Features
BY LEADING WILD BIRD FOOD MANUFACTURER, HENRY BELL & CO In preparation for the arrival of spring, wild birds start nesting early in the year. Due to climate change, nesting is starting earlier than usual when the winter ground is still hard and natural food can be scarce. So, it is essential to support the wild birds by feeding them nourishing food for their egg development and to ensure young birds receive the right nourishment to grow. Henry Bell, shares their top tips on what to feed wild birds and their young during this time.
Henry Bell & Co is a fourth-generation family-owned…
It is safe to say 2020 was a big year for change, and that includes the DIY industry. With people entering the first lockdown in March 2020, the home and garden quickly became more than just a home, suddenly taking on additional roles such as office, gym and even a holiday resort in the summer months.
With people spending more time in their homes and with little else to do there was a huge increase in DIY projects. Google reported an 80% increase in searches for the term “DIY” in comparison to 2019.
At EnviroBuild we experienced a huge increase in demand over summer, with our customers…
We are nearly a year into the Covid-19 pandemic and its restrictions. It is needless to say that the virus caused an extreme effect on the garden retail industry with many stores forced to close several times during the different lockdowns. During these lockdowns, many consumers switched their spending to online platforms. Leading online marketing provider Garden Connect provides services to many garden centres to improve their online sales channels.
Rise of online sales
Surveys show the restrictions have sped up the changing shopping habits for customers. Edwin Meijer, marketing…
For over 30 years Protek have been manufacturing water- based timber treatments that are child, animal, bird, bee, and plant safe from their factory in Somerset. When everyone else was selling creosote (remember the smell and the industrial style gloves??!!!) they started selling water -based timber treatments. A breath of fresh air- literally.
Today the environment is still at the heart of their family business.
They are always looking for new ideas that could improve the wood stains and paints and that includes the packaging. In 2020 they moved 80% of the range into tins, which could…
After a successful first year, the brand and chartered horticulturalist will have a focus on Chelsea Flower Show and charity scheme, Cultivation Street
After a hugely successful first year, leading garden care brand Evergreen Garden Care (www.lovethegarden.com), has announced that it will continue working with Chartered Horticulturalist and TV Gardener, David Domoney.
One of the key calendar events this year will be the Chelsea Flower Show, where Evergreen Garden Care’s leading brand Miracle-Gro will sponsor David’s major exhibit, entitled ‘My Houseplant Changed My Life’ inspired from his…
Notcutts Garden Centres are proud to have partnered with national charity Thrive to help cultivate the nation’s wellbeing through gardening.
Launched just before the first UK wide lockdown in March 2020, the ‘Cultivating Wellbeing in Gardens and Nature’ course has been enjoyed by many – helping them to connect with nature and understand why being outdoors is so beneficial.
The free online course, developed by experts in therapeutic horticulture from Thrive, has been designed to encourage people to use their gardens to spend more time connecting with nature as a tool to restore wellbeing…
It doesn’t seem like five minutes since we were celebrating an unusual Christmas and New Year in our isolated ‘bubbles’ but, as January races to a close, gardeners and allotment holders everywhere have one big job building to mountainous proportions in their minds.
Stormy winter rain, wind and snow might be upon us now, but nature waits for no-one and the time for us to pull on our gardening gloves and wellies will be here before you can say “dead leaves on my lawn”.
Faced with such a big job, green-minded folk everywhere are keen to start clearing away all this winter debris to make…
As spring approaches and gardeners start thinking about their gardens again, garden retailers will be pleased to learn that there is a new brand of high-quality organic topsoil launching to the UK market; a brand which is set to change the way we think about this often-neglected product offering – introducing The Real Soil Company.
The Real Soil Company - previously known as EcoGro SuperSoil - has been brought to market by the team behind Boughton Loam Ltd, leading suppliers of soils, seeds and substrates to the amenity, landscape and construction industries since 1985. Aimed at the…
Searches for ‘indoor plants’, ‘best plants to keep indoors’ and ‘easy houseplants’ have all spiked since the start of the pandemic, and there has been a 402% rise in the number of people searching for Chinese Money Plants over the past few years.
