At Mobjack Nurseries, you'll find a wide array of unique and traditional plant materials — from Boxwood to Camellias, the wholesale nursery anticipates selling the newest wave of market trends to reliable favorites. Located in the Mobjack Bay of Virginia, the nursery serves garden centers, re-wholesalers and landscapers in the eastern U.S. since its foundation 85 years ago. And after being in business for close to a century, the one event the nursery never misses is the MANTS trade show.

Lisa Sutton, president of sales, data and logistics at Mobjack, shares how much the show means to the business. “We love seeing the customers and showcasing the materials that we're offering. It's a great show. It just pulls people in from basically all over the world,” she says.

Since they have attended every single year, 2020 marks the 50th year Mobjack will be in attendance. Lisa has attended 23 shows herself. Located just three hours away from MANTS’ host city of Baltimore, Mobjack makes the show a top priority every January. She shares some of the changes she’s seen since the first time she ever walked foot into that first show.

She notes how the show has evolved over the years to adapt to the inventions of new technologies, but without ever losing its charm of the show’s early days. Lisa explains how much easier their travel and unloading processes have become since vendors made the switch to electronic devices. She’s especially thankful for televisions and portable laptops.

“You used to show up with cases and cases — and I mean heavy cases — of printed catalogs. Now you show up and everything's digitized,” Lisa says. “Now you see people showing up with these huge flat screen TVs that have the constant roll of pictures, and before we didn't have that.”

While the addition of new technology has made setup easier, there’s still a lot of behind-the-scenes setup.

“It's six booths total. And we fill it up. We try to showcase everything,” she says.

Lisa praises the MANTS staff when it comes to unloading heavy materials from the nursery’s tractor-trailer.

“These guys, I mean they understand exactly what we want to do. We call it ‘well-orchestrated chaos,’” she says.

Lisa also points out MANTS’ attention to detail when it comes to each vendor’s booth design.

“Kelly does a great job with the show, I mean he is just fantastic to work with. People look forward to the show. It's not a chore, it doesn't feel like work.” She pauses. “Well, setup day does feel like work,” she says with a laugh.

On the floor, she notes how nice it is to see customers face-to-face when they spend the majority of their time communicating through email or text. The same customers come back year after year, and she says these relationships are considered family.

MANTS is the perfect time to network and reconnect with colleagues and consumers, and that’s what the show is all about. Lisa has fond memories of the show. One particular instance she remembers happened in 2001 or 2002, when the nursery sold water plants. Lisa recalls that Mobjack set up an actual pond in the booth to showcase their water plans, which took a great deal of work. Mobjack transported rubber, cinder blocks and all the materials needed for a “pop-up” pond. (“You know, we always have to do the heaviest things,” she interjects.) Chaos ensued when Lisa and her colleague, John Lee, set to work on filling up the pond. The pair had one more task to complete before wrapping up a long day of work. Unfortunately, the hose flung out of John’s grip with an agenda all its own, and Lisa was soaked from head to toe. She laughs at the ridiculousness of the memory.

“I looked at him and I said, 'I was planning on a shower when I got back to the room, but thanks a lot.'”

Along with memories, vendors create and nurture valuable relationships with each other across the industry. Competition doesn’t exist; rather MANTS offers the chance for nursery owners to pick each other’s brains about anything and everything. Whether it’s about specific crop challenges or the type of lining other nurseries have found to be useful, the hub of information flows freely.

“One thing that I really like is that everybody wants to help everybody else. There are no secrets,” she says. “If you asked Tankard Nurseries, 'How did you get that to grow like that?' Well, instantly they're going to answer you.”

Mobjack is gearing up for another year of MANTS, and soon their 2020 showcase will be finalized.

“We try to do some really unique things that other people are not doing, and we try to have the staples that everyone needs,” Lisa says.

She plans on ringing in MANTS’ 50th year the same way she always does: “Every year I take a picture of just our little plaque that says ‘Mobjack’ and the empty booth and then as we progress, I take a few pictures. I really like the end display.”

For five decades, the Mid-Atlantic Nursery Trade Show (MANTS) has provided the green industry with a welcoming place to nurture partnerships and friendships, procure customers and help the green industry thrive.

