Gazing Bunnies, Tag Pasties and Old Toilet Paper
I love being in Germany.
The only thing I don’t like about this country is the lack of water without gas. My friends and family know I can’t live without water. I drink it all day and I really don’t, no matter how hard I try, like the taste of sparkling water. Most European countries have plenty of still (no gas) and regular sparkling mineral water to choose from, but not Germany. You’d think still water was as precious as gold.
I’ve been known to walk for miles to a full grocery just to get a large bottle of water. I can drink those silly 8 oz. bottles they have at the trade shows in three seconds flat. Silly, huh?
Other than that, I adore Germany. I love the landscape, the people, the oh-so green culture and the food. The yummy beer and bread. Just what someone who isn’t really supposed to be eating a lot of wheat should ingest for the week. When in Rome, eh?
I visit Germany just about every year and now it’s been decided I’ll be here every January to attend and possibly exhibit in this fan-freakin-tastic, idea-filled trade show. I’ve been here all week in Essen, Germany for the IPM, one of the largest (if not THE largest) trade shows in the World.
There were 15,000 exhibitors, yes you read that right, 15 THOUSAND. And – as if that wasn’t a large enough number, there were 60,000 attendees.
60,000.
By comparison, MANTS, the largest winter trade show in the US, in Baltimore, Maryland has about 10,000 attendees and less than 1000 exhibitors. Surprisingly, the largest summer show is the OFA Short Course and trade show in Columbus Ohio and they get an average of 10,000 attendees too, but with only 500 exhibitors – they have larger booths.
So, 60,000 people and 15,000 exhibitors. Is that crazy or what? If I found nothing exciting or innovative here, there’s no hope.
I know I poo-poo everything, but believe me when I say, I was bowled over quite a few times by new ideas and just plain crazy, attention getting stuff in this show.
But first, I must tell you I slept not one minute on the flight from Baltimore to London, so I was able to catch up on a few movies and I finally got to see Social Network. I heard mixed reviews from various sources, but I do believe they were all wrong. This movie was no less than brilliant in the portrayal of two mega-minds in social media. It was food for my soul on a sleepless night crossing the Atlantic.
My favorite line from the movie, which I can’t really quote because I’m pulling this from memory, is when Sean Parker, the founder of Napster and co-founder of Facebook said to Mark Zuckerberg, the genius behind Facebook; (it went something like this…)
Sean: “What is your goal for the summer?”
Mark: “To involve 1,000 colleges in Facebook”
Sean: “Why just 1,000 colleges? Why not two or three continents?”
To that I say, “Prima!”, which is what they say when you say something extraordinary in Germany.
Just like I said in my e-letter two weeks ago about feeling as if I am the lost child of Steve Jobs, why stop at 1,000 colleges? Why limit yourself to such a small goal? Why not go for coverage in three continents?
Well…Parker found them an investor, so that made the bigger goal much more attainable, but still, it’s the concept I want everyone to entertain.
At IPM Essen, it is being entertained. So much so that one booth in the Italian section had smartphones and QR (quick response) codes as their entire booth theme. This booth is always overflowing with people and I couldn’t get inside to see what it was all about, but it looked like a media and tag company, and it looks like they take this stuff seriously. When I atttended in 2009, there was no sign of anything related to smartphones and I’m not sure QR codes had even been invented, eh?
A lot has changed in two years.
After the trade show, in the hotel, I spent many a late night (last night till 4:30am!) following what was happening at the ANLA Management Clinic on Twitter.
Ah…the power of social media. I’m in Germany, but still following and learning and feeling like I’m practically there because of a cool, interactive application on the Internet and my iPhone.
And some say there’s no value to Twitter. HA!
Here’s some of the take-aways from the ANLA Management Clinic that caught my eye.
From Ellen Wells, editor of Green Profit Magazine;
“Best take away from the clinic, put your fears down and get on with it.”
Hooray, what ARE they waiting for?
