2025 California Spring Trials Wrap-Up
Do you ever wonder how a California Spring Trials display gets to be a real display? Planning starts months and months in advance. It’s amazing how an idea that starts as a pipe dream, moves to a design on paper by our talented marketing team, and finally comes to life in full color!
We start thinking about CAST in September after our product advancement meeting in August where we name and create a story about our new plants. CAST is the perfect setting to focus on the new varieties and set the stage to tell our best plant stories showcasing the benefits they offer our customers.
Take for example our Phlox Candy Cloud™ Series. This new, incredible Phlox blooms after P. divaricata but before Salvia nemorosa and offers show-stopping color. How could we possibly display show-stopping color from afar? What about a Phlox Waterfall!
And that’s exactly what we did! We decided to call the entire display – Spring Showcase since we displayed our other new Spring introductions around our stunning waterfall design, which included Erysimum Brightside™ Series and Geranium Purple Glow. We did include some of our 2024 introductions such as Saxifraga Marto™ Series and Phlox Spring Splash™ Series, which blooms after P. subulata and before P. divaricata. The main take away is that your benches can stay full and have color from early Spring through late Spring. (Check out our new brochure below!)
Darwin Perennials Spring Showcase brochure
Another eye-catching display evolved around our new Penstemons. Did you know Penstemons are hummingbird magnets? In fact, they are like candy for hummingbirds!
Our new introductions included color breakthroughs for Penstemon Rock Candy® – Coral and Pink Improved (compact Penstemon), Penstemon Mountain Treats™ Series (Medium sized) and Penstemon Summit Sweets™ Series (Tall but very manageable at retail).
We took the idea – "Candy for hummingbirds" and created a candy shop display for our customers and for the hummingbirds. So if you are looking to add plants that attract hummingbirds to your assortment, add our new Penstemon. The hummingbirds loved it and so did our customers!
The other two displays showcased our new sun and new shade varieties. Some standouts were our Rudbeckia Suntacular and Brunnera Frost King. Click here for more information about all of our new varieties.
In summary, CAST 2025 was a great success! Our customers learned first-hand about all our new varieties and how they can help grow their perennial footprint successfully.
Darwin Perennials Day Coming Soon
Attention all commercial perennials plant growers, nursery growers, retailers, landscapers, designers and media! Sign up for Darwin Perennials Day and see hundreds of perennial varieties grown in display gardens, trials beds and containers. You don’t want to miss the largest perennials trial at The Gardens at Ball in West Chicago, Illinois. Save your place to see us on June 18, 2025. Register here!