Why Throw Away Plants That Just Need Water ?- My Plant Shopping Rant

Let’s pitch out the plants that wilted from no water. Let’s pitch the plants whose blooms have faded. Let’s pitch a plant whose leaves are torn. Let’s pitch a plant just because we can. I am sorry but I have to vent with a plant shopping rant!

My daughter and I have been doing some plant shopping lately. It is really cold here in Ohio, for most days, so not really a good time to buy and take some home, but we like to go out and see what’s there and imagine what we are going to be doing when it is warm enough.

But as you will see in a video I am sharing, it is so heartbreaking when we come across some of the plants that are being discarded or trashed ( I don’t truly know what is done with them since I have never worked there). Maybe they are all shipped back to the nurseries? I doubt that because why ship “dead” plants and go to all that expense. But who knows?

If you are someone who has worked in these areas at one time or another, I would love to hear your input. Please put in the comments here or over on YouTube under my video for everyone to read and state their opinions.

My Plant Shopping Rant – Throwing It Out!

This is so wasteful and shameful when this is done. All the time and energy taken to grow the plant and get it to a sell-worthy stage is entirely wiped out when the plant is just discarded. At the least, mark it way down and see if it can be sold. Some of us dedicated gardeners and houseplant growers don’t mind spending some TLC and restoring these plants to their former beauty.

Don’t you consider it very rewarding when it can be done? I sure do.

Another Plant Rant – Mark Downs That Are Ridiculous!

Can I complain about the prices of marked-down plants? Some stores do sell their “damaged” plants, but the prices sometimes are not reflective of the worth of the plant itself. It is nice to get a $30 plant for half price. But the effort and time that is needed to get it recovered is sad. It would seem to me that marking the price down as the plant ages on the shelf would be better.

For instance, if a plant is $8.99 when it is first set out all beautiful and fresh, why couldn’t it be marked to $5.99 so it can be sold before it actually starts to go downhill?  I am sure there are regulations from the suppliers about what can and cannot be done in these stores, but let’s not let all these plants go to waste.

The service workers in the stores are not really to blame when they are hosing down the succulent section every day just like they do the hostas and ferns in the other row. You know what I mean. I am sure that one day he or she works in the plumbing department stocking the shelves and the next day is assigned to the garden area. They are just told to water. So they do.

What a waste of all the effort the growers took to get these plants out to us!

Plant Shopping Trip Turns Into Plant Rant! Why Let These Plants Die?

I Call The Markdowns “Death Row”

Most plants that we see in these racks for markdown are really the Death Row for these plants. Actually for some of them it is the Morgue. They are dead and just sitting there waiting for the compost pile. ( Well, no, not really. They are just put in the trash dumpster, correct?) Such a shame. I really feel this goes on at some of the Big Box garden centers, but unfortunately at the private ones also.  Is there truly no money in mark-downs?

It is just so wasteful.

Is throwing a plant away and then writing it off as a loss the way most of these stores operate? Is it a tax reduction if counted as a loss? I have no idea.

I have heard that the store gives its nursery where they have purchased the stock something called a “Certificate of Destruction” to swear that they have destroyed the plant so that they can be credited back the cost from that plant vendor. Must be the reason that some stores will NOT mark down their plants.

There just has to be a better way of doing business.

Rant over.