From Bill Calkins at Ball, from a talk by Trey Pitensberger,
“RT @BillCalkins: don’t let the younger generation scare you – Pitsenberger”
Scare, schmare…they are really nice people. They love relationships, learning and the Earth. What more could we, as business folks, ask for?
Also from Trey’s talk,
“RT @BillCalkins: Social Media- Don’t be afraid to say who you are. – Pitsenberger.”
I would like to add – let them know who you are. Have a personality for goodness sake. Make mistakes, admit it and move on. Be Human. That’s what relationship building is all about.
From a talk by Ian Baldwin, tweeted by Bill Calkins,
“RT @BillCalkins: today’s IGCs might be perceived as a place my mom or grandma would shop- Ian Baldwin”
I think it’s more than a perception…they are. Face facts peeps.
From my fellow irreverent nursery dude, Lloyd Traven’s talk (through a tweet from GPNmag),
“Traven: don’t bore your customers to death. Give them new and DIFFERENT”
I’m all about that, but make sure the new and different actually perform and perform well… or they’ll bash you on Facebook and Twitter for selling bad products. Think I’m kidding?
A lot was said at the ANLA clinic. It seemed they spent more time on social media than anything, but that’s just what the tweets were about. It was different from last year, but are they really listening and will it make a difference? I hope so. I guess we’ll see at next years clinic, which I hope doesn’t continue to be the same week as the IPM show, or I’ll never get to go again. Not that they’ll change it for me, but it sure would be nice.
And now we’re back in Germany.
I have no recollection of being impressed when I attended the IPM last time. This year, I was absolutely bowled over by the creativity. It’s as if they read my mind and took all of my ideas that have been swooshing around in my head over the last year and they made them come to life.
The booths were inviting and colorful.
The plants were new or they were being used in new, innovative ways. I’m not so sure about the blue Anthurium. Last week we heard about the blue orchid. Have they gone too far?
They reused materials that would have been thrown in the garbage in the coolest ways. How about the use of old egg cartons in this floral arrangement?
There was the coolest new thing I’ve seen in a while and it was everywhere. Felted ribbon.
Ever seen it?
They put shiny, gazing ball-like finishes on everything from flying pigs to mushrooms and of course, my absolute favorite, gnomes!
You know I wanted one and wanted to take many, many images for you, but some parts of the show were off limits to cameras, so all I could get for you were these clever, shiny bunnies in pastel, Easter shades.
Still pretty cool, eh?
The energy was positive and everyone I spoke to from countries all over the World was excited for the future. Maybe that is because just about every booth has a bartender, juice bar, barista and or full table service for food right in the middle?
Na…they are just more upbeat people. You’ve never been to a trade show in Europe? If you are visiting your vendors, you should never have to buy anything to eat or drink. They will feed and hydrate you well. It’s that European hospitality.
There’s no bowl of cheap candy on the table – no. That’s all we get in the US. There’s a freakin’ full service bar with a happy hour beginning at 5 in many of the booths, so you’ll never want for much for too long at a European show.
Each night, my north German posse (old friends from long ago…) and I would head over to the Kordes Jungpflanzen booth for a glass (or gallon) of wine. This was not headache wine either, a lovely, smooth red from Chile, but watch out. If you turn your head, they refill your glass before you can say no.
I’m certainly not complaining. Free red wine is a good thing, but free, good red wine with a group of friends and a block of parmesan cheese as big as a spare tire is a phenomenal thing. The cheese is a story for another day, but it’s always present and it was the last time I was here too.
After happy hour, we were off to a traditional, old fashioned beer house where they give you a coaster and then put a tick mark on your coaster with a marker to keep track of how many you’ve had. That’s just mean.
What else did I see?
Well, I wanted to see what the Danish gift plant market was up to, so I spent a few hours in that hall. Did I tell you there are 15 halls?
