Hi,
More fun winter project progress. The concrete path stippling has turned out to be quite a long process when you have 36 very long tunnels. We are just over half way, so hopefully another week will see it through. Really pleased with the results, the grip effect is very noticeable, in fact I suspect it must have nearly reached the point where the path H&S guidance moves from a slip hazard to a trip hazard! Sweeping up may not be so easy, but at least my mind has been put to rest on the staff and visitor tumbling front.
I have signed off all but the last handful of new pot label designs, so production of those is imminent, new water filters have been installed in each production tunnel, 1,200 new mini sprinklers have replaced the malfunctioning old ones and most of our wooden trays are now cleaned and stacked in the barn for the winter.
Nearly all the young plants and seeds are now on order, and I even managed to put together an outline guide as to how many plants are coming in and when, which is a first. Usually I don't get time to be that organised and once I have placed the orders it is usually a bit of a surprise when everything arrives during the following season. If it's a difficult year, I can get quite alarmed at even more plants arriving each week, but if it's going ok then I wonder if there are enough. Well I'm pretty confident now that there will be plenty for 2024, especially now it's all illustrated on one bit of paper. Quite scary but exciting at the same time. We are gearing up to increase production by between 15 and 20% for 2024 (we produced and sold about 9% more pots in 2023), so all the advanced ordering had this in mind. There are just under 50 new perennial lines and higher volumes of all those really popular lines we sold out of too quickly this year.
So backup orders are in for more labels, pots, plants and extra wood to make more marketing boxes, an extra delivery vehicle is on
the way and we already have someone new lined up to start in the New Year to help with the production and potentially extra deliveries. Not quite an exit plan, but I can't help myself!
More mature peoples maintenance this week with a trip to the optician. Scans and tests confirm against all the odds, that I
am definitely getting old. The images they showed me were amazing, technology has certainly come a long way and
although they did illustrate quite clearly an issue I had had with one eye earlier in the year, they were reassuring in the detail
you
could see, and that there was nothing too much to worry about. They then very kindly emptied my bank account by
helping me pick a new pair of glasses. Although
my prescription was the same, I had mentioned that I have been working
from
a depleted stock, with a couple of pairs only having one lens left. Not quite sure why I kept them but you never know when
that lens might turn up!
Prices for 2024
The last couple of years have seen some explosive cost increases in the after affects of the pandemic, the ongoing conflict in Ukraine and now Gaza. We were forced over that time to increase our prices by more than ever before, but still below the inflation rate and definitely well below the rate at which our own costs have risen. However, improved efficiencies, reduced
waste and increased output do appear to have made up some of the difference and kept margins workable. Labour remains by far our biggest cost and wage rates rose significantly this year and will again in the coming year, but we are hoping other
costs are beginning to settle down and are not rising quite as quickly.
There will be a price rise at the end of the year, but we are keeping it to 4%, at 10p per pot. I know the recent HTA report on plant prices says price increases will result in fewer sales, but absorbing costs is not a grower option here, 'turnover is vanity, profit is sanity' and all that. There is so little margin involved at the growing end that removing more of it makes no financial sense. We have to be financially sustainable as well as environmentally that way.
Availability list.
Cyclamen coum pink and white forms are already on the list and showing the occasional bud. These will usually flower from October through until well into Spring, with a tasteful sprinkling of flowers rather than being drowned in them. There are already a few flowers on the Helleborus niger varieties so Santa can't be far away!
New varieties of H. orientalis for us are Halcyon Early Dark Red and Halcyon White Spotted which have both surprised us by showing a few buds already, especially nor the white one. Both are intended to be quicker flowering varieties, whereas some of the others can be a bit shy until their second season. The ever-giving Erigeron karv. Stallone is available in bud again this week and should be around for ages as this is our big
overwintering batch we are into now. If the weather is with us we often still have colour up to Christmas.
Wooden box collections
Most of our boxes are now collected, cleaned dried and stored away in the barn but if you have any of our wooden boxes ready to return and aren't expecting to order anytime soon, then please do drop us an email and let us know. Thanks.
