On a podcast I listened to recently (and sorry – I forget which one) I heard this question: If native plants perform better than nonnatives, why have garden centers sold primarily nonnatives? The interviewee, a native-plant advocate, provided two reasons, equally interesting: the public doesn’t appreciate them, and garden centers prefer nonnatives because they make more money off patented plants.
Which prompted me to ask my closest garden-center buddies (former owner and staff of Behnkes Nurseries, which closed in 2019), how they would answer the question. And I clearly asked the right people – so knowledgeable! Imagine if the garden departments of big box stores had people like these guys answering your questions! No, it’s impossible to imagine.
Besides being my favorite former garden center, I think Behnkes is a great source on this subject because from my observation, it made more effort than any other independent garden center to sell natives. So I asked their top experts: Why don’t garden centers sell more natives?
First up, Miri Talabac was the buyer of woody plants at Behnkes for decades until it closed. Since then, she’s helped gardeners across Maryland through her work as the Ask Extension expert in woodies. As someone who’s asked Ask Extension several questions since Miri started working there, I can attest that her answers are longer, more researched and more big-picture than I could have imagined receiving. Miri has a degree in entomology.
What the public wants
“The gardening public wants reliable, attractive plants that stand out from their surroundings (the natives (and yes, non-native invasives now too) that surround us are often perceived as unkempt or boring), so many of the non-native perennials, shrubs, etc., add a touch of the exotic and exciting as unique-looking plants. (Yeah, most plants look unique, but our natural environs don’t have blue-flowered mophead hydrangeas, yellow-edged evergreen euonymus, sunset-hue-leaved Japanese spirea, and roses that bloom from Mother’s Day to Halloween.)
“Plus, these exotic species generally have been bred and developed into numerous cultivars more extensively (and perhaps over a longer period of time) than native plants have, so we have more options for new and stand-out traits than we have had for natives. New and richer colors, dwarf growth habits, foliage colors, disease resistance, etc.
“That said, the growing movement behind using and valuing native plants for their ecosystem benefits, especially for people focused on using only straight species for supporting genetic diversity, is starting to change some of that public expectation of what nurseries should carry, but there’s still plenty of uninitiated or uninterested shoppers who just want a reliably blue hydrangea, a large-flowered, scented, long-stemmed, thornless rose…what-have-you.”
The role of growers
“Perhaps less so now as they become more mainstream or hip, but in the past, nursery growers of native plants just didn’t treat them like they would any other standard nursery fare (grown for uniformity and consistency), so they’d look messier in the pot, would have more unpredictable traits, etc. Many would be more ‘restoration-grade’ than ‘retail-grade,’ at least in my experience. I remember a presentation from a UConn student/graduate many years ago who was advocating for the nursery industry to make native plant inventory more appealing and approachable to consumers by treating it like the grower would other crops…pruning for uniformity and a dense growth habit, for example.”
Perceptions of native plants
“Native plants used to be perceived as weedy and/or messy (and it doesn’t help PR that several have “weed” right there in their common name), so maybe shoppers were afraid they’d not only look unappealing for curb appeal, neighbor approval, or HOA approval, but that they’d also be harder to maintain so they don’t take over or detract from other plantings.”
Shortage of supply
“Especially in recent times, supply hasn’t been keeping up with demand, though they’re trying. As interest in the use of native plants increases, demand is outpacing supply, which was already struggling to meet the needs of both retail and restoration plantings. I think I heard in another symposium that the Bureau of Land Management uses a high percentage (at least half? 70%? I forget exactly) of the native seed collected/available any given year for forest/habitat restoration projects. Given that wholesale nurseries are always going to have shrinkage when some of the plants die before being sold, that adds another hit to the availability that hampers large-scale adoption of stocking a higher percentage of one’s garden center with native plants. Add to that the ‘purist’ need for more species-only (no cultivars) availability, and that shrinks the options even further, since many of the native plants nurseries sell are cultivars.”
Deer!
“Too many deer. Plenty of non-native plants are unappealing to deer, whereas not as many native plants are, at least at current levels of browsing pressure due to overpopulation.
