Savvy marketing feeds fertilizer sales

Discount Store News, April 5, 1999 by Debbie Howell

For Peters, the most growth has been in sales of plant food products. This year, the company is launching tomato and rose foods as well as a new liquid fertilizer. Also, new sizes of Super Bloom Booster and Acid Food have been added. All Peters products are now in resealable polybags or plastic containers.

Rounding out the major competitors in the business is Schultz Co., which reported record-setting sales for the first quarter. Liquid plant foods have been doing particularly well, said Bob Buck, vice president of marketing.

"The nice thing about liquids is it's easier, more convenient, it's portable," Buck said. "The concept of feed once and you're done is also garnering a lot of attention."

Schultz, which launched a series of outdoor liquid plant foods in 1997, added to its liquid line this year with Schultz Starter Plus, Rose Plus, Tomato Plus and Cactus Plus. Other new items are Takeroot Rooting Hormone and MultiCote Time-Release Plant Food. The MultiCote is a polymer-coated granular formula that feeds up to nine months with one application while Takeroot is a powder fertilizer product that aids growing plants from cuttings.

Like the other companies, Schultz has moved to plastic bottles or resealable canisters and polybags. Its plant food packages are among the most colorful of the companies surveyed, using sharp, eye-catching pictures of flowers.

In fertilizer spikes, Jobe's has also turned to plastic, packaging its products in weatherproof packets. Easy Gardener Inc. president Dick Grandy said the company has expanded its line to 11 products, including potted plant and hanging basket spikes and fertilizer plus insecticide spikes for potted plants.

"Sales are very good. The convenience trend is helping the sales of spikes," Grandy said, noting increased interest in potted plant products.

A smaller player in the fertilizer business, Green Light of San Antonio, Texas, has also been heavily promoting its all-weather displays and plastic-packaged plant foods. Bing McClellan, director of marketing, said while the company's five skus may seem minuscule compared to Scotts' estimated 30, he expects offering customers too many specialized plant foods may at some point backfire with oversaturation.

"I think you will see some consolidation in the product lines offered," McClellan said. "We have an internal joke here that we haven't introduced a banana nut tree spray yet."

Specialization has been one trend, but none of the major players seems very anxious to dabble in organic, chemical-free fertilizers, which are hard to find at retail.

Fertilizer representatives said while customers may like the concept, some organic products haven't performed as well, so they're keeping most of their focus on a sure thing--npk formulations, which they say are environmentally safe. The test may come in the success of Kmart's Martha Stewart Everyday gardening line, which includes six organic garden fertilizers manufactured by Pursell Industries of Alabama. (Pursell also makes the Vigoro brand of fertilizers.) The MSE organic fertilizer began shipping in February.