Promotional

Ball Horticultural Co. offers growers a choice of branded pots, including its new SoilWrap.

Technology has made using printed pots cheaper and more available to smaller growers across the country. But when does using printed, promotional pots make financial sense?

The answer? Don’t launch such a program to promote a particular plant product unless you have the inventory to back it up, said Bill Doeckel, general manager for Ball Innovations in West Chicago, Ill.

Ball Horticultural Co.’s biggest success with branded pots has been the company’s Wave petunia series, which has been around 20 years. The company now promotes dozens of lines for the floriculture industry, as well as a line of woodies through Ball Ornamentals. The company has no time schedule planned for when it will begin selling its Ball Ornamentals products in printed pots.

“But if there’s one thing we learned the hard way, it’s don’t get ahead of yourself,” Doeckel said. “In our experience you need inventory in the millions, even tens of millions, for these programs to be effective and become recognizable names to consumers.”

Of course that’s on a national scale. For growers that service regional markets, these numbers would be much smaller.

Ball also offers two sustainable printable pots that can be customized. One of the containers is the SoilWrap, which is biodegradable, printable and plantable. It consists of Mirel, a 100 percent renewable material made from biopolymers produced by microbes. It becomes food for beneficial soil microbes and biodegrades in just one season in the garden.

TerraShell is a wheat-derived container that is completely biodegradable and compostable. It is manufactured using thermoform production. The printable 4- and 6-inch pots fit existing automated potting machinery and handle, store and ship like standard thermoform containers.

For more:   Ball Horticultural Co., (630) 231-3500;

www.ballhort.com