State of the crop: Hydrangeas

Hydrangeas have become the dominant player in the flowering shrub world. Judging from what leaders in the market say, and judging from consumer demand, don’t expect this to change anytime soon.
 
While it seems dozens of new hydrangeas now hit the market every year, this will be the norm for at least a decade. The genus Hydrangea is highly variable with many species and traits the world’s top plant breeders have just begun to tinker with.
 
In Nursery Management’s first-ever State of the Crop market research project, we focused on hydrangeas. They’re simply the hottest crop on the ornamental market right now.
 
We asked growers how many they were growing and in what sizes. We asked what varieties they were producing and what they thought of the current hydrangea market.
 
It was no surprise we found hydrangea growers will produce more in 2012 than they did in 2011—an average increase of about 5 percent. And serious hydrangea growers (ones that grow more than 1,000 units per year) will produce on average almost 26,000 hydrangeas per year.
 
When we asked what varieties hydrangea growers plan to produce, we received 163 different responses.
 
So the market for hydrangeas is enormous, and there’s good reason for that.

Read the rest of the story here: http://www.nurserymanagementonline.com/nm0312-new-hydrangeas-market.aspx