Do natives really perform better?
“I disagree with folks who assert that native plants perform better in gardens just by virtue of being native, and I know Larry [Hurley, Behnkes perennials manager] has also maintained the point that ‘right plant, right place’ dictates much more about planting success than whether what you put in a certain spot is native or not. I could plant a moisture-loving, sun-loving native Buttonbush in dry shade and it will struggle or fail because I didn’t meet the plant’s needs, and a non-native hardy plumbago will do just fine.
“Heck, one reason so many non-native plants are probably still in wide use is because they can handle a wider array of conditions, or less-than-ideal conditions, and still perform admirably well. (Crapemyrtle and Callery Pear, anyone?) There’s always exceptions — some non-natives are very picky and some natives are very adaptable — but I do dislike when native plant aficionados claim as a blanket statement that they will do better overall just because they evolved in our region. After all, if native plants always did better or had a leg up on non-natives, we wouldn’t have nearly the rampant problem of invasive plants as we do.”
Branding?
“Yes, branded plants cost the consumer more at retail. They also cost more for the breeder/grower to produce, between years of trials, registering a patent or trademark to protect their breeding investment, developing point-of-purchase materials and marketing, paying more for branded containers and tags, etc. I don’t know if a retailer actually makes more margin on branded plants proportionate to non-branded plants…after all, there’s only so much pricing discrepancy you can get away with if a customer doesn’t know or care why XYZ plant in a white pot is ‘better’ than ABC plant in a black pot and demands a higher price.
“Providers of branded plant lines have also been paying attention to which way the wind is blowing and have already latched onto the growing native plant interest, having added some of those species/hybrids/cultivars to their lineups. American Beauties and Proven Winners are two commonplace examples. I think David Culp’s Brandywine Cottage line (through Cavano’s, is it?) has also recently done the same, featuring some natives and some esoteric exotics. Sure, you can’t fit many natives into Endless Summer’s lineup (though don’t they now have an H. arborescens variety in there too?) or into a Knock Out rose lineup, but then they can always just create a new brand just for natives, as American Beauties did years ago. Stocking lots of branded lines just increases a garden center’s overall perceived price point for shoppers…not something I think most garden centers want unless they cultivate a boutique/niche/high-end shopping experience. Garden centers understandably already gripe about the added costs of branded plants to each other all the time on social media.”
Turning that old retail ship around
“I think part of the problem is just a resistance to change, a la…’we always sell hundreds of cherrylaurel, privet, barberry, and English ivy flats every year as go-to foundation plants everyone uses and puts on landscape plans…why mess with that?’ I think some members of the industry will whine about pending (I hope) MDA [Md. Dept of Ag] regulations becoming stricter on what invasive species can be sold in Maryland. To them I’d just say: you’ve had plenty of time to see which way public opinion on this is changing and to decide on your own to drop those particular products from your inventory, and you chose not to change what you stock. Now, you should be able to jump on that invasive-shunning, native-embracing bandwagon and make up for lost barberry and ivy sales by stocking more XYZ natives.
“Of course, the issue there goes back with the inventory shortage again, as there are only so many natives to go around. I know the Maryland Native Plants Program (the partnership between UMD Extension, MDA, DNR, and the MD Native Plant Society) is working towards helping growers learn propagation skills and tricks for natives in demand to bulk-up the local supply of seed sourced from local populations of native plants (ecotypes). It’ll take time to get there, though, especially since some wholesale growers may keep their propagation tactics close to the vest to have an edge over their competition, rather than sharing information that would (in my opinion) benefit the industry as a whole.”
Larry with Easter bonnet for family Zoom session
Now let’s hear from Larry Hurley, who grew perennials in Behnke’s production nursery before spending decades as its perennials buyer. His answers here pertain solely to perennials. “At peak we were selling maybe 200,000 perennials a year through three stores and a landscape department.” I’ll add that Behnkes’ perennial selection was so outstanding that busloads of people would come from as far away as North Carolina on shopping expeditions.
Larry received degrees in zoology and horticulture at the University of Wisconsin.
