Sacramento Digs Gardening Article
Your resource for Sacramento-area gardening news, tips and events

Articles Recipe Index Keyword Index Calendar Twitter Facebook Instagram About Us Contact Us

Garden trend for 2019: Get real, says Burpee chairman

Sacramento Digs Gardening
BY Debbie Arrington PUBLISHED JAN 11, 2019

George Ball, chairman of Burpee Seeds, says authenticity is the trend in gardening. (Photo: Dean Fosdick of Associated Press, courtesy Burpee)

Relevance appeals to millennials as well as boomers – as does fun

Burpee Seeds’ George Ball, the man who keeps a 143-year-old brand relevant, sees 2019 as a year of opportunity for the gardening industry.

“This is a decisive period of time,” Ball said in a phone interview. “It’s critical, both in terms of demographics and technology.”

Ball bases his prediction on two major gardening audiences: boomers and millennials.

“Our big challenge: One is fading out while the other is fading in,” he observed.

Right now, those trends are converging in a way where gardening appeals to both groups.

“In gardening, we’ve reached an absolute sweet spot,” said Ball, 67. “It’s time to really go forward and go for us aging baby boomers – I’m one. But even more crucial, we need to go for the up-and-coming gardeners, the millennials.”

In the digital age, gardeners of all ages can be overwhelmed by information, he added. Some topics -- chemical use, plant breeding, changing weather – add to uncertainty.

What people forget is gardening should be fun.

“In gardening, the B.S. is over; that’s what will be different this year,” he said. “Go back to traditional plant breeding, seeds that grow and gardens that work. Gardening is about playing. That’s why we garden.”

Boomers and millennials equally like to play, Ball added. But the key to reaching both audiences comes down to relevance.

Burpee's tomato seeds include a Baby Boomer

cherry variety. It's the red cherry lower right. (Photo:

Kathy Morrison)

“Baby boomers grew up inventing relevance,” he said. “That’s been passed on to millennials. They think they live, breathe, eat relevance.”

As Burpee’s ambassador as well as chairman, Ball finds himself surrounded by millennial gardeners in their 20s and early 30s. The question he gets asked often: “Are you real?”

“There’s this whole authenticity thing,” he said. “But gardening is about as real as it gets.”

He gets questions about GMOs. (Burpee doesn't sell any GMOs and breeds its plants the old-fashioned way.) Heirlooms vs. hybrids? (“Some heirlooms are really great, but others are not starters,” Ball said.)

“I’m a plant scientist,” he said. “Traditional plant breeding is just coaxing out of the gene pool what wants to get out.”

Sometimes it’s golden orange cherry tomatoes that taste like honey drops (called Honeycomb). Others, it’s wine-purple speckled striped petunias (Starry Sky). They’re among dozens of introductions in Burpee’s new 2019 catalog ( www.burpee.com ). More on those new plants and many more next week.

Meanwhile, Ball urges gardeners – and garden companies – to see the real fun in gardening.

“I felt last year was a sea change,” he said. “We got away from the B.S. The trend now is to keep it real.”

Comments

0 comments have been posted.

GENERAL GARDENING

An article about gardening.

Keywords:

hybrids seeds gardening heirlooms Sacramento planting seed catalogs plants Burpee Seeds garden trends GMOs

Newsletter Subscription

Sacramento Digs Gardening to your inbox.

Taste Summer! E-cookbook

Find our summer recipes here!

Thanks to Our Sponsor!

Local News

Taste Spring! E-cookbook

Find our spring recipes here!

Sites We Like

Garden Checklist for week of July 21

Your garden needs you!

* Keep your vegetable garden watered, mulched and weeded. Water before 8 a.m. to reduce the chance of fungal infection and to conserve moisture.

* Feed vegetable plants bone meal, rock phosphate or other fertilizers high in phosphate to stimulate more blooms and fruiting. (But wait until daily high temperatures drop out of the 100s.)

* Don’t let tomatoes wilt or dry out completely. Give tomatoes a deep watering two to three times a week.

* Harvest vegetables promptly to encourage plants to produce more. Squash especially tends to grow rapidly in hot weather. Keep an eye on zucchini.

* Pinch back chrysanthemums for bushy plants and more flowers in September.

* Remove spent flowers from roses, daylilies and other bloomers as they finish flowering.

* Pinch off blooms from basil so the plant will grow more leaves.

* Cut back lavender after flowering to promote a second bloom.

* It's not too late to add a splash of color. Plant petunias, snapdragons, zinnias and marigolds.

* From seed, plant corn, pumpkins, radishes, winter squash and sunflowers.

Taste Fall! E-cookbook

Find our fall recipes here!

Taste Winter! E-cookbook

Find our winter recipes here!