Different Ways To Sell Your Plants
If local zoning rules allow you to have a stand on your property, and you are near enough to a highway, you may be able to dispose of your plants yourself. Friends of ours have a very attractive redwood roadside stand where plants and garden supplies are sold exclusively. Their greenhouse, 20 by 18 feet, is attached to the stand, and on the land adjacent they grow roses, shrubs, and some perennials to sell.In their greenhouse—which they close down in winter and do not operate again until February—they raise all the annuals they sell. They also purchase geraniums and other plants like calceolaria, hydrangea, and fuchsia as unfinished stock for "growing on" (an old trade term for taking young plants and growing them for a period of weeks or months until they are mature specimens). Thus by Mother's Day my friends have gift plants large enough to sell for a good profit. Both husband and wife work in this shop and greenhouse which yields them a comfortable living plus a lengthy winter vacation.
Other friends raise annuals and tomatoes in their greenhouses and sell flats of them at a farmer's market. In their greenhouses the temperature is kept at a minimum of 60 degrees F. One woman with a lean-to greenhouse, 6 by 12 feet, grows tomatoes and annuals which she transfers to a cold frame when the weather warms up—usually in March. The tomato space is then taken over by hundreds of pots of Jerusalem cherries and ornamental peppers. From March on, the greenhouse needs but an occasional warm-up, and the heat goes off entirely around May first.
The peppers are started in flats and transplanted to 3-inch pots in which they grow until August, when the proprietor starts taking them to the farmer's market. Purchased singly, they sell for 59 to 69 cents per plant; in lots of ten or more at half that price. This woman's little greenhouse is a home made affair, the initial cost of which was under $300.00. It brings in an annual revenue of approximately $2500.00.
Mail-Order Business
Perhaps, like many greenhouse operators, you would prefer to sell by mail. With such a sales setup, you will not have to travel or interview people or have customers coming to your home. To carry on a successful mail-order business, you must grow something in general demand like geraniums, roses, iris, tender foliage plants, or daylilies, or specialize in collectors' plants, such as the newer or species types of African violets and other gesneriads, the cacti and succulents, fuchsias, amaryllis (hippeastrum), and other amaryllids, bromeliads, or orchids.In fact, the specialist grower will find the mail-order business perfect for him. Buying by mail-order often permits customers to obtain plants that their local greenhouses do not carry. The average retail greenhouse owner-operator in a small town usually is dependent for the bulk of his business on seasonal sales of popular plants and flowers. Seldom does he grow collectors' items. For example, he may carry half a dozen varieties of African violets while you, the specialist, list 75 to 100; or he may grow only one or two kinds of geraniums, while you can list 25 to 50 varieties. And, of course, gardeners living in large cities also are prospects for your unusual and extensive line of plants.
When you sell mail-order you will obtain many customers who do not have time to go to a greenhouse. They will appreciate being able to shop from an easy chair. You can of course be very successful using the internet. Many garden business have started and prosper this way.
