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In keeping with our Horticulture Marketing Strategy 2019 – 2021 and the Bloom Strategy to place horticulture at the core of the event, the horticulture team spared no effort this year to build and amplify its horticulture content. The objective was to activate additional and stronger horticulture (and industry-linked) content and activity across the show site. This was achieved in the following ways;

THIS IS HORTICULTURE BY BORD BIA

The central feature in the Nursery/Floral Pavilion, This is Horticulture, was designed to educate and inform visitors about the Irish Horticulture sector, its existence, scale, variety of activity and how it contributes nationally from a commercial perspective. It showcased both ornamental and edible production in a variety of ways, with fresh produce and plant displays, infographics highlighting production values and a selection of growers, along with plasma screens running Meet the Grower videos. The main focus of the display was a large screen made up of 42 individual half metre screens, which wrapped around the viewer in an especially designed viewing gallery. This provided a virtual tour of Irish horticultural production via six specially commissioned 360-degree videos bringing the viewer through giant glasshouses full of flowers, strawberry and tomato production, a field vegetable production site and apple orchards from spring flowering to harvest time full of fruit.

The experience was designed to deliver key messages about the importance and value of the horticultural industry to Ireland and gave growers the opportunity to spend time at the feature and chat to visitors. ✽

THE HEALTHY WAY - #EATWELL #BEWELL #FEELWELL

Following a collaboration with Healthy Ireland at Bloom 2018 and building on this relationship further in 2019, Bord Bia partnered with Healthy Ireland to install a large show garden at Bloom this year. Healthy Ireland is a Government-led initiative (led by the Department of Health) aimed at improving the health and wellbeing of everyone living in Ireland. The garden, called The Healthy Way represented a public space linking healthy eating, healthy movement and wellbeing through a series of seasonal planted areas and water. Ranging through a mixed perennial environment and mature woodland setting it reflected a vision that Ireland is a place where people can be inspired and feel empowered by their natural surroundings to improve their health and wellbeing.

Over the course of the show, the garden had a schedule of interactive activities ranging from cooking demonstrations, to exercise and wellbeing with singers, dancers and yoga bringing the garden to life. The range of seasonal vegetable crops grown in the garden was profiled and cooked into delicious healthy meals by the Hungry Gardener amongst others, with the Food Dude characters along with some other wellknown faces bringing an energetic dynamic to the garden over the five days. ✽

RAINBOW TUNNEL (SEVEN A DAY FRESH PRODUCE PROMOTION IN THE FOOD VILLAGE)

This year Bord Bia focused on showcasing salad crops, as well as launching new season strawberries, salads and new potatoes. As part of the Celebrate Strawberry Season campaign, strawberry sampling took place while salad preparation and growing demonstrations provided the main sector theme for the entire feature this year. How to use new potatoes in potato salads was a sub-theme of the salad demonstrations. Alongside this a display of Irish honey was hosted within this feature, with beekeepers from the Irish Federation of Bee Keepers Associations (IFBKA) on hand to tell the story of Irish bees and honey making. A series of speakers took on the theme of healthy eating while practical 7-a-day demonstrations took place across the five days. ✽

THE HIVE & HONEYCOMB PLANTED FEATURE (CENTRE OF FOOD VILLAGE)

This new planted feature in the centre of the Food Village and close to the main stage combined a series of planters containing a mix of crops and ornamentals set out around a hexagon (honeycomb shape) with a centre pedestal with a facsimile beehive mounted on top. The beehive at the centre represented the important contribution of bees to all plants and horticulture, through the work of pollination. It aimed to be thought-provoking in linking worker bees to human existence on the planet. ✽

EDUCATION & SCHOOLS: FOOD DUDES AT BLOOM /INCREDIBLE EDIBLES

Key highlights included: ● Kids zone renamed as Food Dudes Kids Zone with new interactive activity including demonstrations and messaging around healthy eating and exercise in a fun and engaging manner ● Food Dudes Information boards carrying healthy eating messages strategically placed at five locations around the Bloom site ● Food Dudes Selfie stations around the Bloom site ● Food Dudes Characters brought to life – moving around and engaging visitors and children around the site with a key message of eating fresh produce regularly to stay healthy ● 10,000 Food Dudes passports were distributed to children and families as they arrived at the show, inviting them to visit (and where to find) the key educational features around the site (e.g. organic school garden, seven a day tunnel.

Food Dudes Kids zone, craft village, conversation area). The passport was stamped at each location visited and could be posted at the Food Dudes characters posting stations on site for a chance to win a prize ● School tours with the Incredible Edibles programme – 1000 primary school children visited on the Thursday and Friday and were provided with portions of healthy fruit to sample. ✽

ORGANIC SCHOOL GARDEN

The organic school garden made a welcome return to Bloom this year organised in conjunction with SEED. The very topical theme for 2019 was “The Pollinator Friendly School Garden.”

