crossroads

It’s been a full year since Garden Center first served up a discussion on plant branding. And a lot has changed in the past 365-or-so days. Here’s a recap of some developments we’ve reported over this year:

Knock Out Roses must be grown and sold in branded containers. Retailers may still see these roses in a few non-branded containers next spring. But the vast majority will be in the new chartreuse-green pots.

Proven Winners ColorChoice shrubs, likewise, must be sold in branded containers. Also, Monrovia and Proven Winners ColorChoice have entered into a strategic partnership, and will be offering plants in co-branded containers in 2011. The pots include both company’s distinctive logos.

David Austin Roses has tightened its quality-control measures, and will only offer plants in its unique, branded containers available from a select network of growers.

Greenleaf Nursery launched a new plant brand: Garden Debut. Items in this line will be marketed in a pot that features the brand’s hummingbird logo.

This list is far from comprehensive. The rest of this page could be filled with various branding efforts initiated by color and veggie growers. In a crowded plant market, there’s a veritable race to differentiate.

To sum it up, branding is still the “in” thing. And some would say plant branding is the new paradigm for the green industry. But retailers, growers, breeders and marketers are a long way from joining together to travel a common path. Some remain downright ambivalent.

An Alternative Path
Despite current trends, not all growers are trying to make their company a household name. The Perennial Farm in Glen Arm, Md., is growing its customer base by helping retailers keep their store brand front-and-center.

Ed Kiley, director of sales and marketing with The Perennial Farm said many garden centers appear to have an identity crisis. Store-brand pots and signage are interspersed with national and regional plant brands. (Sometimes on the same bench.)

Granted, The Perennial Farm does offer some brand names (like the Treadwell groundcover line). But the vast majority of its plants are marketed with the company’s “Big Barn” tag. Kiley noted that the tags, signage and POP are professional and full-color. They don’t, however, have a single mention of “The Perennial Farm.” The farm also created and maintains a website for consumers, www.GrowingForYou.com, that has complete information on the perennials offered under the Big Barn label. Again, there is zero mention of “The Perennial Farm.”

The result, in essence, is the perennials become a store brand, Kiley said. This strategy resonates with two distinct consumer groups.

“There are people who are very discriminating buyers,” he said. “There are also a lot of people who know very little. They want to buy something that looks good. They also want to go shopping at a ‘destination place,’ to converse with people that are knowledgeable. I think they’re very different audiences.”

The Big Barn materials present a clean, professional look that gives customers confidence in their purchase, regardless of their knowledge of plant brands. It also lets retailers to play up their own name and reputation, something Kiley believes in.

“There’s a downside of relying on an outside brand and falling into that trap,” he said. “If for some reason that brand goes away, or Joe Retailer down the road is given an exclusive and you haven’t branded yourself, you’re in trouble. You’re copping out and letting [other brands] do the work for you.”

Retail Reality
Small, single-location garden centers tend to struggle the most with branding—whether it’s with national brands or their own store branding efforts. Most of it boils down to dollars and cents.

Glen Reeder, owner of Glen’s Pond & Garden Center in Fort Smith, Ark., said one of the most visible symbols of branding—custom pots—tends to cause the biggest problems for small garden centers.

“All these pots are made from oil,” he noted. “The branded ones don’t stand up very well and, of course, we can’t reuse them. The branded pots are also very expensive to customers. When times were better, they were willing to pay more for a plant in a branded container. But in today’s market that’s not going to happen.”

Point-of-purchase materials can also be hit-or-miss, according to Reeder. He often shops his competition, and the majority don’t use POP very well or consistently. Garden centers become a garish mishmash of store and national-brand materials.

“Every retailer has its own colors and pictures,” he said. “It looks like a junkyard after a while. It just becomes too much for the eye to take in. The larger garden centers have shelf space for a lot of different branded items. But once you get to a place that has maybe 5,000 square-feet of space—it’s a different story.”

A mélange of branding has become the norm in garden centers. Store brands, national brands and regional brands all vie for the customer’s attention. Buy Local and Branding
Many independent garden centers have adopted “Buy Local” as a branding strategy. For Trey Pitsenberger, owner of The Golden Gecko Garden in Garden Valley, Calif., it’s a matter of survival.

“For some reason I just don't think plant brands have the same cache as other brands. Maybe in more suburban or urban settings? Around here I just don’t see an acknowledgment of plant brands by customers,” he said. “That may change, however. We have partnered with Lotus Valley Natives, a small wholesale grower of Northern California natives. We gave them an area to display their plants, complete with a sandwich board with their name on it. What I like is it sends the signal that we are supporting a local business. That may be the future for smaller garden centers who want something different than the national brands found in box stores. If local is in, then let’s advertise it.”

Pitsenberger even wonders if a branding counterculture could be the next big thing.

“It may become fashionable to sport local, micro-brands on t-shirts, signage, etc., as a counter to all the national-brand advertising,” he said. “That may be the way for smaller nurseries to stand out. Yes, go ahead and brand but keep it local—as much as possible. Rather than having Proven Winners, Bonnie Plants and other national brands, brand local suppliers. Walk the walk, so to speak.”

Lynn Ferda of Ferda’s Garden Center in Adena, Ohio, echoes Pitsenberger’s sentiments:

“We carry Proven Winners and other national brands, but most customers don’t ask for them by name, except for ‘Wave’ petunias, which to them are any of the new vegetative petunias,” she said. “We push our ‘locally grown’ products.”

Middle of the Road
Meanwhile, the vast majority of retailers take a central stance in regards to branding.

“You’ll find we’re middle of the road,” said Clayton Bieberfeld with County Line Nursery in Harleysville, Pa. “We’ve said this before: Thank goodness for plant branding. Because they [the marketers/growers] are the ones making plants a household name. They’ve actually taught us how to brand ourselves well.

“At the same time, we’re not necessarily all-out dedicated to promote people [brands] who can go in and out of business. Customers will always be coming in to us asking, ‘What do you recommend?’”

Bieberfeld said customer service and a store’s reputation trumps most branding efforts. A consumer might come in asking for Brand X petunias. But 9 times out of 10, they’ll go with another plant if it’s recommended by the garden center. What’s most important is an informed and enthusiastic salesperson.

It’s funny, Bieberfeld said, how the industry’s perception of branding has changed over the years. We still haven’t learned, it seems, that you can’t have it both ways.

“Years ago we wanted them [growers] to be partners with us,” he said. “Now we’re saying, maybe we don’t want you to after all.”