“The ambulance felt like the perfect tool to confirm the importance of plants to our health and wellbeing"

An ambulance makes an appearance at the Oxford Business Park. Everyone is keen to know who’s in need of medical help without appearing too nosey. Watching from afar, one person noted something wasn’t quite right – plants kept appearing, peeping out of the back of the ambulance and around the corners of the doors. Where was the patient? And what had happened?

Searching for the bed and the patient in the ambulance was difficult as the back was full of plants, not patients! Proving that visible signage #plantstotherescue is very apt.

This is how National Plants at Work Week opened in 2023. The brainchild of plants@work ambassador Ian Drummond confirmed, “The ambulance felt like the perfect tool to confirm the importance of plants to our health and wellbeing.

“Research over many years has shown that plants improve our moods, reduce stress levels, and generally help our workflow. They can stimulate and improve our performance and concentration, plus they lessen noise around us by deflecting and diffracting sound.”

Shirley Smith of Botanica Nurseries, who has several clients in the business park and looks after their plant installations with the same care as doctors and their patients, commented, “Plants make us more productive and help our creativity as well as reduce our stress levels.”

Ian added, “The ambulance is a great symbol to show how we should respect the work that plants do for us in the same way as we respect the National Health Service, including ambulance crews.”

From July 10 - 14, the company will be celebrating the positive benefits of having plants in the workplace. Plants@work members will support this event with stories on the web using the hashtags #plantsatworkweek and #plantstotheresc