Just about everyone I have talked to this spring has said the same thing to me. They have all said, “This has been a weird spring.”
No one knows what to make of how spring turned out. Some folks are up and some are down. Spring started early for just about everyone then chopped off around the end of April. But this happened last year too. We started early then got shut down with rain the last two weeks of April. The spring before that it snowed the third week of March but sales shut down after Mother’s Day.
I have suggested that “weird” is the new normal for us. We can’t plan for weird, but we can do our best to roll with it and make the best of it. Vegetable sales leveled off this spring which suggests that even though a lot of new gardeners got burned out last year, they are still trying again but not increasing their gardens. Perennial sales are climbing again. We see perennials go through cyclical sales with peaks and valleys.
I am concerned that the early start and early stop this spring will be detrimental to IGC sales this year in a year that a lot of people were needing to be outstanding.
Our plant selection is starting to thin out but we still have a good selection of summer annuals, deco pots and hanging baskets to keep your inventory looking fresh.