In 1969 a group of forward-thinking nurserymen from Maryland and Virginia tossed around the idea of a nursery trade show. Carville Akehurst, who served as executive secretary of the Maryland Nurserymen’s Association, was a forthright member of the group who envisioned the show as a vehicle to stimulate commerce for the region’s nursery industry. The following year, the group took action and incorporated the Mid-Atlantic Nurserymen’s Trade Show, formed a board of directors and started ironing out details for the first show. MANTS debuted in 1971 with 64 exhibitors in Williamsburg, Virginia. (Learn more about the charter exhibitors who are still with the show starting on page 8.) Akehurst became the executive vice president of MANTS, a position he held for 30 years.

Akehurst was confident that MANTS would be an asset for the nursery business, a venture that would involve his wife and eventually his children.

A natural leader

“He was very much an administrative type of person, a good, solid businessman type that made him a natural to manage the association,” says Vanessa Finney, Akehurt’s daughter and current executive vice president of MANTS. “That was a good starting point for pulling together MANTS.”

Vanessa’s mom, Nancy, was an integral part of the administration of the show.

“Mom was a teacher, but she helped dad with a lot of the show’s administrative duties such as typing and mailings. When it came to stuffing envelopes, we all got in on that chore. I remember sitting at the kitchen table with my sisters when I was 7 or 8 years old stuffing envelopes,” Vanessa recalls.

The core mission

When Akehurst and his fellow MANTS founders started the show, the core mission was to stimulate commerce for the region. It was all about business from the start. And that’s persisted for the entire 50 years of the show, as the management uses the tagline, “MANTS means business.” The founders knew that nurseries needed to build relationships for the industry to thrive.

“They valued those face-to-face relationships,” Vanessa says.

The West Virginia Nurserymen’s Association became the show’s third partner by 1972.

Traditionally, MANTS was a nursery show and for many years featured only green goods. But the show has diversified to include allied companies — anything a grower would need to produce plants, all the way through the supply chain to goods bought at a garden center.

“And we continue to diversify with software companies, insurance firms, staffing companies, robotics and drones,” Vanessa says. “We certainly value the green goods side of the show and we know it’s important to stick to our roots.”

No matter how the industry morphs with new products, technologies and services, building relationships based on trust, integrity and honesty are the tenets of success for MANTS.

“The names of the state associations may have changed and the name of the show many have changed, but the core mission has never changed,” Vanessa says.

The MANTS staff and the board repeatedly analyze the show and its elements to make sure the needs of the exhibitors and attendees are met. They’re cognizant that it would be dangerous to slip into a rut, Vanessa explains.

“We discuss how or if things should be handled differently, including adding speakers or receptions, for instance,” she says. “Based on strong feedback from exhibitors, we’re staying the course. The exhibitors have mandated they just want a trade show.

“We are sticking to our core because it works and it’s very successful. But we continue to look at the big picture and make sure our mission is going in the right direction for the right reasons. We produce a consistent product for people. They have come to know what to expect and we meet those expectations. Exhibitors tell us we make it easy for them to exhibit.”

The MANTS culture encompasses consistency and integrity, coupled with open communication — something Vanessa’s father and the other founders worked hard to create and what the current team embraces.

“I’m proud of our MANTS culture and we’re known for that culture,” Vanessa says. “I want to deliver on that every year.”

MANTS is operated by a staff of four led by Vanessa and her husband Kelly. In recent years, they enlisted the help of Maroon PR, which helps handle marketing and other responsibilities for the show. A small staff managing a show with approximately 1,500 booths and more than 11,000 attendees requires strong relationships based on trust, something first cultivated by Vanessa’s father and his partners 50 years ago.

“We went from a mom-and-pop organization to something much more sophisticated,” Vanessa says. “We have a full-fledged decorating company and a registration company. But we still hold on to those mom-and-pop values.”

The Finney’s company, Quercus Inc., also manages the Maryland Nursery, Landscape and Greenhouse Association, as well as a few other professional associations.

Carville, Nancy, Vanessa and Kelly have forged relationships with key partners that help make MANTS a success.

“I can’t emphasize enough the importance of the relationships we have with others that help make this show a success year after year, including Peggy Daidakis, the executive director of the Baltimore Convention Center. She’s a mentor to me and my father mentored her. Our floor manager Charlie Blocher has been with us since the beginning. He manages our floor team, which helps move our exhibitors in and out,” Vanessa says.

And the show staff also works closely with the Baltimore local of the United Brotherhood of Carpenters union.

“My dad worked hard to cultivate that relationship,” she adds. “We all work in tandem with the end goal of putting on a superb show.”

A family legacy

With valuable lessons gleaned from her father and hands-on experience at the helm of MANTS, Vanessa is leading the venerated trade show into its 50th year, even though that was not in her original career plan.

“I had no intention of being part of this business as a career,” she recalls. “I would come home during the college break and help with the registration table or whatever was needed. My father was going to do this job until the day he died — and he did.”

Vanessa’s dad fell and broke his hip and died in 2001 from complications of the surgery. The shock reverberated throughout the family and the show staff. At the time, Vanessa was home on maternity leave with her third child, her mom had retired from teaching and was helping her dad run the show full time.

“Mom decided she was going to close the management company but get through the next show and she asked for my help,” Vanessa says. “She asked the MANTS board to find new management and we buckled down and put the show on.”

Her mom was grief stricken and Vanessa took on an enormous responsibility.

“I went into dad’s office wondering where to even start. I found his MANTS to-do list in his desk and it had 50 items written on it. ‘Get ice’ was number 20 and it included the name of the vendor, the contact name and the phone number,” Vanessa explains. “I went through each item and followed the list and his directions. The January 2002 show went on.”

After realizing they could do this job and do it well, Vanessa and her mom decided to keep going. The board also expressed confidence and faith in the mother-daughter duo. Nancy was executive vice president of MANTS from late 2001 through 2004. She retired after a serious surgery kept her from her duties for a couple of months. Nancy passed the torch to Vanessa and she was named executive vice president. Vanessa also brought her husband Kelly into the business at that time.

She experienced what many children of family-operated businesses face — never say never.

“For years dad tried to get me or my sisters to join the business, but we all had different professions. The fact that I’m running this business came unexpectedly,” she says. “Now with our own kids, we ask them if they have any interest in coming into the family business and they say no — for now. But I just sit back and watch. They’re helping during the show just like I did when I’d come home from college.”

Nancy still comes to the show to help each year, even though she’s not involved on a day-to-day basis in managing the event.

The next decade(s)

The future of MANTS is promising. Booth space is full, attendance is steady and there are 150 companies on the waiting list. But there is the concern and challenge of space, hence the waiting list.

“We have no more contiguous space at the convention center,” Vanessa explains. “We’re discussing potential solutions. For two years we looked at whether or not we should expand in the convention center, which would mean splitting up the space. We decided that wasn’t the right direction for MANTS. There are no blind leaps when it comes to the management of this show.

“Our board is a conservative organization and an awesome group of people. They take a strong interest in how the organization is run and we have thorough discussions. We’re like a family.”

The vision of the show remains true to the original founders’ mission statement.

“If it’s new plants, new technology and if it’s good for the green industry, we want to make sure it’s at MANTS,” Vanessa says.

You’ve discovered a plant with a wow factor. It’s got your botanical bells ringing just thinking about how popular it may be. So now what? There are ways of protecting your discovery before it’s released in the marketplace, including patents and trademarks, but there is some serious preparation and tedious steps involved before the sales dollars start rolling in.

Plant patent primer

That dandy plant you found — whether it was through concentrated breeding efforts or by a fluke — must meet certain requirements before it can be patented.

If you’re considering a patent, you have the option to contract with a patent attorney, a patent agent, or you can do it yourself. Take heed, this is a complicated process and even the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) suggests several times on its website to consult a professional. If you choose to tackle this elaborate process on our own (known as pro se), the USPTO offers some assistance here: uspto.gov/patents-getting-started/using-legal-services/pro-se-assistance-program.

Once you’ve partnered with a pro or decided to go solo, the next question is, “Has this plant already been patented?” A thorough search must be performed to dig up this information. Rejoice — no one else has patented your discovery. The next question to ask: “Is my plant even eligible for a patent?”

Besides adhering to the general requirements of patentability, your plant must also meet these conditions, according to the USPTO:

• Have been invented or discovered in a cultivated state, and asexually reproduced.
• That the plant is not a plant which is excluded by statute, where the part of the plant used for asexual reproduction is not a tuber food part, as with potato or Jerusalem artichoke.
• The inventor named for a plant patent application must be the person who actually invented the claimed plant, i.e., discovered or developed and identified or isolated, and asexually reproduced the plant.
• The plant has not been patented, in public use, on sale, or otherwise available to the public prior to the effective filing date of the patent application with certain exceptions.
• The plant has not been described in a U.S. patent or published patent application with certain exceptions.
• The plant be shown to differ from known, related plants by at least one distinguishing characteristic, which is more than a difference caused by growing conditions or fertility levels, etc.
• The invention would not have been obvious to one having ordinary skill in the art as of the effective filing date of the claimed plant invention.

While every condition must be met before a plant patent is granted, there is one rule that is sometimes broken in the nursery and greenhouse industry because growers love to share information with colleagues. The USPTO will determine if there’s been any public disclosure of the plant. In other words, has your plant been offered in a catalog, featured on a web site or posted on a social media channel? If so, you will not receive a patent for it.

“Don’t show the plant you wanted patented to anybody,” warns says Sam McCoy, a registered patent agent at Perennial Patent Co. in Mt. Pleasant, S.C. “Don’t take it to a trade show, don’t take a photo of it and put it on social media, don’t let others take a photo of it. The patent office will go on the internet and look for it, they’ll look through patent databases and they’ll look for it in the public domain, such as a Google search.”

Previously, the patent office looked at public disclosure only in the U.S., but now they look at disclosure globally, he explains.

The disclosure refers to anything prior to applying for the patent. Once your patent application is turned in, you are allowed to discuss, market or sell that plant. Some breeders, growers and brand owners will refer to a plant as PPAF (plant patent applied for) after the application is complete. But there is an inherent risk in this action, McCoy says.

“If, for some reason there is a subsequent patent infringement case regarding the plant you marketed or sold as PPAF, and you are awarded damages, you’ll only receive damages beginning from the application publication date, which occurs 18 months from the filing of the patent,” he explains. “In other words, if your plants were sold illegally during that 18 months, you’re not going to get paid for those sales based on case law.”

Patent protections

The grant of a plant patent by the USPTO precludes others from asexually reproducing, selling, offering for sale or using the patented plant or any of its parts in the United States or importing them into the United States.

A plant patent is regarded as limited to one plant, or genome.

“When you patent a plant, you are literally patenting that one plant. Any clone off of it is still considered that ‘one plant,’” McCoy adds.

A plant derived from a sport or a mutant is unlikely of the same genotype as the original plant, and thus would not be covered by the plant patent to the original plant. Such plant derived from a sport or such mutant may itself be protected under a separate plant patent, subject to meeting the requirements of patentability.

A plant patent expires 20 years from the filing date of the patent application. As with utility patents, when the plant patent expires, the subject matter of the patent is in the public domain.

Since the patent has a shelf life of 20 years, growers can continue to protect that plant with a trademark. The marketing name you’ve assigned to the plant has no bearing on your trademark.

“Trademark can live on for perpetuity,” McCoy says. “Many companies’ licensing agreements read that even in the absence of a patent, royalties will continue to be paid. This allows you to covet that plant you bred vis a vis the trademark.”

For basic information on trademarks, visit uspto.gov/trademarks-getting-started/trademark-basics.

Trademarks are critical to the marketing success of the plant. A plant patent is not the formula for success.

“I’m also a licensing agent, so I caution clients that this is not a ‘build it and they will come’ situation,” McCoy says. “You need to have some sense of how you’re going to commercialize that plant, bring it to market and support it out in the market. That’s a huge consideration. What is your distribution model?”

Nursery folks and backyard breeders need to think bigger than just selling it to their own customers. They need to look at the bigger picture, he adds.

“You have to consider things like if you are going to direct license it to a company; what are the terms of the agreement; will you license it to a branded program; or work with an independent license agent,” he explains. “If you don’t have an idea about distribution and marketing, or aren’t willing to go through that exercise, don’t bother with the patent.”

Illegal propagation and trademark infringement is a problem in the ornamental industry, although there’s no hard data regarding how widespread it is. There are companies that specialize in intellectual property services, such as Royalty Administration International (RAI) and MarkWatch, which monitor activities throughout the industry looking for patent and/or trademark infringements. Many patent agents also practice patent prosecution.

The bottom line: illegal propagation and trademark infringement hurts the entire industry, not just the affected company.

“Innovation is the lifeblood of any industry. Without innovation, you become stagnant. Illegal propagation and trademark infringement erode the bedrock of innovation,” McCoy says.

The green industry needs more collaboration and communication between colleagues and competitors when it comes to these illegal activities, he adds.

A group of growers, propagators and brand managers has started the collaboration process. J. Frank Schmidt & Son Co., Bailey Nurseries, Spring Meadow Nursery, Greenleaf Nursery Co., Chicagoland Grows, Jackson Nursery, Pleasant Run Nursery and Star Roses and Plants formed a stakeholder group to address the increase in illegal plant propagation. While the group has not yet created an action plan, they vowed to continue educating the industry and creating a united front to combat the problem.

Editor’s note: This is a basic overview of the patent application process. There is much more to the process, something a patent agent or patent attorney can navigate with you.

For several years, Bailey Nurseries successfully used the First Editions brand as a vehicle to introduce new plants to the marketplace. It was a utilitarian brand of sorts. The plants were thoroughly tested before their introduction, and the marketing behind the brand was something growers and garden retailers understood. But there was somewhat of a disconnect with the consumer. The brand is made up of trees and shrubs, a purchase that the average consumer finds intimidating, according to research conducted by Bailey in North Carolina and Minnesota’s Twin Cities.

“The new introductions theme didn’t resonate with consumers, and they had all this doubt that went along with choosing trees and shrubs,” says Natalia Hamill, brand and business development manager at Bailey. “We needed to find a positioning that worked well at the consumer level and one that made buying trees and shrubs easier, without the stress, as well as fun.”

With millennials entering the home-buying phase of their lives, it was critical to connect with that audience. Bailey responded with new vibrant colors, pop culture references and quick, fun videos. Bailey’s fresh approach to the First Editions brand includes a bright purple pot and large tags that completely stray from the typical model and design that has dominated plant sales for years. Bailey chose more than 20 sayings that will appear on the front of the tags — quips that are intended to grab the consumers’ attention, such as “throw shade,” “totally yard-core,” “#shrubgoals” and “you grow girl.” The plant variety and care messages will appear on the other side of the tag.

“This is a chance to connect with our audience in a whole new way,” says Alec Charais, marketing and communications manager at Bailey.

The core foundation of the brand will not change, he adds.

“We’ll still move exceptional genetics into the marketplace through First Editions. But we’re dialing back those standard messages that have been in the marketplace for so long. We’re going to have a lot of fun with the product we’re offering,” he says.

The new campaign will first appear in retail during the summer of 2020, while a larger rollout will occur in spring 2021.

“The changeover will happen in stages throughout 2020 as growers go through their inventory of the old First Editions pots,” Charais explains.

Bailey dropped the former tagline “Selected with Success” and opted for a more modern “They Rock You Rule” message. The goal is to assure consumers that First Editions plants are hardworking, which means less hassle in the landscape, he says.

“We found out that the First Editions consumer doesn’t want to work too hard, but they do want a good-looking landscape. This campaign makes the purchase of trees and shrubs less intimidating,” he adds.

Videos will reinforce the new campaign and appear on subscription-based television such as Netflix, Hulu and Sling, which better serves their target customer, Charais explains. Videos also will appear on social media channels.

Get a peek at one of the videos here: youtu.be/-WC0JEC2umc.

The First Editions website will be revamped to meld with the new campaign.

“This is like nothing else a consumer has seen in a garden center before,” Hamill says.

The new campaign was officially introduced to the trade at the 2020 Mid-Atlantic Nursery Trade Show.