Yes, 15…that’s why it takes three days to walk this gigantic show. I didn’t see anything that would revolutionize what’s already going on in the states, but I did notice a lot of “minis”. They make mini azaleas, mini orchids and mini campanulas in mini pots and sell them in the grocery stores. Mini pots of forced bulbs were also big this year, especially Iris reticulata, which makes perfect sense to me being that it is a mini bulb. They are also pushing succulents as houseplants. I’ve been seeing those at the chains and at groceries the US. At the chains, they are always in the back, blocked by the houseplants, so I’m not sure anyone buys them but me.
In the Danish section, you’ll find Danish butter cookies galore…and good coffee.
I did see some really cool merchandising in the Danish section too. Look at this chair made from Christmas cactus. Cool, huh?
They even had a display for urban gardening that had a bike, old car tires and a mailbox? Clever?
I do also really like the coffee cup veggies. You start them in the coffee cup and it comes with it’s own little “greenhouse” lid. Then, once they sprout, you can transplant them or just plant the cup in a container and then thin them as they mature. I did not get to ask how long they could grow in the cup if it’s not planted. If it disintegrates quickly, that could be a downside.
I spent two hours walking through the floral and floral design halls. There I looked for trends in color, texture and materials. It was stunning and the displays were like nothing I’ve ever seen. Imagine seeing floral design like this on a regular basis? How cool would that be?
I’m sure there’s not enough demand and my friend Jim Martin, who is my floral guru in S.C. will say there are tons of things in the US like this, but honey, I never see them in my local flower shops.
Apparently, purple, like Easter Peeps purple and citrine green are the new colors in Europe for 2011. My entire hotel was citrine green and so were many of the themes for the floral competitions. You all probably don’t know that’s one of my two favorite colors. The other is aqua. My mini cooper is citrine green and it’s an essential in my wardrobe. Needless to say, I like it much more than that nasty honeysuckle (which really looks like a coral-pink) the color experts in the US have chosen as our color of the year. That’s a hard color and you know what?
I did not see it anywhere at the show.
Hmm…
I love the fancy containers of forced bulbs. They were so cute and clever. Anyone could do this and it far surpasses those colored plastic or even simple terracotta pots in beauty. They used old wooden crates and all sorts of cut branches as complements to all of the arrangements.
They even had the coolest (as cool as they can be) funeral arrangements. Oasis has a new line of funeral shapes and they have the sweetest things. Hearts and butterflies and crosses that are so much nicer than a white plastic bucket with a bunch of ghastly colored gladiolus coming out of it in a sundial shape. Oh, don’t get me started on funeral flowers. When my day comes, mine better be really cool, that’s all I’m saying.
No gladiolus, please.
They even made good use of old, used toilet paper and paper towels out of the trash. Just kidding…haha! But they did crumple up some white paper and make it look old and they used it as bases and in the most clever ways to accent the pastel and citrus colored arrangements.
It was all so cool and inspiring. It was better than being at the Philadelphia flower show, but just as therapeutic cause I didn’t have to fight old ladies to get to the displays. I only had to fight old European men, who for some reason cut off young women and never look back, but that too is a whole story on it’s own.
Check out my albums on Facebook and Flicker to see all that I saw.
There’s also a video on Facebook of the Vogue mandevilla introduction at the show. They had Madonna singing Vogue and girls on the runway carrying the pots of blooms to the song. It was a mostly white and black booth and the scenery was minimalistic, just big images of the flowers. If only the models they used could dance, it would have been a true Euro-dance party, but they had no rhythm.
Too bad. It was a great idea, though and it got lots of attention.
There’s just too much to talk about here. Here’s a little IPM video I put together to show you the energy and feeling of this amazing show.
I will certainly be back and I plan to exhibit if all goes well. I absolutely want to be a part of something so powerful and innovative. It’s food for my soul.
Next week, I’ll be reporting from the New England Grows show in Boston, unless there’s more snow. I’ll be attending a special event for garden writers while I’m there and I hope to see some new trends for the US. Don’t you worry, I’ll be implementing a lot of what I saw this week in future marketing and trade show adventures. Stay tuned!
Stay warm and Happy Weeding!
Angela Treadwell-Palmer
President, Plants Nouveau