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More GCA Fashion in Bloom coverage posted

More sneak peeks from GCA's Fashion in Bloom 2007 have been posted. Check out this slideshow with some of the highlights.

-- Sarah

Gift and Home Channel makes online debut

Gift and Home Channel, an online community for independent retailers, launched this week with a series of short video segments. More than 200 episodes are available discussing a wide range of topics including customer service, visual merchandising, accounting basics and electronic marketing.

Much of the content comes from other successful retailers. Retailers must sign up for a free membership to access content on the Gift and Home Channel.

-- Sarah

Scotts, TerraCycle settle lawsuit

The Scotts Co. and TerraCycle, a small vermicompost manufacturer, have agreed to settle a legal dispute regarding false advertising claims and trade dress infringement. According to a statement from Scotts, TerraCycle has agreed to change certain advertising claims and its package design, and Scotts has agreed to dismiss the lawsuit.

TerraCycle will also shut down SuedbyScotts.com, a Web site the company set up initially disputing Scotts’ claims. Advertising Age reported (registration/subscription required) that legal costs were beginning to weigh down TerraCycle, which is struggling with its school-based bottle collection and recycling program.

Students collect used soda bottles that the company uses to package its product. The program has been enormously successful, resulting in surplus packaging and increasing costs for the company. TerraCycle is launching a new, modified program to deal with the problem.

--Sarah

Retailers push Halloween early

Retailers and consumer media outlets have begun touting Halloween right after Labor Day, The New York Times reported. The holiday has gained importance in the past few years, as more adults join in the festivities.

-- Sarah

Home Depot to close Landscape Supply outlets

Home Depot will close its 11 Landscape Supply stores in Georgia and Texas, the Atlanta Business Chronicle reported. The doors will close by Nov. 19.

Home Depot spokesperson Ron DeFeo told the paper that the company can serve landscape supply customers at its traditional stores.

-- Sarah

A haunting (for pumpkins) I go.

We’re heading into the home stretch now. Pumpkin stands litter the roadside from here to all four points; they’re overflowing in grocery store bins and garden centers have artful displays to tempt you.

My son and I have debated the different types of pumpkins and in the end, I conceded we’d get one that has a smooth and large carving surface, good roundness and a tall stem for easy lid-lifting. I have no idea what variety it will be, though. The perils of pumpkin shopping with a kid.

One thing we do know is that we’re going to carve this one into an artistic manifesto that will make trick-or-treaters weep with joy at its beauty. OK, or not. We’ll give it a good try. Helping us out will be that most magnificent of tricks – the pre-planned pattern.

Now the only thing to do is find which pattern to use. Yikes, I sense another long debate coming on. He always goes for the ghoulish and flaming eyeballs. Or spiders <shudder>. Me, I like the trompe l’oeil aspect. The subject matter doesn’t drive me as much (except spiders. Did I say eww, already?)

Pumpkin Masters is one of my favorites. They have always had easy-to-follow patterns and our designs come out good. Another good resource of patterns is The Pumpkin Wizard.

So what’s it going to be this year? A haunted house? Goblins and trees? Frankenstein with spooky, crazy eyes?

Hmm, why not all three?

Happy carving!

-- Jennifer

From Fashion In Bloom: I’ll drink to that

DAVIDSONVILLE, MD. – “Here, try this,” David Wilson said as he thrust a cup full of bright-orange liquid in my hand.

It was a curious drink called mango lassi, which Wilson explained is from the Punjab region of India. The taste was definitely mango, and the texture was almost like a yogurt smoothie. But it wasn’t the drink’s taste or texture that Wilson was emphasizing here at Fashion In Bloom. It was the drink’s color – which coincidentally or not was the exact same as one of the new flower varieties that Overdevest Nurseries was showing.

Geum ‘Mango Lassi’ was named by its discoverer, Grace Dinsdale of Blooming Nursery in Oregon, who recognized the flower’s color as an exact replica of the Indian drink.

