From Where I Stand

This past summer, I found myself at one of my This year, the hot IGC topics were houseplants and cannabis, which, friend’s houses for a backyard BBQ. I was looking through the window I guess is just a different kind of houseplant. I wandered around for most at a gorgeous collection of plants. Their leaves were shiny and in every of the afternoon trying desperately to figure out how to implement both of shade of green. Gorgeous white flowers popped. The branches were these into the landscape market. Cannabis is a topic for another column, meticulously pruned. I wondered if the homeowners but it doesn’t take a marketing genius to understand its rise in populardid the maintenance themselves or had a professional ity. The more challenging question is how do we learn who tended to the foliage. lessons from this unexpected boom in the houseplant

Now for the weird part. I wasn’t inside their market. Perhaps, the factors that led to the surge in the house looking out into the backyard, I was outside of popularity of houseplants can translate over to exterior their house looking into their living room. Yes, this landscaping. couple had invested hundreds of dollars and dozens of The succulent is credited as being the gateway drug hours into their houseplants. to the houseplant market. Writer April Long (what a

Houseplants are having a renaissance. great name for a garden writer) called succulents, “The Houseplants sales are up 50% in the last three years. plant kingdom’s first bona fide social media star.” They are now a $1.7 billion industry and it’s impos- Succulents led to terrariums, terrariums led to fiddle-leaf sible to turn on an HGTV show or flip through a figs, and fiddle-leaf figs led to any glossy, comically design magazine without seeing houseplants nestled broad-leafed plant in an Instagrammable white pot. in every corner. The theory of why houseplants took off is fourfold.

Normally, millennials and social media are The first aspect is that millennials love them and appear blamed for all of society’s ills, but in this case, the to be a more nurturing generation than they get credit for opposite is true. Both are being credited for the revival as long as what they are nurturing isn’t a human baby. of a market once left for dead. It’s no longer anachro- Millennials have lower fertility rates than previous gennistic to see green houseplants dangling from macramé erations, but apparently love to raise plants and pets. A hangers in college dorm rooms or trendy studio apart- 2016 National Garden Survey concluded that of the six ments. What’s old is new again. million people who had taken up gardening that year—

It is doubly strange to be of an age where you both indoors and out—five million were millennials. remember the trends of the 70’s and 80’s while still Millennials outpace Boomers and Xers on pet ownership being tangentially interested in keeping up with them. I am sure that by about 10% and 95% consider their pets actual members of the family. in ten years I won’t care if Sony Walkmen and Rubik’s Cubes become The second aspect is that houseplants infuse a tiny shred of nature into popular again because I will be stuck in my ways and culturally ambiva- lives dominated by screens and walls. There are both real and psychosolent. For now, I still care about what the kids are wearing, watching and matic benefits to connecting with nature. Eclectic use of natural materials listening to. I am mostly annoyed and threatened by new trends, but I feel are seeping into the interior design aesthetic and houseplants are the perthat is the normal, default response as we age. fect fit to soften cold spaces.

Many of my friends’ parents tended to houseplants. I remember Third, they are easy to maintain and there are low risks to neglect. A moms waltzing about their homes while Phil Donahue played in the browning houseplant may lead to a frown, but waiting one more day to background. They’d have a spray bottle in the one hand and a Tab in the water one isn’t the same as being out all night with a Labradoodle or child other. Some of my friends’ houses became overgrown jungles as vines at home. Houseplants are a stoic and durable companion during an era of and ferns burst out of their containers and cascaded downward. These our lives when it’s difficult to be tied down. waxy plants merely got in the way of our lifestyle. They encroached on Finally, let’s face it, houseplants are kinda cute. They aren’t showy my designated spaces for Atari and Hungry, Hungry Hippos. Yet, hell containers or majestic trees, but they have a girl next door quality. They hath no fury like an angry mom who rushed downstairs to see an over- are photogenic and offer plant owners an ironic sense of pride. Sure, turned houseplant and five boys hiding a football behind their backs. it’s just a plant, but there is genuine joy in seeing it grow and prosper.