Behnkes history promoting natives
Back in the ’80s Behnkes had access to some officially collected native plants under license from sites that were going to be developed, and they knew they had a demand for them, but “Unfortunately, our survival rate in potting and growing them on was low. We gave up after several years.”
Around 2000 John Peter Thompson, a Behnke family member, became involved in invasive plant groups in Maryland. [He went on to serve on the Maryland’s Invasive Species Council.]
“We worked to reduce or eliminate the sales of invasive ornamentals at Behnke’s, and at the same time set up a native plant program. We decided to define native plants as plants that were on the Maryland Native Plant Society list of native plants of Maryland. At that time we were publishing a quarterly print newsletter mailed to 45,000 people, and we promoted natives and came up with the ‘Take a Closer Look’ program to steer people away from invasive ornamentals and toward native alternatives. We identified natives as ‘Baysafe’ with a blue logo on our store signage.
By the time Behnkes closed, it “had a successful program, and my recollection is that native plants were about 20% of our sales. This includes nativars.
“I believe that most people who are aware that native plants are important think just like I do as customers: 1) Does the plant have appeal to me through flowers or foliage? It has to have aesthetic appeal. 2) Is it deer and/or rabbit resistant? If not, I am going to have to spray it and probably cage it. I am getting used to chicken wire cages but they are low on the aesthetic meter. 3) Is it native?”
Merchandising
“We tried various approaches to native plant display at the garden center. When we put native shrubs with native perennials as a ‘native section,’ it didn’t work. It was hard to stock, and we found that most customers were looking for a shrub or tree or perennial, and might buy a native plant, but few came in specifically looking for native plants exclusively. This has probably changed some in the last ten years.
“We found that having a native plant display within the department worked best, and peppering the more popular natives within the larger display of perennials (which we had in alphabetical order by scientific name) with our Baysafe signage was the most effective.”
The role of garden centers
“A garden center is a generalist retailer that provides a wide variety of plants and supplies to gardeners. What the garden center sells is demand-based. The garden center can have some influence on what people buy, but ultimately they are going to stock what sells. My thinking for Behnke Nurseries was: We are in the business of providing perennials to suburban and urban gardeners; we were not an environmental restoration business.
“In order to have more native plants to sell, there has to be a demand for them. So, if you want native plants, talk to the garden center staff and buy what they offer that fits your needs.
“I think a garden center perennial sales area is like a food buffet. At the food buffet you have all sorts of salads, main dishes, and desserts. As a consumer, you are bombarded with warnings about the dangers of highly processed foods, fats, carbohydrates. And a proportion of folks will heed those warnings and stick to the salads and vegetables. But most people go for a selection. Or pile on the desserts.
“There are specialty suppliers for careful eaters and for native plant buyers, but a garden center is not going to survive as a specialist. Note that these suppliers tend to be mail order firms that attract a small number of customers from a very wide area to survive. Most garden center customers come into the store, look around, are overwhelmed, and buy some plants that have pretty flowers. Like the dessert buffet. Others come in and just buy what they think will be easy to grow. One trip, one afternoon of planting, done for the year. It’s like cars. I just want one that gets me from one place to another with minimal care.”
Perennials manager Karin Coppins among pollinator plants.
About patents, etc
“I think you brought up the idea of patenting plants and no one wants to grow the native plants because they aren’t patentable unless they have some trait which would make them stand out. Then you have your vegetatively propagated nativar – which native plant purists don’t want because they may be less wildlife friendly/attractive than the seed-propagated, local seed strains.
“There are wholesalers who breed plants for specific traits and patent them. There is a lot of money in patents, but that goes as a royalty to the patent holder. So, if Behnke grew a Foamflower patented by Terra Nova Nurseries and we bought plants (known as liners) from them to pot up, we would pay a licensing fee of say, 25 cents a plant to Terra Nova. If, on the other hand, we bought liners of butterfly weed from North Creek Nurseries, they aren’t patented and there is no royalty.
