| Panel Discussion: Help Your Customers Become More Successful
Date: August 8, 2023 .... Time: 1:00 - 1:45 p.m. Our industry welcomed roughly 18.3 million new gardeners as a result of the Covid pandemic, according to estimates. And of course, we want to keep them. So let's pat ourselves on the back for doing a good job teaching "Gardening 101" to our customers over the past few years. But is it time to up our game to "Gardening 102?" What is your in-store experience? How are your customers behaving in this uncertain economic climate? Are they spending like it's 2020 or cautiously doing so? How are you getting customers in your store when it's oh. so. tempting. to buy online? Once they're in your brick-and-mortar, what is your garden center doing to help budding gardeners cultivate their green thumbs so they're successful in their gardens and come back to your store for more? We'll hear from representatives of very different independent garden centers. We'll learn how they're doing and what they're doing to help their customers become more successful gardeners inside and outside. If you want your garden center to succeed in the short term for the long term, this is a not-to-be-missed lively discussion where attendees participate as panelists in the conversation.
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Amanda Thomsen - Author, Speaker and Garden Overlord @ Kiss My Aster .
Amanda Thomsen is an author, speaker and garden overlord from suburban Chicago. Her monthly column, Kiss My Aster, can be found in Green Profit magazine. Her shop, Aster Gardens, is a quirky and creative plant & garden shop in historic Lemont, IL.
Amanda Thomsen .... AKA Kiss My Aster!
Practical, fun, imperfect gardens for everyone! Amanda Thomsen is a horticulturist, garden designer, keynote speaker, freelance writer, backyard consultant, and author living in suburban Chicago. Amanda wants to help the world live more sustainably (but without a load of effort and twice the fun!). Amanda has been working in gardens, garden centers and landscaping for the last 20 years. Her focus is bringing rule-breaking fun, a little kitsch and a lot of humor into an industry that is often thought of as stodgy and full of rules. Amanda speaks and gives classes at all-sized events throughout the United States.
Practical, fun, imperfect gardens for everyone! Professional horticulturist, landscape designer, author of Kiss My Aster & Backyard Adventure and Mother of Gardening Memes .
Amanda Thomsen is a horticulturist, garden designer, keynote speaker, freelance writer, backyard consultant, and author living in suburban Chicago. Amanda wants to help the world live more sustainably (but without a load of effort and twice the fun!). Amanda has been working in gardens, garden centers and landscaping for the last 20 years. Her focus is bringing rule-breaking fun, a little kitsch and a lot of humor into an industry that is often thought of as stodgy and full of rules. Amanda speaks and gives classes at all-sized events throughout the United States.
Amanda Thomsen is the author of two books: Kiss My Aster: A Graphic Guide to Creating a Terrific Yard Totally Tailored to You (Storey 2012) and Backyard Adventure: Get Messy, Get Wet, Build Cool Things, and Have Tons of Fun (Storey 2019). She is half of The Garden Girls podcast and produces a one-woman gardening show, Mud Life Crisis. She has a monthly column in the garden center industry magazine, Green Profit. Amanda was chosen to attend the Better Homes and Gardens Stylemaker event in NYC in 2017 & 2018.
