...start selling ideas

It now seems that if plant retailers are to move their static plant sales in a positive direction they’ve got to stop selling plants altogether; or at least take a radically different sales approach

. That was one of the core messages delivered by Jo Reed at the recent Plants for Lifestyle event, hosted by the Flower Council of Holland and held over three days in a rented house in Rotterdam.

“We wanted to deliver something different,” explained a typically energised Jo, “and decided to use the house to communicate our message as it provided us with an innovative backdrop that directly related to the end use of plant products.” Split over four floors, the rented property had been decorated, merchandised and arranged to within an inch of its life. With dedicated rooms set up for different sections of the market and a multitude of inspirational ideas to draw from, the week of hard work put in to make it happen certainly seemed to pay off.

Delivering his opening presentation, Jo drew attention to many of the issues that are contributing to poor plant and cut flower sales. Highlighting the fact that most plant displays are managed and merchandised by horticulturalists, who typically have no marketing experience and know little of what today’s customer really wants, he stated that the first step towards increasing plant sales is bridging the information deficit between the merchandiser and what the consumer is really looking for. “Lets face it,” exclaimed Jo, “today’s plant buying consumer is a woman. Retailers need to recognise this and focus their energies towards delivering the right message.” Detailing the results of a number of recent studies on consumer trends, Jo went on to describe the characteristics of the modern female buyer. “Buying patterns have changed, people have far more money in their pockets today and are far more impulsive,” he said.

Adopting a lateral approach, he asked the attendees to momentarily discard their perceptions of how we sell plants and take a hypothetical walk through some familiar female buying environments. “What are women buying when they go into a clothes shop?” he asked. “They may well be taking an item to the checkout, but the fact is they are buying far more than what they picked of the rack.” Illustrating his ideas with a number of slides, Jo described how the female consumer is buying into an entire package; a story, a message that reaffirms an existing perception of self-image within society or a lifestyle ambition. Far from the bargain hunter of yesteryear, who’d spend hours rifling through the reduced-to-clear bin, the modern consumer is cash rich, time poor, style conscious and wants a lot more than perceived added value. “We’ve got to forget about added value and concentrate on added appeal,” said Jo.

So where are Irish retailers when it comes to effective merchandising? Apart from a couple of innovative garden centres, the majority of plant retailers seem content to either coral their plant displays in some far flung corner – horticulturalists standing guard, armed to the teeth with secatuears and botanical Latin – or merchandised along with the spuds and broccoli. Worse still, most displays are usually so densely packed that the most important element of plant sales, the communication of a plant’s aesthetic quality, is lost in a jungle of foliage and fenced off with fear inducing, multi-lingual labels that feature scary botanical names. So what are retailer to do?

“The starting point for retailers is to first understand the needs and the wants of the modern consumer,” explained Jo. “She doesn’t need a houseplant or for that matter a horticulturalist. She wants a story that communicates a lifestyle message. And she needs to be told why to buy.” Utilising a number of labels and posters, Jo illustrated how the use of short story and tag lines, when used with potent visual imagery, can provide powerful incentives to draw consumers in. “Retailers need to have a firm grasp of what is informing her decision process,” he went on. “Packaging and presentation represent the most dominant force guiding purchase decisions, followed swiftly by core lifestyle messages.” While price is still a contender in buying decisions, a greater emphasis on packaging, presentation and message can reduce the price impact to almost nothing.

Not one to stand still for too long, Jo enthusiastically led the event attendees through the various stage sets, where the core messages of ‘stop selling plants and start selling lifestyle’ were put into practise. Within the garden centre room, plants were adorned with vibrant, eye-catching labels that might at first appearance be more at home in a High Street shop. Wellbeing, Detox, I Clean the Air, were just a few of the snappy tag lines set against abstract lifestyle imagery. “Indoor plants,” exclaimed Jo. “Who, apart from the occasional horticulturalist, is going to be attracted by a label that shouts that? Retailers need to communicate in a language that people speak.” Drawing attention to the use of colourful shelf strips, Jo asked why retailers seem to have stopped utilising them; he didn’t get an answer. In addition to the use of strong lifestyle messages to underpin appropriate packing, Jo extolled the virtues of providing sufficient space to maximise the visual impact of plants and labels while also exploiting context and associative products to help communicate the idea of a complete style package. Gone are the days of lumping a Dracaena in with a bag of Golden Wonders. To increase your plant sales you’ve got to build upon the concepts epitomised by the likes of Ikea.

So are we to stop selling plants? I think so. As plant lovers and horticulturalists we can all too often have a narrow view of how best to sell them. Do you think Nike and Coca Cola are selling trainers and fizzy pop? I don’t think so. Do you think the people buying Innocent drinks are buying puréed fruit? Not on your nelly. they’re buying into a lifestyle concept that frees them from guilt, makes them appear like they’ve got an empathy for their fellow man and allows them to have the perception that they are striking out at the evil corporate empires. How on earth do they get all that into a small plastic bottle? They do it by understanding and exploiting the fact that, for the modern consumer, the story and perceived ideals that surround a product are far more important than the product itself. So get out there and start selling lifestyle ideals.