ESSEN, Germany, January 26, 2010: Nurseries can now guarantee pot plants with a mininum shelf life of ten days in the shops without extra watering.  Jackpot, a leading Danish provider of sleaves, labels and decorative pots,  has developed and patented the concept “EASY WATERTM – LONG LIFE”. EASY WATERTM is a flower pot cover with a built-in water reservoir and has been introduced at the IPM 2010 in Essen, Germany.
“It is a big problem to keep the plants fresh and watered in the retail chain including supermarkets, garden centres, service stations and other places where the modern consumer more and more prefers to buy the pot plants”, says inventor Jørn Hansen. “Often these types of shops have a waste of up to half of the plants, because they dry out and die, because there is not enough staff to take care of the plants. The waste gives a loss to the shop and the consumer has a bad experience with the plants he has bought. This has inspired JACKPOT to invent a special decorated plastic flower pot cover which can contain about 1/3 litre of water, which the plant can drink quietly while waiting in the shop for a new home.”
For some years JACKPOT has successfully marketed flower pots with ”frosted glass” decoration and now a new functionality is added.
As added bonus the consumer only has to control water level a few times per month and when the water reservoir is full the pot plant in the EASY WATERTM cover will be able to manage for 1-2 weeks. When the pot plant consumer goes on holiday it is no longer necessary to ask the neighbour to look after the plants and the consumer gets much more value for the money.
“We have made some calculations” says Torben Moth Madsen, owner of the nursery Rosa Danica A/S in Marslev at Funen. The nursery is the first to launch the invention in the market. “If the shop gets additional sales of 5% the account is balanced and we estimate that it will be easy. We therefore introduce the product to chosen customers from the beginning of February and we see it as a breakthrough for especially our production of ‘Kordana’ pot roses – a production of more than 10 millions per year”.
The nursery Thoruplund A/S in Fraugde at Funen liked the idea from the beginning. Thoruplund will sell their Campanula ‘Blue Ocean ®’ in the new flower pot with the name EASY WATERTM LONG LIFE. This refers to the easy way to water and the much longer durability. “EASY WATERTM” gives only few extra costs in production and marketing. The concept gives a new interest in the Danish pot plants on the big European export market. “New development is crucial for success and EASY WATERTM is a fine contribution” says Sales Manager Bodil C. Johansen from Thoruplund A/S.
Denmark is still the second largest exporter of pot plants in the world with an export value of about 2.4 billion DKK per year.