Excellent for mixed borders, this geum works well near the front of beds, or massed in lightly shaded, woodland settings. The perennial (Zone 5) is perfect for cottage garden settings. It’s one of nine Garden Splendor Showcase Plants for 2008.

-- Kevin

From Fashion In Bloom: Native beauties branch out

DAVIDSONVILLE, MD. – Prides Corner Farms’ American Beauties program continues to gain stature.

Tim Kane said at last week’s Fashion In Bloom event that the natives-based program is adding new varieties and new growers and is garnering some impressive p.r.

The program allows independent retailers to establish a store within a store with outstanding point-of-purchase materials, benching and merchandise support. Prides Corner in turn donates 25, 50 or 75 cents, depending on container size, to the National Wildlife Federation for each plant you sell, to fund the group’s habitat work and outreach programs.

Kane said Midwest Groundcovers has signed on as a participating grower, and as all growers tend to do, is tweaking the mix to reflect regional preferences. “They’re growing 25 to 30 percent of what Prides Corner is growing,” he said. “It’s more focused on Chicago and the Upper Midwest gardeners’ preferences.”

Meanwhile, HGTV plans to film a segment on American Beauties at Behnke’s Nursery, focusing on a landscape renovation project for one of Benke’s customers.

-- Kevin

Colorado adopts a sustainable mentality

Larry Martin, the driving force behind Branch-Smith Publishing’s All-Industry Horticultural Product Directory shares some signs of sustainability he saw during a road trip through Colorado.

Colorado -- the great land of the Rocky Mountains. Ever since this planet was created, these massive heaves in the Earth's crust have stood as sentinels of the awesome power represented in the force that must have been exerted in bringing this planet into being.

For centuries, these rugged peaks, along with the resulting valleys, teamed with life -- from the smallest of one-celled animals and plants living and reproducing in the small water pools in the rocky crags, to the mighty beasts and beautiful flora that once covered the land.

Then came man! During the last 200 years, these great lands have been gouged with mines, dynamited for tunnels, excavated for roads and highways and trampled by millions of tourists.

And nature has suffered for it. The delicate ecological balance has been threatened with destruction.

Thankfully, during the last couple of years, forest rangers and others involved in the preservation of the dwindling wildernesses, have begun a new philosophy that is sprouting up everywhere -- SUSTAINABILITY!

We recently took a road trip through Colorado, and noticed a very interesting trend. From the lowest valley to the highest peaks, there are now signs -- big, beautiful, colorful signs -- making tourists aware of the need to preserve the area. The signs also inform tourists of what the authorities are doing to make sure that wildlife and plant life will flourish in the centuries to come.

Here is one of the signs, and some photos of the struggling seedlings and other examples of nature being protected.

Everyone must take a personal responsibility, using every means at our disposal, to ensure that plant life and animal life in the world is sustained.

-- Larry Martin

From GCA's Fashion In Bloom: Bailey stands behind its roses

JENNERSVILLE, PA. –The marketing folks at Bailey Nurseries know that roses can be a tough sell to the younger crowd who considers gardening to be too much work and too time-consuming. So they’re stepping out on a limb and introducing a two-year guarantee on the Easy Elegance Rose Collection beginning next spring.

“We did a consumer focus group of generation X and Y, and roses are off their radar,” Bailey brand manager Jonathan Pedersen said. “They call them Grandma’s plant and say they don’t have the time to spray and care for roses.

“As an industry, we need to change that,” Pedersen said. “Knock Out roses are helping to change that to a degree. But we’re going a step further with this two-year guarantee. We’re saying that we as a company believe in roses.”

The Bailey guarantee – essentially a manufacturer’s warranty – is above and beyond whatever guarantee the local retailer puts on an Easy Elegance rose.

The three newest members of the collection – All the Rage, My Girl and Super Hero – were displayed for the first time at Fashion In Bloom.

-- Kevin

Pictured: Jonathan Pederson, Bailey Nurseries