Visitors and children had the opportunity to learn about: ● The 6 key principles of organic horticulture ● The Green Leaf symbol for consumers ● Why bees matter? ● What to plant? ● What schools can do to help bees? ● How to compost (wormery demo – EPA) ✽

GROMOR/BLOOM/ SUPERGARDEN

With a view to linking up the various gardening and plant promotional activities by Bord Bia and the Industry, this year’s Supergarden series had an increased focus on using local quality mark plants in the garden designs. Additional funding to spend specifically on plants was provided to each designer to raise the profile of plants in each garden design. ✽

THE QUALITY MARK PLANT VILLAGE

The re-named Quality Mark Plant Village was moved to a more highprofile location at the front of the Bloom Bistro and close to the entrance to the show gardens. This was to give quality assured Irish plants greater exposure and to highlight that The Bord Bia Quality Mark means that the plants have been produced to the highest Bord Bia quality standards and grown in Ireland. The formal layout and new shelving with the prominent Bord Bia Quality Mark branding reflected a stronger professional profile for local plants from a variety of QA growers and were run in conjunction with the Kildare Growers and Newlands Garden Centre and supported by Bord Bia. A number of new plant varieties were showcased, with one being mentioned on Lyric FM and consequently sold out during the show. ✽

GROMOR/GARDEN CENTRE PROMOTION AT BLOOM GARDEN STAGE

At Bloom 2019 a new initiative inviting GroMor garden centres to have a presence on the main gardening stage was piloted. Interested retailers were requested to put together an engaging talk/demonstration. Participants on the stage could choose from a wide range of topics and could also engage a third-party gardening expert to participate on their behalf. Topics suggested included container gardening, lawn care, fruit and veg, the herb garden, year-round colour, etc. or the pilot, the aim was to have one GroMor retailer participating each day. The uptake on this initiative was encouraging, with three garden centres taking up the offer. Throughout the event, QMark plants were showcased on the stage, along with a list of 15 Qmark plants profiled. This list was sent to Garden Centres to ensure that they could stock them for the weekend following Bloom. ✽

FRESH POTATOES AND THE MILLENNIAL

GENERATION

Recent market research was carried out by Bord Bia with the objective of understanding consumer’s behaviours and attitudes towards fresh potatoes, with a more in-depth understanding of millennial relationships across all carbohydrates with a specific emphasis on potatoes. The market research was carried out as an online survey (sample size n=1,500) with insightful results that will be used to inform the strategy of future potato promotional collaborative initiatives between Bord Bia and the Potato Industry. An application for a new potato industry and EU funded consumer promotional campaign was prepared and submitted to the EU in April. The project partners participating with Ireland in this application included Belgium, France and Europotat (European Potato Trade Association). The outcome of this application will be known in October. The research showed that the carbohydrate world is being increasingly challenged (seven in ten people see it is the least important part of the plate versus nearly five in ten seeing protein and vegetables being more important) and with a rise in meal snacking new requirements and meal solutions are required from a more healthy and convenient driven culture. This is a challenge for the potato category which has reduced importance for younger cohorts than previous generations.

However, potato purchase penetration is still high at more than 97% across the population. People are consuming potatoes on average more than three times a week. Focusing on the younger millennials and Generation Z cohorts they are likely to consume rice and pasta more frequently than previous generations, gravitating towards these other carbohydrates in particular for their perceived convenience and health properties. They believe that they are more aligned with their needs. Younger cohorts believe potatoes to be harder to cook and take longer to prepare at a time when they consider that meal preparation time should not take more than 15-20 minutes.

The health benefits of potatoes are not as well understood with millennials perceiving them as having more fat and calories when compared with other carbohydrates while older cohorts associate them as a source of fibre, magnesium and vitamin C. The newer grain carbohydrates such as brown rice are perceived as being more nutritious with 44% of people seeing them as being good for gut nutrition. However, where millennials are consuming more potatoes they have a better understanding of their nutritional benefits (of those consuming more potatoes, 35% are doing so for their fibre).

The research showed that the potato lacks relevance for many younger consumers and it is not being showcased online in the way other foods are e.g. on Instagram it lacks a major presence and is less likely to be a food that people are prepared to plate-up to show to their friends on social channels. There is limited understanding around potatoes with 35% of all people not knowing any variety, this goes up to nearly 5 in 10 for millennials.

The potato is very much part of an indulgent moment and has strong associations with family, Sunday roasts and nostalgic thoughts. While it delivers on taste, these associations are often with more indulgent toppings such as butter, cheese, mayonnaise etc. People and millennials, in particular, are now looking for healthy tasty and convenient options that give them more reasons to consume potatoes. ✽