Sabine, what is the goal of "plants? easy!"?
Sabine Benger: The average age of garden centre customers is usually over 50. On the other hand, we have been observing the trend of urban gardening for some years now, which has led many young people to take a new look at plants and gardening. The «Grüne Profis», an association of 24 garden centres in Switzerland, uses the "plants? easy!" concept to ensure that this new, young audience finds its way into the specialist garden centre. Because so far this target group likes to buy plants at IKEA or online. What a specialist garden centre has to offer is hardly known. In order to turn these young people into customers in the long term, is therefore important to seize the opportunity now and create a targeted approach.
What exactly can young people expect at www.plants-easy.ch?
Sabine Benger: This new target group often thinks plants are great, but has no experience with them. To ensure that the joy of gardening continues after the purchase of the plant, success is crucial. After all, there is nothing more frustrating than when a freshly purchased plant dies after just a few days. The plant professionals have therefore selected the ten easiest-to-care-for varieties of all houseplants and herbs. A short portrait explains the most important facts about each plant. Sometimes there are quite extensive groups of plants, such as cacti and succulents, where the beginner will find a huge abundance in the garden centre despite a limited choice of plants. We have chosen short videos to explain the most important points about care. A young couple, as an example for the target group, shows what you need to know in an easy-to-understand and entertaining way. So, on one hand, we have a classification of plants with their description and on the other hand, the most important tips on care are summarised in a short and concise way. In 15 minutes, every beginner becomes a plant expert - and has fun doing it.
What about the costs? A project like this can get expensive very quickly...
Sabine Benger: By pooling the resources of the whole group, much more can be achieved with the same effort. Let's take the videos which show the young target group how easy plant care is. On one hand the production would be very expensive for a single garden centre, on the other hand, the scattering loss would also be very large. The fact that a whole group is behind it means that the costs are shared and the proximity to the customer is given because the green professionals can be found throughout German and French-speaking Switzerland.
How is the concept marketed?
Sabine Benger: In advertising, we rely on a close linking of joint measures of the whole group with individual measures of each garden centre. This requires some coordination so that the advertising is received in a concerted manner despite the 24 participants. Analogue and digital possibilities are linked. Of course, the design of the POS is also important making sure that the people coming to the garden centre can find what they have seen online.
Thank you very much for the enlightening conversation.