Home grown

With one-fifth of UK households now renting, and DIY and garden giant Homebase having well-publicised problems, you could be forgiven for assuming the gardening market was wilting.

However, this is far from the case.

Euromonitor recorded value growth of 3% in the gardening market from 2016 to 2017 and AMA predict that the value of the UK garden products market (inclusive of horticulture, garden equipment and sundries) will grow from £4.9bn today, to £5.3bn by 2021.

So where is this growth coming from? 

Green-fingered urbanites, with a lack of outdoor space, are bringing their gardens indoors.

Houseplants have spiked in popularity over the past year, with high-street brands leading the charge and traditional garden centres playing catch up. IKEA is at the forefront of the trend – with houseplants appearing on their catalogue covers since 1958, and a dedicated houseplant area before the tills in every store, enticing impulse purchases from consumers.

Predominantly, indoor gardens are increasing in popularity in conjunction with the global wellness and mindfulness trends – which promote healthy living and stress reduction.

Gardening is being used as therapy by the increasingly time-poor, and easy to care for plants, such as succulents, are particularly popular. Urban consumers are also choosing plants which oxygenate rooms to combat the effects of record pollution. Sansevieria plants are particularly on-trend.

Sustainability has also helped buck the gardening market, with "grow-your-own" providing a bumper harvest for retailers and consumers alike. This comes as consumers are looking to reduce their waste and live more environmentally friendly lives. Homegrown vegetables are finding their way onto dinner plates more than ever before.

Demand for allotment space is also increasing, with current demand requiring a further 90,000 allotments to be built; this combined with the number of British people choosing a vegetable-based diet (up 360% from 2008) indicates the grow-your-own market is looking healthy.

Gardening has been embraced by the smart home trend, too. Small scale indoor hydroponic kits, such as the Tregren T-series (seen above), have been performing well, and robotic lawn mowers are expected to account for 12% of total lawnmower sales by 2020. Smart sensors and automatic sprinklers are also seeing growth, as time-poor consumers look to tech to automate everyday tasks, inside and outside the home.

Growth isn't just limited to novel trends however; traditional stalwarts of the gardening world have also performed strongly. Horticulture, power-tools and fertilisers have registered value growth, performing as a strong foundation to specific trend-related growth.

In our opinion, gardening looks set to grow well over the next few years, recovering from its slump in 2012. Although the population is renting more, inventive ways of bringing the garden indoors or into smaller spaces are capturing consumer spend.

Sam Rintoul