I’ll be completely honest, I never really “got” houseplants at the time. That pride eventually ends up on social media profiles and in “oohs” and I was constantly being reminded to water them when I got home with the “aahs” at backyard BBQs. glass RC Cola bottle we kept by the sink. They never made me breathe So, can exterior landscape professionals capitalize on this burgeoning easier. I don’t remember a wild mood swing when a houseplant bloomed love of houseplants or is this simply a silly fad that happens to involve or died. They were like boring, lifeless pets that my parents doted over. plants? Houseplants could’ve been storm lanterns or floor poofs or ceramAt least my dumb fish wriggled back and forth a bit. ic deer heads or any of the other design fads working their way through

Annually, I attend the Independent Garden Center Show in Chicago. the zeitgeist. This is a national gathering of garden center retailers. ILCA doesn’t delve Let’s look at the criteria: they provide their owners a sense of nurture much into the garden center arena, but I attend for different reasons. Garden and nature, they are easy to maintain, and they are ironically cute enough centers tend to be ahead of most of the trends. They exist in an extremely to generate pride of ownership usually reserved for dogs and kids. Using competitive market since the advent of big box stores and have to take a those criteria, landscaping hits on half the marks. Landscapes allow us to number of risks to maintain a healthy customer base. Usually, what I see nurture and provide us with nature. However, landscapes are not easy to trending at the IGC Show will make its debut in the commercial and resi- maintain unless we use professionals and there is a stark difference about dential landscape market a few years later in some shape or form. Instagramming a containerized houseplant versus a $45,000 patio. One is

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adorable and the other looks vain.

I respect that it’s silly to compare an entire functioning landscape to a houseplant. I do feel the popularity of houseplants offers clues to the stickiness of modern trends. It is impossible to deny the benign narcissism we show when we follow a trend. Whether it’s skinny jeans, Canada Goose jackets, or ironic mustaches, we straddle the line between wanting to be hip and not wanting to be left behind.

I recall a great exchange on the hilarious show Parks and Recreation that best captures trends. The town trendsetter was discussing the season’s hottest obsessions. She says, “You need to try the hottest new craze - beef milk. It’s like almond milk that’s been squeezed through tiny holes in living cows” Ron Swanson, the Libertarian Parks Director scoffs and replies, “It’s BLEEPING milk!”

So then, what do you call an outdoor houseplant? If you said, “a plant” you are thinking like a sane, rational person. You are the Ron Swanson to a society of trendsetters and trend followers. Yet, you are being shortsighted. Houseplants are not what’s important, they are just what is important right now. The real lesson is why they have found a foothold again. The trend is merely the byproduct of the petri dish it is grown in. What is important is that modern consumers want nature, to nurture, ease of care, and something to brag about. That’s the bulls eye worth aiming for.

The outdoor houseplant is not a shrub, container, or tree. The outdoor houseplant is the part of the landscape that resonates with the client because you’ve entrusted them with ownership of a small, meaningful piece. It is a piece of the landscape that they will engage with, draw nourishment from, and brag about to others. It is the first element they will show on their tour. It is what will catch their gaze when they look out the window. If it checks the same four boxes that houseplants check, it will be consequential. It can be a unique plant, funky container, salsa garden, herb-filled window box, living wall, pocket garden, grass covered picnic table, heck, it can even be a houseplant outdoors. The key is giving something to the client that they will take ownership of.

Landscaping is a referral-driven business. Every landscape professional’s hard drive is jammed with picture after picture of incredible landscapes and landscape features. Do you know what is not covered in photos of incredible landscapes and landscape features? Facebook, Instagram, and other social media sites where influencers gather. Those sites are covered in pictures of vacation spots and food and cute kids and dogs and yes, even houseplants. Those are the currency of the shareable world. Sales reps, take note, and find a client’s outdoor houseplant. To you, it may be another BLEEPING plant, but to them it’s a personal statement that bears repeating.

Scott Grams September 16, 2019