“So, plant breeders have a monetary interest in hybrids and selections. But the general grower usually grows an assortment of patented and non-patented plants, and the quality is good across the board. The grower is looking for plants that are relatively easy to grow, plants that survive in the pot, and plants that have aesthetic appeal and for which there is a demand, that the grower can sell.
“What I often see in garden centers or at native plant sales is a native plant display from a small grower specializing in native plants, and they are usually small plants in small pots for a high price. And not just slow-growing plants like trilliums, but plants like Cardinal Flower or Helenium that should make a full pot. So I think there is a learning curve on the part of some of these small growers in terms of turning out a higher quality product that justifies the price.”
Want native plants to buy? Larry’s advice
- Create a demand and you will see more native plants at garden centers.
- Follow through on the demand by actually shopping at the garden center.
- Patronize your specialist online growers as well.
- Remember that most people want their yards to have aesthetic appeal, and they don’t want to spend a lot of time caring for fussy plants. Success encourages further planting.
- Drop the canard that just because a plant is native to a region, that it automatically is going to be adapted to garden life. The native soil has been scraped off and replaced with soil from the basement dig. Homes in cities are in heat islands with additional stress from air pollution. As Miri pointed out above, just because it lives in Maryland in a marsh doesn’t mean it’s going to do well in your yard.
- It’s important that garden center staff be on board. We had a number of part-time staff at Behnke’s who were native plant fans. So maybe take a part-time job in the spring and steer customers to native plants.
And last words from a Behnke
Stephanie and I, some years back.
“Well, I don’t know about other garden centers but we had the Behnke BaySafe program years before anyone thought about natives and invasive plants. My brother John Peter Thompson and Larry Hurley did a lot to promote them. And the Chesapeake Bay Trust thanked us for our work.
“But so many people want what they want, and they will go somewhere else if you don’t have it. And they want instant gratification. We saw that’s when they bought the very expensive container gardens in the spring. They did not want to wait for smaller annuals to grow. They drive around and see this or that and say wow! I want that. Magazines still showcase the hot plants.
“I also feel that the majority of customers just do not know or really care about natives. Which is why it is so important for the word to get out.”
Thank you, Susan. There’s a lot of good information packed in your story. I loved Behnke’s and visited often.
Excellent article
I especially like the statement if natives are so much hardier than nonnative why do we have problems with invasive species?
So what’s being sold in Japanese garden centers? Mostly (Japanese) natives?
very good article. I found it so disheartening that locally-based nurseries (not those that specialize in cacti) in Tucson had their native plants so far from the showroom that an employee gave me a ride in the cart to get to it. The showrooms were full of things like orchids, tropicals, petunias, bougainvillia, etc.. the Sonoran desert is a hard venue for gardeners (in my opinion) so why in the world not promote the natives????
Thanks for including the pros and cons in such a good way. I love Native plants but have to understand that not all are suited to urban gardens which have limited space.
I appreciate the center employees’ perspectives. Thanks for interviewing them!
I think that the more expensive our municipal water becomes, the more interested people will become in site-appropriate natives and other less thirsty plants. They may not usually be as showy as exotic plants, but there are other ways to bring in interest.
Also, I find that I’m happy with one slightly needier prima donna as a landscaping “dessert” in the yard, especially when it’s strategically placed both to meet its needs and provide maximum impact.
Great article. Another big fan of Behnke’s who used to drive down from Baltimore. I spend the summer in New Hampshire and this morning visited an excellent native plant nursery outside of Warner. I am looking forward to comparing how these plants perform versus non-natives as welll as natives purchased through the wholesaler chain.
Great article. Another big fan of Behnke’s who used to drive down from Baltimore. I spend the summer in New Hampshire and this morning visited an excellent native plant nursery outside of Warner. I am looking forward to comparing how these plants perform versus non-natives as well as natives purchased through the wholesaler chain.
Thank you Susan – great round up of opinions.
