Trade Flows and Marketing Practices within the California Nursery Industry—Survey Results from 1988 and 1993

Abstract

Abstract Nurseries were surveyed nationwide in 1989 and 1994 to collect information on products, customers, and business practices during the previous year. California's nursery industry is the largest in the nation and provided the majority of seedlings, liners, whips, and grafted material from within the state. Landscape firms were the most important customers for wholesale nurseries in 1993 (35% of sales), followed by garden centers and re-wholesalers (26% and 25% of sales), and mass merchandisers (12% of sales). Over 90% of California nursery wholesale products were sold within the state, and the rest were shipped to the north, west, midwest, and parts of the east coast. Production cost was used as the most important criteria for price determination of nursery stock. Sales methods such as in-person and telephone, negotiated and non-negotiated sales varied in popularity between the two years surveyed. Nurseries spent about 3.5% of their revenue on advertising, primarily in catalogs and the Yellow Pages. Twenty-six percent and 70% of medium and large nurseries, respectively, were represented at trade shows versus only 11% of small nurseries. Capital and land were the major factors limiting expansion of nurseries in 1988 and 1993, with market demand becoming a more prevalent factor in 1993.