Vegetable plant giveaway aims to encourage people to garden

On May 21, the Burpee Home Gardens Team handed out nearly 2,000 garden-ready vegetable plants to early-morning commuters in downtown Chicago. The purpose of the promotion was to celebrate the passing of the frost-free date and to encourage consumers to grow vegetables.

Six racks of vegetables including peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, pumpkins and herbs were delivered to the site. The plants were gone in less than an hour.

The Burpee employees were also interested in getting people to think about why they garden. Burpee sees four main motivators behind vegetable gardening: Eating better, Education, Environment and Economy.

This year, Burpee launched its “I Can Grow” program, a national program to support a new, popular interest in home vegetable gardening among younger and novice gardeners. Community and youth gardening events have been planned across the country as part of the program promotion.