I can’t agree that native plants are browsed more than non-native plants, as I grow many taxa in both camps, and see damage frequently. This is such a difficult thing to study, as something that is not browsed in my garden is browsed in the garden of a friend across the road, or an hour away, and the choices in every garden are different. I recently read the blanket statement on a government website that non-native viburnum are not eaten where native species are (used to justify why they shouldn’t be planted), which is patently false. It would be an interesting thing to study scientifically, perhaps using a randomly selected group of plants adapted to a particular habitat on a well-documented migration path.
I don’t want the deer eating my plants, but the fact that they eat the Hydrangea paniculata just as readily as the Solidago rugosa is interesting in terms of their own adaptation to a changing landscape. After all, they are a native species. – MW
Thanks for this comprehensive overview of the challenges and opportunities for garden centers. I own a small nursery in mid-coast Maine that specializes in Maine natives, woodland plants, and rock garden plants. I propagate from seed, cutting, and division, and, like a garden center, bring in “retail ready” stock sometimes. All of my plants are intermingled on the sale benches according to light and moisture requirements. My goal is to have the native flora grown right along with the “nice visitors from away”, as we call all our pleasant non-natives in Vacationland. They are all plants and they all have various attributes. They also all pose various challenges. People need to plant more plants. If I can get them to under plant every shrub cultivar in their garden with a sweet little native sedge, I will have done something useful. But the creativity just barely begins there! Also, of our natives are beloved visitors from away (or invasive!) in other countries and are prized for their ornamental value. Pokeweed and Helenium, to name just two. Garden Centers don’t usually propagate too many of their plants. More and more wholesalers are offering a retail way to purchase landscape plug-sized native perennials. I even offer these. They are economical and a great way to try something new or really get a patch going. More garden centers could up-pot these to grow on to larger sizes. There are plenty of native plants available but you need both educated buyers and sales staff, and to establish both consistency and cues to care on the sales bench in order introduce what are essentially new plants into the standard homeowner palate and get folks intrigued. Pictures of bloom help (just as they do with more conventional plants). Ok, those are my additions to your excellent work in no particular order. Thank you!
A good reason why the environment is losing its native plants is because they are food for native animals as they co-evolved together. So don’t buy native to avoid the browsing heartache, buy native to help support a broken ecology that needs mending. For all the reasons in Susan’s article, we can’t expect commercial garden centers to instantly bend to the ever shifting whims of the public. Try supporting native plant society’s and plant preserve’s native plant sales as a source. Buying seeds from reliable growers and propagating your own using the “winter sowing” method is extremely rewarding. Why are you growing natives in the first place? Are you hoping to support some specialists that are in danger? The layers of ecology surrounding each species is so complicated in the first place that it’s unrealistic to just plop in a few milkweeds and save the Monarchs, or set up a grove of lupine (must be Lupinus perennis) to save the Karner Blue butterfly. My own folly is to match up the insect with its host plant and propagate same. Native bees are specialists too, needing their own species of flowering plants. That crazy little bee, the Wool Carder Bee, uses the fuzzy fibers on the lamb’s ear plant to line it nest. Gardening should be a joy to engage in and, God willing, help something else to survive or to promote and share happiness with our fellow humans.
I grew up going to Behnke’s with my mother in the 1960’s and it was a formative part of my development as a gardener (even though the duck pond was Probably what got us there!) . It’s so interesting to read about their expertise and experience with native plants. I still mourn their closing.
Two years ago, native plant advocates organized an effort to legally mandate native plants on all public and commercial properties in California. The nursery trade was one of several gardening constituencies that stepped up to defeat that effort. This story is the California version of your excellent article.
The Associate Director of Plant California Alliance published an editorial about the proposed law (AB1573) in an agricultural newsletter. Plant California Alliance represents “California’s nursery industry. Our membership includes farmers, growers, urban agriculturists, wholesalers, retail garden centers, landscapers, garden suppliers, horticulturalists, as well as educators and researchers.” This is an organization with horticultural knowledge and practical experience growing plants in California. The editorial explained why the goals of AB1573 are unrealistic and based on mistaken assumptions about California native plants:
• There aren’t enough native plants available for sale to meet such a requirement. California Native Plant Society claims nursery sales are about 6% native, but two large wholesale nurseries estimate their stock is not more than 1% native.
