Good morning, Keith Ramsey with the garden supply company. I've got Shannon here this morning and wanted to ask her questions about what's trending and houseplants. She manages our houseplant department and garden supply company and does all our buying, and there's just been a massive growth in houseplants, Shannon.

What do you think made the house plant trend spike up? I think COVID had something to do with it. It drove people to be at home and stuck and want to bring some life into their home. It also brought in some people with more disposable income and this new generation.

Who is starting to like house plants? Millennials seem like they've picked up houseplants. It's a—resurgence of the [00:01:00] the sixties and seventies. I was a kid at that point, but that was a time when houseplants were just huge. Macrame hangers and pathos growing all over, you're taking over your house.

We're back to that scenario, especially with young kids. I couldn't agree more. And the macrome trend is also back for sure, but I see the pictures of the people, the customers home, and it is like a greenhouse. That's the thing that gets me most excited is big plant shelves and hanging plants in front of a window and just people's plant collection and how excited they are about their collection of plants.

It's been a lot of fun from my perspective as well. Not only these younger people are coming in and teaching them about. Plants and caring for them, but also people who never got into it are now adults and have started to pick enough house plans. Yeah. The thing that amazes me a lot about it is the rare and unusual house plant scenario, and it's, it's gone crazy.

It's unbelievable. Yeah. [00:02:00] We brought in last year, like that tie constellation and the pink princesses, and just the opportunity for people to come in and see them was exciting. So these are plants that nobody else has. In many cases, people haven't seen before they're plants that are newly developed or newly crossed plants.

And, the first one I purchased them hard to believe that we're buying a house plant for $800. And scary for me too. Yeah. And now we've, we've—two of those in the $500 price range. And of course, there's the same plant available for $10 without the variegation and its uniqueness as a first-time out-of-the-box plan.

So everybody can get into houseplants at any price range, but it is truly unique. We've started the rare and unusual plant collectors that are out there. Showcase those and bring in more as they become available from our growers, right in the center of the house plant section. We have a couple of tables that are really [00:03:00] featuring all those right now.

And every week we get more on different Fridays. The houseplants do we have currently are just unusual or newer. And you two of my favorite are both anther Rams right now. One is called the king Ethereum, where the leaves will bend forward a little bit. Become about three feet long.

There's also. Black cardboard and thorium are spectacular. The black heart-shaped leaf with white veining and even spikes flowers. That's awesome. We're partnering with a couple of other local garden centers as well, too. Be able to buy in more plants that are harder to get, that have to travel a long distance, or you have to buy larger quantities.

Go into a local garden center. Not necessarily just a garden supply company, but there are so many of them that are just amazing. Fairview Homewood garden. Logan's garden hut down in a few coy about finding these unusual plants that you're not going to find necessarily a box store or something like that.

Absolutely. We [00:04:00] have a couple of them that I have seen a little bit of. Big box stores that were unavailable to us were under trademark. And now we're starting to get some of those in the Ravens easy and that Claudia network. Yeah. Some of the larger, there's an extremely large grower in the states and is rolling out some unusual plants to box stores.

And they're a little bit harder for us to get, so it's a little bit of a change of pace. They're there. They're growing them specifically for them. So it's a little bit harder to chase that. Definitely. What about caring for somebody that doesn't have that hasn't had houseplants before knowing what the light condition is or bringing in pictures helps us get a sense of what is considered bright light to them, or medium light, low light.

Low light plants can tolerate bright light and thrive in bright light, but colorful light plants need. Or need bright light. But watering is probably the number one issue I see with our customers who have problems with their plants. Too much [00:05:00] love.

. Babying it just a little bit too much, instead of letting it dry out between those waterings, they want to water a little bit every day or every other day. Yeah. The thing that I think what's interesting is when a plant looks dry if you're looking at the soil and it looks dry on the surface, if you push your finger into the ground, you can push it in half an inch and all of a sudden you can feel moisture.

And so the plant doesn't need any water yet. And, but people are watering them. I like to explain to people how to lift the plant in the grower. So they can feel the bottom, the holes, of course. And then also just the weight of it, right? Yeah. I always tell people the water every week, pick your day.

If you're off on Sunday and Sunday is a day you spend time around the house to water, try to water consistently on the same day. And that way, it's either a little teeny, a few drops of water or maybe no water at all, or, a good in good, heavy watering if a plant's dried out.

So yeah. It'll make it to the following week. Absolutely. And then when you're letting it dry out, that's decreasing your odds of fungal gnats. [00:06:00] Exactly. And, when a plant's overwatered, it's just not getting enough oxygen. So if it's sitting in water, it's smothering the planet. It just doesn't get the oxygen it needs.

And without the oxygen, it can't take up water. So it does. Letting a plant's not going to dry out as fast in the house, so it's just a check that with your finger almost as he is lifted. As you said, that's a great idea.