Landscape Juice

The APL isn't well marketed says its members

In a recent poll on the APL LinkedIn group only 33% of those polled thought that the Association of Professional Landscapers is doing a good job of marketing the organisation.

One of the biggest problems, according to members, is that the general public don't know what the APL is or what it stands for.

APL member, Matthew Miller said: " I agree the APL does represent the highest quality members within the industry, is pushing up professional standards and does have all the checks and balances within its structure to ensure that the consumer can be assured of this.

"However it does not, in my view, making this know to the wider public well enough; these things are the KEY difference between the APL and other trading bodies out there.

Where to buy Ceonothus 'Tuxedo' using the Internet

Well I can tell you FitzGerald Nurseries of County Kilkenny, Ireland sells them and they doing very well at it; partly (and it's a big part it seems) to the success from their use of social media.

Owner, Pat Fitzgerald, explains in an interview on Horticulture Week, how his controlled use of social media platforms such as Twitter, blogger and Facebook has helped connect his business to potential customers all over the world.

Pat commented "Keeping up to date with all the tweets, posts and updates is not always easy - it makes me dizzy a lot of the time. This is where the iPhone came in. In my opinion, it is revolutionary. Once I started using the iPhone in July 2009, it became so easy to share stuff and it started to allow me to do more on Twitter and Facebook.

Is Gigolo landscaping services the next garden trend?

One lady client said to me, when told that there was VAT to pay on top of the cost of laying her patio, 'will you accept payment in kind?': she was deadly serious!

It's the ideal environment...bored and lonely housewife, hunky young gardener or landscaper on site, husband at work (or she's divorced or single) and anything can happen.

It therefore doesn't surprise me, in a poll poll commissioned by B&Q, that 12% of garden owners - and it doesn't say if these are men or women - wanted a 'hunky' gardener in the garden.

Landscape Juice visitor statistics for February 2010

It's been just four years since Landscape Juice started out and it's fair to say that the first year of development contributed very little in the way of visitors.

It's a different story today and I'm delighted to say that February was a record month for Landscape Juice.

Patterns for laying paving stones

I don't know how many times I used to pick up a product paving guide, cut out and photocopy the paving guides in the back?

We used to keep a wad of sheets in the filing cabinet and laminate a sheet depending on what pattern we would be laying.

Now landscapers can keep their copies safely tucked away on their hard-drive and print as many as they like; when needed.

The Landscape magazine audited circulation - 18.3% drop?

The Landscaper magazine's ABC audited circulation figures have finally been released.

I am not sure why it has taken quite so long because the circulation date which was used for the audit was the 18th May 2009 - ABC didn't release the Landscaper certificate until the 4th November 2009.

Join the APL LinkedIn group

As part of its website restructuring and pledge to become more interactive, the Association of Professional Landscapers started a LinkedIn discussion forum - so far the group has fifty members discussing four topics.

The APL group is open to anyone so if you think you can add something to the debate or you want to start a discussion on the benefits of APL membership, then why not pop along.

Daniel Thurlow talks to Landscape Juice

I spent fifty five minutes on the phone to Glee show director, Daniel Thurlow yesterday in a conversation about the show's future.

Dan was refreshingly frank about its [Glee] perceived failings, put his side of the story and listened to what I had to say.

The conversation started with an apology. Glee say that they have rather neglected the blogging corner of journalism and it is something they now intend to address.

UK garden center list - add your details

It appears that there is not a single list of British garden centres available anywhere - this is not helpful for business who would like to make a connection.

If you own a garden centre or plant nursery and you would like to add your business to the list then please do so.

The list will be publicly available to anyone who downloads it - for use in marketing purposes.