After 4 busy weeks of visitors from across the horticultural industry, the Ball Summer Showcase came to a close on 5th August 2022.
Despite almost 5 weeks without rain and the highest temperatures recorded in the UK, the summer plants trials and displays proved a resounding success and a valuable visit to all those who visited. The challenging weather conditions certainly demonstrated how plant genetics have improved dramatically over the past years with so many plant varieties showing amazing resilience to the most unforgiving heat and lack of rain.
“Not an ideal year to launch a new series of Double Busy Lizzies!” says Stuart Lowen, Marketing Manager at Ball. “But testament to the incredible breeding work carried out by our sister company, Ball FloraPlant, the all-new Downy Mildew resistant Glimmer™ Impatiens Glimmer™ Impatiens Glimmer™ Impatiens simply stole the show.
Through heat and sun, the robust plants and rose-like blossoms of Glimmer just battled on to give a non-stop display of colour… that’s just what we want from new plant varieties!”
The extended presentation of Lasting Beauty® Perennials which included Everlasting Beauty shrubs, Edible Beauty soft fruit and Exotic Beauty succulents and tropical plants were also incredibly well received. Developed and sourced through our extensive global partners, these varieties really deliver stand-out performance on the nursery and provide exciting solutions for retail and todays modern gardener.
More of the outdoor display space was given over to retail bench displays with plants in a range of pots sizes to help growers and retailers see the real potential of the plant varieties. Ideas such as
Vertical MixMasters® using climbing Ipomoe Vertical MixMasters® Ipomoea SolarTower™ and Thunbergia SunEyes in tripods. Speedplanters in a range of baskets and containers to show how flexible they can be to suit any retail price point, and an extensive retail concept display of CC Trolleys and themed planteria benching to create interest in taking retail presentations to the next level.
There was an extensive trialling area of over 1,000 experimental annual and perennial varieties providing visitors full transparency on ‘What’s cooking in the kitchen’, a great insight to the continuous stream of future new plant varieties Ball is looking at for the UK and Irish market.