"Diana Kulaga" wrote in message
hlink.net...
Interesting! My first reaction to what Ruth described was to assume
that
the clerk mentioned is "ethically challenged", to be politically
correct.
;-) I guess I have assumed a survival strategy of hoping for the best
but
expecting the worst since in that way, one is never really disappointed
and
occassionally surprised.

Yeah, maybe I did cut the clerk too much slack. Still, *most* growers are
honest and helpful, in my experience. You are right, though, that many
growers develop repeat customers because the plants die due to poor care.
But I tend to blame that on the buyer who doesn't pay attention to the
culture sheets.

Yes, I agree in part. But often these culture sheets are not available from
the vendor. If I had the money to set up a retail operation selling house
plants, and supplies for them, I'd be making sure that I had detailed
information for the customers, and regularly hold workshops to teach
customers about orchids and how to take care of them. And on a price basis
alone, the other nurseries and big box stores would not be able to comete
unless they dramatically dropped their prices (a NOID phal at Zehrs or Home
Depot here will cost C$25-C$40, and similar phals at any of the orchid
society shows or meetings could be had for C$10 to C$15), and MUCH better,
properly labelled phals could be had for only a little more. These people
aren't about to provide culture sheets to their customers. Nor are they
going to hire people who really know what they're doing when it comes to
keeping the plants alive. Only a bad result can be expected when a consumer
who knows nothing buys from such a vendor at grossly inflated prices.

Look at it this way: For every buyer who picks up one white Phal (and
lets
it die after flowering) annually, how many are simply turned off after
watching that Phal kick the bucket, and never buy another orchid, period?
If I were in the business I'd bend over backward to see to it that the
buyer
succeeded with his/her first plant. You know - create another addict!
S

I fully agree. There is nothing better for a business (regardless of the
business) than a knowledgable customer. And it doesn't matter what the
business is! I know that in this area, only a tiny portion of the business
people making decisions about how to run their business have any
acquaintance with how IT, used correctly, can help their bottom line. Their
eyes glaze over if you start talking about workstations, servers, software
integration, web apps and the like. And I know a number of businesses
(selling computer and peripheral hardward) who have been told by their
customers that they will only buy shrink wrapped software from companies
like Microsoft because they and their colleagues have been burned too many
times buy folk developing custom software. I am presently helping out with
one project in which the coding is actually very basic because the client
doesn't really know what could be done. And I know of many cases where had
the idiot who sold the clients their software sold a properly integrated
system and the right software for the job, the clients' productivity could
have been as much as four times greater than it can be at present. Needless
to say, such bungling results in the alleged productivity gains from IT not
materializing and business folk becoming highly sceptical of new projects,
especially custom projects. They simply do not want to hear from IT
consultants who do know what they're doing how they've been badly served by
their previous supplier and how if their systems and procedures were
re-engineered they'd see tremendous improvements in their productivity and
profit margins.

C$50/plant seems like a lot of money. And it is outrageously expensive if
the plant will stay in bloom for even a month or two and then die. But if
you know that if you keep it happy, i will give decades of blooms, then the
cost is almost nothing. If you believe the plant you just bought will only
die after a few months (or less), then you might buy another only on very
special occassions and even then only if you have money to burn. If, OTOH,
you believe that with proper care it will conitue giving blooms for years or
decades, then you are likely to fill every available spot in your home with
yet another beautiful plant.

Hehe! If our schemes to create more orchid addicts works, our cities will
eventually become filled with houses and apartments with sun rooms or
attached greenhouses larger than the rest of the homes combined! :-) That
would be a good thing, wouldn't it?

Cheers,

Ted