Originating from Southwest China, The Chinese Money Plant - or Pilea Peperomioides - is a perfect home office addition, said to bring good luck, money, prosperity and hope to the owner.
The research, from homeware retailer Sass & Belle, also shows the growing popularity of plants including Aglaonema (+340%), Peperomia (+317%) and ZZ Plant (+313…
Carpe Lumen photography offers a large range of greetings cards and prints from a substantial portfolio which means that as well as standard ranges we can offer bespoke cards for clients; where your organisation has a number of outlets, we can offer exclusivity on images. We can also shoot requests; if you have your own ideas you would like us to develop, we can do our best to create those designs.
With all photography by Ed Crispin, the range is coherent but hugely varied. Ed has been a photographer for over twenty years, selling prints throughout that time and working in a variety of…
Nestled on the North Norfolk coast in the picturesque village of Cley next the Sea you’ll find Red Hare Publishing, a small but growing independent business, supporting British artists and manufacturers.
Red Hare is the sister company of the long-established and much respected Pinkfoot Gallery, also based in Cley. The gallery, founded over fifteen years ago, has been representing well-known British artists since its inception, including names such as Robert Gillmor, the grandfather of British wildlife art and creator of the RSPB logo. The collaboration between these two companies allows…
Here at Amica we are all about beautiful, handmade and Fair Trade felt.
We offer a variety of collections including Christmas & Easter decorations, toys and a home accessory range. All products are designed by the team at our studio in Bristol, then made with great skill and to the highest quality by a fantastic team of craftspeople in Nepal.
With Christmas at the centre of our product offering, we sell a whole host of characters from our gorgeous Fox Terrier, trusty Black Labrador and traditional Reindeer to our more exotic Christmas Guinea Pig, Mr. Fox & the very popular…
A resurgence of interest in domestic lawns coupled with the stay-at-home-culture arising from the Covid-19 pandemic is set to drive sales of lawn seed via DIY and hardware channels in 2021, according to Johnsons Lawn Seed – the UK’s oldest grass seed supplier.
With Covid cases on the rise across the UK and a new three-tier system of lockdowns coming into operation, hardware outlets have so far benefitted from being classified as essential retail if the toughest restrictions are brought back into force – allowing consumers to readily access lawn care products if other outlets are forced to…
Peter Worrall & Benjamin Millward, specialists in commercial debt recovery at Moore Barlow, discuss the dangers of weak supply chains and how to avoid contractual disputes…
For businesses in the gardening industry, interruptions caused by Covid-19 to the normally thriving sector have made 2020 one of the most unpredictable years ever for this billion-pound contributor to the UK economy. The horticultural industry was predicted to be wiped out at the start of lockdown, but is now picking back up again as consumers turn to home and garden renovations.
Some sectors within the chain may…
We’ve cracked it! The perfect stocking filler this Christmas, to tick all the boxes, is the daft and hilarious Bewilderbeest Wild Bites calendar. Light and flat to post, the calendar will hang on the wall all year round, and will bring a smile (or at least an eye-roll over a bad joke) every day.
Finding thoughtful and memorable gifts will be on people’s minds more than ever this year, as it may not be possible to meet with friends and family in the usual way this Christmas. Something unusual, with a decent dollop of humour thrown in, will be just the ticket to spread a little festive cheer…
Spike Leisurewear launched their collection of officially licensed socks in 2018. The range has grown steadily and now includes a large selection of branded designs, including The Beatles, Doctor Who, Mr Bean and Only Fools and Horses.
Socks sell well in gift shops across the country and a particular area of growth has been in garden centres. They are an inexpensive, fun present for birthdays, Father’s Day and Christmas, retailing at around £5.00 a pair.
Who are Spike Leisurewear?
Spike Leisurewear has been trading since 1987 in the UK gift sector. Our primary products are t-shirts,…