• “…there is also the fundamental question of why a native plant mandate is included in a water conservation bill at all. Not all native plants are low water plants…Sometimes a non-native plant is a better choice when designing a drought resilient, low water garden.” California Water Service recommends: “Plants that are adapted to long, dry summers and short, rainy winters are called “Mediterranean-zone” plants. These include plants that are native to California, as well as those that originated in southern Europe, South America, and other “Mediterranean” climates. These plants don’t need much water in the summer and have thrived in water-scarce conditions for thousands of years.”
• “And, what about native plants’ impacts on fire? Unfortunately, some California native plants are not considered fire-resistant, and some are even considered fire prone. For example, FireSafe Marin has several California native plants on their list of fire-prone plants, including manzanita (Arctostaphylos), coyote brush (Baccharis spp.), California buckwheat (Erigonum fasciculatum), and California bay (Umbellularia californica).” Most wildfires in California occur in native chaparral and native conifer forests. When wildfires occur in residential neighborhoods, the homes themselves are the primary fuel for the fire. Everything burns in wind-driven fires, regardless of the native origins of plants.
The preference for native plants persists in California, but it’s based on personal preference, not the bogus claims about the superiority of native plants for the environment. Horticultural professionals understand this and respond to those preferences accordingly, as any business would. That’s why there are few native plants in local nurseries.
Thanks for this interesting article and to the nursery trade for giving gardeners what they want.
Very informative and relatable. We lived in Eureka CA for our first 69 years where we enjoyed our coastal garden for 45 years. We added a few natives as time went on. Since we wanted to be near children and grandchildren we moved to the Williamette Valley in Oregon. Your new home on one area of land had 3 dying Alders. So our first nursery trip was to a native nursery to replace the Alders. Well, let the fun begin. The nursery owner was very knowledgeable and gave great advice. Bought a pickup load of natives which most worked out and some did not. We continue to shop at our native plant specialist and a couple of garden centers in Portland that have a large assortment of natives. We consult Oregon State Extension often. Have learned from our mistakes as our property is wetland, riparian woods, and dry -sunny and shady. Still have our patches of conventional plants (like our natives) that are deer resistant and drought tolerant for the most part. It has been a challenge but truly a wonderful adventure in our retirement.. Right plant -Right place is the answer!
This article sets out to answer a simple question: If native plants perform better, why don’t garden centers sell more of them? The answer, apparently, is: Because hydrangeas are blue and people are lazy.
What follows is a meandering nostalgia tour of a closed garden center, Behnke’s, where former staff deliver long, defensive monologues full of industry insider logic. We’re told customers don’t want natives because they look messy, have “weed” in their names, and aren’t available in sunset colors or patented containers. Also: deer. Also: blue hydrangeas.
The pièce de résistance is the food buffet analogy — because nothing helps you understand the crisis of native plant underutilization like imagining coneflowers as coleslaw. If customers pile their plates with sugary cultivars, well, it’s not our job to nudge them toward the kale. Garden centers, we’re told, are not environmental institutions. They’re just there to sell what sells — even if what sells is actively harming ecosystems.
To be clear: this isn’t an argument against non-native plants or even hybrids. It’s a thorough self-report of an industry that followed consumer demand instead of helping shape it — and then acted surprised that the demand didn’t shift on its own.
If this is the industry’s answer to a biodiversity crisis, it’s no wonder invasive barberry is still getting more shelf space than Asclepias. The problem isn’t that native plants don’t work. It’s that the people selling them don’t actually want to change the menu.
Reductionist arguments framed in condescending wordsmithery does not nudge people towards the kale any more than imagining coneflowers as coleslaw.
Particularly when it’s unfairly aimed at business people who devoted decades to the uphill battle to get people to grow ANYTHING, regardless of passport status — and who are happy to share observations of consumer patterns. Sadly it is only a small fraction of people in this country who garden. Thankfully it’s an even smaller fraction who share your zealotry.
Just when we thought we couldn’t handle one more crisis, along comes the “crisis of native plant underutilization.” Now I’ll be up all night. – MW