"Keep a few plants away from your fertilizer trial"

Here’s an idea. You’re in the middle of wrapping up a controlled release fertilizer trial. You’ve set your trial, you’ve monitored it from the beginning to the end and maybe both products performed equally as well. You’re trying to figure out which product is the best solution and which will provide you with the greatest amount of value. After looking at all the specifics such as grow time, color, bloom count, root development etc.

by Nelson Gonzalez

One extra step that you can take to figure which is the best fertilizer for you, is to keep a few plants from each treatment. I don’t know maybe 5 or 20 from each treatment. Whatever you can spare to keep. That’s up to you.

Keep them watered and treat them as they were treated when they were in the trial or better yet, how you think they would be treated in retail or by the landscaper.

Now you’re probably asking yourself, why is this important, why does he want me to go through this extra step. Well here’s why, obviously your plants will be sold and perhaps your current practice is to not top-dress them before they go out the door, which in my opinion can be avoided sometimes but in most instances a quick top-dress application can do your plants a lot of good.

But let’s say you don’t want to top-dress them, you feel the quality is there or you just don’t want to add to the expense of producing this plant. Then it would be in your best interest to know which controlled release fertilizer in the trial will finish off best when your end user takes that plant into his or her possession. Or in other words which of the fertilizer treatments will truly give you and your customer the most longevity. Which fertilizer will keep their plants the greenest and healthiest the longest, with minimal effort on their part.

Just like my job is not over after you buy a bag of Osmocote or Suncote from me. I need to be positive that you have the best experience ever when you use my product. And trust me I strive to do that.

You too, after you sell a plant your job is not over, the greater experience that your customer has with the plant that they purchased from you, the more likelihood that they will come back tomorrow, to buy from you again.

So take that extra step, keep a few plants from your trial and continue to monitor them to see which one truly provided the most longevity.

For more information:
ICL Group
Epsilon House, West Road, Ipswich.
IP3 9FJ
T: +44 (0)1473 237100
F: +44 (0)1473 237150
E: prof.sales@icl-group.com
www.icl-group.com
www.icl-sf.co.uk
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