Ravin’ Traven: Finding Long-Term Solutions
July 2, 2008 
Each week, wholesale grower Lloyd Traven of Peace Tree Farm in Pennsylvania sends out an engaging and highly opinionated rant to his garden center customers along with the most current availability, order forms and pictures of plants in the greenhouse. Here is his most recent rant, written after two weeks on the road at various industry events.
June 24–Searching For Long-Term Solutions
From what we hear going on all over the place right now, it reminds me of the music they always play when the emperor and Darth Vader appear in Star Wars–”Dump, dump, dump, dump da-dump”. We’ve heard of growers tossing ACRES of decent material. Is this some weird alignment of the economic planets, some basic flaw in the economic model of our industry, a response to gas prices and consumer fear? Do we just have the WRONG product? For sure, I don’t have an easy solution, but we’d better figure this out fast–or nobody will hear this rant!!!!
I spent a good portion of the last two weeks traveling to different areas of the country (Southwest, Southeast and Florida) giving presentations. Many of them were on sustainability. While there, I was in front of a group called North American Horticultural Supply Association (NAHSA), the folks who sell and deliver around 90 percent of ALL the hard goods we all buy. They’re reeling as bad as we are. In fact, they are AHEAD of us–their prices go up before ours. Then, I went to the Southeast Greenhouse Conference. We have it great compared to them; we CANNOT blame the weather and drought for our issues.
Folks who sell to the box stores are backed up, too, because the boxes aren’t moving the merchandise. The ANLA and GCA tours were this past week, and their numbers were WAY DOWN on attendees and the consensus from everywhere was a very soft “THE SKY IS FALLING, THE SKY IS FALLING.”
There are some things we CAN do about this, but it’s NOT a short-term fix. What we really need is long-term solutions. There is an exceptional new voice speaking through the haze, bringing wisdom and clarity to confusion through FACT and ANALYSIS. Please, I urge you all to find him, listen and start to adapt NOW, because our industry is at a critical stage. I have no intention to fade away, and I hate the thought that any of you would lie down and accept this as inevitable.
The man to find is Charlie Hall, the Ellison Chair at Texas A&M, tasked specifically with market and economic analysis relating to floriculture production. Charlie GETS IT!!! The key thing, for all of us, is that those of us who DIFFERENTIATE from everyone will be the THRIVERS, and that those who do the same old same old will get the same old results, the same old price and the same old ending. Notice this has NOTHING to do with pricing, quality or branding–in fact, it is just the opposite way of doing things. Price is WAY DOWN on the list of customer decision-makers, quality only gets you a seat at the table (it all has to be good) and national branding just means you sell the same stuff as your neighbor.
Selling a different product packaged beautifully, in a clean and inviting setting, with people who are happy to help the customer select fresh product is called an EXPERIENCE, and that is what sells your products.
DIFFERENTIATION and FOCUS: This is what we’ve always been known for, and somehow it just feels right now that we have lost sight of that here at Peace Tree. Yeah, sure, we’re STILL the herb people, and we’re the folks with the cool begonias, but maybe we’ve been concentrating too much on NUMBERS and EFFICIENCY and PROGRAMS instead of remembering our roots, what got us here. Cool new stuff, grown beautifully, stuff that makes you say, “Wow, that’s neat.” Well, we see the light, NOW we know what to do to get the MOJO back. Come along with us, let’s all make it happen together.
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