With 7007 unique visitors from 66 countries, FlowerTrials continues be the centre of floriculture in week 24. No less than 62 breeders showed hundreds of new introductions and many more existing pot and bedding plants to growers, distributors and retailers from across the world. In the words of new FlowerTrials exhibitor Gaël de Cock from De Cock Plants, ”FlowerTrials was top”. Michael Perry, UK social media reporter, stated that “he will never get tired of going to this wonderful, creative, colourful event.”
The number of international visitors remained steady with a number of large new delegations attending particularly from Taiwan, Mexico and Korea. The total number of local visitors showed a slight decline over 2018 which can almost certainly be attributed to the Whitsun weekend preceding the week 24 event and the poor weather conditions. Later in the week when weather conditions improved the numbers caught up, with the Thursday being the best third day on record.
Higher reach thanks to clustering
The average FlowerTrials visitor visited 13 exhibiting breeders at 5 locations. This is a 9% increase compared to 2018, and is a positive result of the cluster strategy which has been adopted by the organisation. Due to the increasing number of participating companies, the FlowerTrials board has advised exhibitors to team up and share locations in order to ensure an efficient visitor journey. Visitor numbers show that cluster locations have registered an increase in footfall.
Gill Corless, Marketing Manager Sakata Ornamentals Europe and Chairwoman of the FlowerTrials Foundation: “If I take the example of our company, we are happy with our decision to welcome Queen Genetics and Van den Bos at the Sakata FlowerTrials location. The various assortments have clearly resulted in an increase and differentiation at visitor level. We see this as positive for the FlowerTrials in general.”
