Belgian Mums Newsletter March 2015
Dear customers and brokers,
I have to admit that I really enjoyed one of the articles in the December issue of the Greenhouse
Grower magazine written by Chad Underwood. I couldn't agree more when he wrote that the quality of
the garden mums offered for sale by large retailers here in US is often very mediocre. Chad gave
compelling reasons for declining quality but concentrated mainly on shipping issues as a leading cause
of product damage and shrinkage in retail. He also presented some very accurate and convincing
calculations which showed that one could ship the same number of garden mums on 4 racks and make
the same profit as if they were delivered on 5 racks but in perfect shape. How could that be, you might
ask? Apparently, plants loaded on 4 racks were jammed together and broke apart while being delivered
to the store. As a result the quality suffered, customers weren't happy, the store manager was upset
and the sell-through was only 70%. This is one of the cases when more on the rack is not necessarily
better or more profitable.
I see numerous garden mum crops throughout US and Canada each year and the quality at the
production site doesn't often correspond with the quality at retail. Something unfortunate happens to
our garden mums between loading on carts in the greenhouse and displaying them on shelves at
garden centers. As much as I like to see perfect plants only delivered to the stores it is up to the
individual grower to decide how many garden mums to ship on each rack and which varieties to
choose. I believe that this quality issue will eventually correct itself, those growers who can deliver
good quality will eventually replace those that supply quantity only.
We should seriously look into improving the quality of garden mums that are being offered to our
customers if we want to grow this market. Fortunately for us this is one of the crops that doesn't even
require digging in the ground so even the young generation unaccustomed to yard work might consider
displaying few pots around the house without much effort.
Figure 1.
Staviski Yellow displayed at a
garden center.
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Some growers always say that garden mums are the least profitable crop they have and continue to
treat it as the unwanted child. I think it's time to make an effort and elevate this crop to the higher level
and change the way we think of garden mums. Perhaps we should assume for a moment that each
plant we produce goes to the auction and has to be absolutely perfect and in stage one, packaged in a
sleeve with no breakage. Would that make us think twice before loading anything questionable on the
rack? It seems to work in Holland, of course they have many other problems and the auction system is
not ideal but the quality of plants being sold there was close to perfect.
So how are they able to do this? I had a chance to
ask some of the largest growers in Holland and the
answer was: “we stick with genetics that ensure the
best post harvest quality at retail”, Growers said that
Gediflora was able to deliver families like Staviski,
Jasoda and now Mefisto that outperform other
varieties on the market. It starts with uniformity;
imagine every single plant exactly the same with a
perfect rounded shape and all colors ready on time
as scheduled, no delays, no surprises. And yes, these
varieties are very flexible and ship better so growers are able to deliver better quality to the stores.
Rene den Hoed who is the sales representative for Gediflora in Holland said that it took several years
for the growers to switch to these new varieties. They tested small quantities at first, asked questions,
compared and by now 90% of their production consist of Jasoda and Staviski. It has to be good and we
are seeing the same trend here in US and Canada by now.
So let's make our garden mums pretty and appealing and they will too become a profitable crop.
Figure 2 - 3 - 4: Uniform Jasodas sleeved with no shrinkage in production area
Bernard Chodyla (Gediflora US-Canada)
Sales & Technical Support
[email protected]
850-445-2591
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