“The current situation is quite the opposite from the Mother’s Day period, when everyone was craving orchids and we were completely sold out,” says Danish phalaenopsis grower Christian Schwartz of Gartneriet Rønbæk. According to Schwartz, this summer has been quite poor concerning the demand for their orchids, which is something they did not take into consideration with their production, and the prices for their orchids have been dropping. “Fortunately, things seem to be stabilizing now and we are hoping for further improvements soon.” 
Christian Schwartz
“Not thinking about flowers”
According to Schwartz, this summer has been challenging as people are travelling again instead of buying flowers. “Summer last year, there was a very high demand for our orchids as people were staying home and buying flowers. And earlier this year we were completely sold out of our orchids around Mother’s Day. Yet afterwards in the high season, during the end of June and mid-July, there was basically no demand at all. People are somewhat able to travel again and, understandably so, they want to go on holidays. And when people are leaving their homes and visiting other places, they are not thinking about buying orchids for their homes.”
“We didn’t cut back production”
Schwartz explains that the drop in demand came quite unexpectedly for them. “Before the pandemic, it was normal for our summer demand to drop after the Mother’s Day peak. Yet, during last year’s summer there was an incredibly high demand. Therefore, we were expecting this summer to be similar and thought people would still be staying home. As a result, we did not cut back our production for this summer, which is something that we normally would do.”
Low prices are stabilizing
As a result of the low demand, it was necessary for Rønbæk to lower their prices. “We had to sell our orchids very cheap in order to get them sold. Yet when there was no demand, the low prices didn’t really matter as it did not increase the demand. Luckily, towards the end of July and the beginning of August, we are noticing that the prices are stabilizing and the demand has been increasing slightly.”
New varieties in the works
In the meantime, Schwartz shares that Rønbæk is continually working on new and improved varieties. “We have our own breeding program with a young plant producer, so throughout everything we are working on new varieties. Especially the small and medium sizes of orchids are doing well, so we have some exciting things coming up in the future.” Overall, prices are stabilizing and demand is starting to slightly increase. “We have been doing orchids for over 20 years now, so we have dealt with ups and downs before. We know we will get through this and inspire people to brighten up their homes again.”
For more information:
Gartneriet Rønbæk
Christian H. Schwartz
chr@roenbaek.dk
www.roenbaek.dk
Danish grower Christian Schwartz, Gartneriet Rønbæk: