Re: CAT - Free plants

From: <HIPSource@aol.com>

John Montgomery, retired nurseryman, inquired:

<< I am curious about the origin of the practice of adding free plants to
orders. With one exception I can not think of any other type of business
which routinely provides this act of charity. I did once patronize a  hardware
store where if you bought a couple of dozen screws for  instance, they would
add one extra (for the crack in the floor.) In any other commercial
transaction you expect to get exactly what you pay for  and nothing more. >>

And I'm speaking as a private person here and not as HIPSource. 

I don't know about the origins of this in irises but I have thought about it a
lot and I'm also ambivalent about it. As for precident, there is always the
"baker's dozen", which is 13 dinner rolls for the price of 12, a practise now
fading into oblivion. And, in the days of privately owned retail
establishments with repeat cutomers and on-site owners one saw the occasional
lagniappe tossed in when the bill was totalled. But you don't see it too often
any more, and when you do it tends to be a "promotional" item, a manufactured
talisman of ersatz good will. 

The fact is irises have to be dug and divided for optimum growth and customer
preferences will fluctuate from year to year and new stuff is coming and old
stuff going and there is only so much land and there are extra rhizomes
acumulating about this time of year in most everyone's garden. What to do with
them? The solution arrived at by some nurseries is to pass them on to the
customer, and that is fine up to a point. Most everyone likes a gift, and many
folks are deeply impressed with anything free, especially in quantity. But too
much of a good thing does cause one to ponder about the prices, and I have
wondered if the tradition does not encourage us to value all the plants less.

I think it is hard to separate the economic issues that impact irises. The
first that comes to mind in this context is the economy of the nursery itself
as a unique commercial entity. Second, and impacting the first, is the
traditional heirarchical relationship between novelty and price, which is
coupled with the traditional heirarchical presumptions about novelty and worth
or desirability, and price and worth. Third, is the absolute fact that irises
are being swapped, bartered, and stolen continuously and sold cheaply all over
the country in society sales. Some are actually buying rhizomes specifically
to grow on to sell in these sales. 

The simplest scenario is that some nurseries have extra plants and they pass
them on to encourage you to purchase your irises from them rather than locally
from a society. It also helps them keep the price of their offerings at a
dignified level. Many irises are abnormally cheap compared to other perennial
plants and they should not go any lower, especially given the presumptions
noted above. The reality is that since the market is competative and folks
want freebies and feel gypped if they don't get them, a nursery must
acknowledge the tradition and expend resources to meet the expectation. But
the best do not hold their own product cheap, or act like it is a load of
zuccini they need to get rid of.

So it looks to me as if while giving copious extras may tend to encourage
folks to undervalue the plants,   it does tend to have a counterbalance in
that it provides a mecanism whereby the published price of the product may
remain respectable while being competative in the wider marketplace. 

This is all pure speculation, of course........

Anner Whitehead
HIPSource@aol.com  

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