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I'd say it depends on the volume, whether you charge time to get the plants.
Generally we look at the prices in the local garden centres and undercut them marginally.
So say we get a HP nursery plant for 2.99 -20% we will sell it for 4.49 / 4.99. Whilst the garden centre may sell for £5.99 or higher.
We always make a point of removing any identifying labels.
Garden Centres/ Retail Nurseries normally mark up by 2.35, or double plus vat if you rather, on UK grown stock.
Garden Designers seem, from my experience to roughly mark up the same as Garden Centres, whereas Landscapers tend to mark up less, why I don't know???
I sure that I am not giving to many secrets away when I say from a growers perspective, we normally mark up plants by between 300/400%, if you work on a Liner costing 70-80 pence. There are obviously the production costs involved, pots, soil, water, rent or mortgages, chemicals, transport and Labour.
This is obviously not the case with Growers trading stock, where the margins are only 30-50%.
As a grower for 30 ish years, I do believe that plants are generally underpriced for the work involved in producing them, compared to say a paving slab, fence panel etc, etc.
A plant or tree makes this world a greener, more pleasant place to live, whilst obviously a paving slab or fence panel does not.
When I started in 1980 ish, a basic 3 litre shrub was around £1. So thirty years later it's around £3, so not really a reflection of inflation over the period, that I guess is my gripe.
To give you an example, I was at a retail Nursery today visiting a friend, when a customer asked me the price of a plant. The plant in question was a Grevillea Canberra Gem in a 10 litre pot. The Customer aked me how much it was, I replied £20.00, when she responded she thought that they would be £5. As the plant was 3 years old, in a 10 litre and a little bit choice. At £20 that only works out at at £6.66 ish a year, which is really not bad value for money.
All branches of our industry need to educate the public on the value plants, not only in price, but the value to our envirioment.
Best regards,
Steve
Steve & Tina said:
I do a smaller mark up than garden centres - they do x 2.35 here - I do x1.6 but I do an average price for plants in my costings unless its for lots of the more expensive plants then I'll add more in - so I cost 50 plants in at a standard price - landscaping jobs. For the maintenance side, I do x1.6.
kirsty