IGC Show unveils new ‘IGC Retail Lab’ interactive design forum

Chicago, IL – IGC Show organizers are unveiling IGC Retail Lab, a new 3,500-square-foot retail symposium and interactive design forum, right on the trade show floor this August 13-15 at Lakeside. The lab is in collaboration with Garden Center Makeover Expert Judy Sharpton. IGC Show attendees will discover how to incorporate modern gathering spaces in their stores that sell to consumer demand in four key trend areas. The IGC Retail Lab’s TED-Talk-style discussions and merchandising demonstrations are free and open to all attendees daily on the trade show floor.

Using both models based on existing gathering spaces at independent garden centers and interactive planning consultations, Sharpton will demonstrate the products that support each of these four trend focuses. She will also include how to merchandise them for maximum profitability inside store gathering spaces and on the sales floor. The trend focuses are as follows:

IGC Trend Focus 1: ReWild

The new ecologists among young customers are reinventing garden centers’ approach to environmental stewardship with a local focus. It’s more than pollinators, but it starts there. You’ll visit a butterfly house, and learn how to bring “the wild” back into customers’ gardens.

IGC Trend Focus 2: ReTurn

The garden has always been a place of provenance, bringing memories of plants from grandmother’s garden like the vegetable patch or fresh-picked strawberries for hand-churned ice cream. You’ll reconnect with the plants and products that take you back to a simpler time and get inspired to sell that same sense of nostalgia to your customers.

IGC Trend Focus 3: ReJuvenate

Independent garden centers are places where tech-stressed customers come to wander among the greenery and “smell the roses.” Find out how your product mix can help rejuvenate your customers, and how to merchandise these refreshing sellers for a uniquely pleasurable shopping experience that distinguishes your store from the rest.

IGC Trend Focus 4: ReTreat

Just as your customers desire rejuvenation, they seek retreat. From forest bathing to monastic centers, the demand for solitude has grown alongside the emergence of constant connectivity. Your customers envision their garden as a place to retreat, where birdsong and water are the only sounds they hear. Help them turn their unique visions of retreat into reality.  

The IGC Retail Lab concept takes store gathering spaces to the next level of profitability for IGC Show attendees.

“The purpose is not to create just fun places where somebody can come and have a wedding,” Sharpton says, “but to create a way to actually sell product in these gathering spaces by communicating the trends.”

IGC Show’s trade show, three keynotes, and Wednesday’s concert featuring Starship are all free if you register here.