Understanding Greenhouse Marketing Strategies

How can you form a greenhouse marketing strategy?

Greenhouse businesses make money by selling plants, flowers, produce, and other gardening and landscaping items to customers. They can add to these products by offering services such as delivery and landscaping design and labor. A marketing strategy actively identifies target customers and meets their needs for desired products and services, and pursues customer loyalty.

The four P’s of marketing to consider are product, price, place, and promotion. In order to gain a competitive advantage, a business must offer consumers a greater value than the competition. To achieve this value, greenhouse businesses must define their product in terms of customer’s values. Customers want to do business with companies offering a good price, products with benefits, and good customer service.

Marketing Plans

A strategic marketing plan begins with a market analysis. The market analysis will define the target market and their needs, the business’s capabilities to meet their needs, and who the competition is, and how they are meeting market needs. The market analysis can also detail market dynamics and potential collaborators.

After a market analysis is completed, a business can decide which market to pursue and how by evaluating market segmentation. After the market segment is chosen, products can be positioned to meet the needs of those customers. Target marketing will guide what a business sells, where they sell it, and how they sell it.

Target Marketing

Define Product: function, design, packaging, quality, special features, services, warranty, returns, and brand name
Define Price: pricing strategy, payment period, payment method, discounts, bundling products, allowances, variance by locale, and variance by customer
Define Place: distribution channels, market coverage, locations, inventory, and transport
Promotion: promotion strategy, advertising, personal selling, sales force, public relations, communications

Marketing Methods

In order to attract and retain customers the business then needs to raise awareness of itself in a way that attracts enough interest to engage sales. The ultimate aim of marketing a business is to gain and retain loyal customers.

Tips to Consider for Greenhouse Marketing

Differentiate product by what makes it unique and cater to trends like local, organic, and superfoods
Use advertising to tell the story of your product
Make the business visible with logos, farm signs, business cards, and online presence
Offer pricing at competitive rates by calculating the break-even point, production cost, and sales pricing for direct/wholesale
Define your customer’s traits such as age, dietary preference, family status, and culture/background
Consider what potential customers are thinking about and what trends are popular
If a greenhouse is going to offer retail, location of the business is ideally within 50 miles of a large population
If a greenhouse is going to wholesale, supply chains, retailers, farmer’s markets, and restaurants can make good partners
E-Commerce presents opportunities to bring products to market through online sales, online co-ops, and online grocers
Especially when retailing, greenhouses should have the means to process credit cards such as a smartphone card reader