orchid world evolution

[Ben_in_North_FLA]

I have been involved in the orchid world since some
clerk gave me a blooming orchid whilst I was waiting to speak to someone about picking up window treatment stuff that my Wife ordered and I knew nothing about orchids. That was in the mid eighties.. quite a while back. As I was browsing some old AOS orchids magazines and looking at the ads it is incredible how many of those "growers" are history and gone with the wind. I often peruse the orchidmall on line and many of those sites are shut down as well. it is depressing how much this orchid world has constricted.
Was looking at brazilian growers sites his morning and same thing, very few have an operational site. I am already looking forward to the redlands show in May, down in Homestead area to see who has plants I may need and some of the links to the vendor's sites are also inoperable. So it looks like MANY growers are out of business and a few more have decided that websites are too expensive to operate and keep up. So the best thing is to email them directly and inquire about specific interests and or list of plants... which I will do.
just an observation on how the orchid business has changed, the 1990's through the 2010 were the definitely the peak of the orchid business.
Vendors – Redland International Orchid Festival

[SouthPark]

Yes indeed. Technology - internet and online shopping etc - has really changed things, not just in the orchid industry and other industries. Some good and bad things associated with these changes.

Many years ago... eg. 40 years ago, having no internet prevented people from acquiring particular details about orchids --- types, names, where to buy from, growing methods etc. It was hard or even impossible to acquire a lot of what can be acquired these days.

That's just the plants. And it also seems like collecting orchids also often requires collecting other things - chemical fungicides/miticides/disinfectants, pots, etc ---- a lot being orderable via internet stores. This is for cases where a lot of us don't live anywhere near a huge orchid nursery.

[dbarron]

And (speaking from stance of general specialty nurseries), these darn enthusiast nursery folks keep wanting to retire, leaving us to have to seek out new avenues of indulging our plant fixes.
(Please note, I hate to see it, but I recognize the want/need)

[Ray]

I started my orchid growing in the early '70's, and used to simply drool over the pages of the Jones & Scully catalog, and was like a kid on Christmas Eve when anticipating a new one.

There are LOTS of reason for the shift. For one is the lack of per-plant profitability.

In the J&S catalog, a typical cattleya plant was around $40 - in 1970's dollars. It didn't cost any more to grow a plant then than it does now, but due to the relative rarity of orchids, the market allowed such good profit. In that model, with those financials, lots of good growers could have nice businesses. Now, with cloning, that same plant would be far more available, driving the price way down, which means volume is the key factor in profitability, but that requires a great deal more capital, reducing the number of players.

I personally spoke to a former commercial grower up the the Chicago area, and they paid over $10,000 per month to heat their greenhouses. You gotta sell a lot of plants to cover just that!

[MrHappyRotter]

Many of my favorite vendors from my early orchid collecting days are closed, with a few others struggling. It's a sign of the times for sure. Also, there was a time when most major commercial nurseries did their own breeding and that constituted a significant portion of the plants they offered.

In much of North America, energy costs make it very difficult to operate at a profit and compete with regions that have a more moderate climate. I'm not holding my breath, but I really hope that "green" or alternative energy as well as using more energy efficient practices will help revitalize these businesses. A lot of these technologies and techniques have a high up front cost, and for a businesses like orchid nurseries, that stops them from updating.

Strange as it sounds, I also hope that the expanding legalized cannabis industry will have some positive benefits for the hobby. I think it'll help drive costs down on LED grow lights and other materials/products (that are also used for orchids), but also could help drive a more robust (and lower cost) industry for greenhouses and greenhouse technology (including the alternative energy stuff I discussed earlier).

As for now, many of the remaining nurseries are adapting, for better or worse. Many of them have long since given up on their breeding programs, and instead buy "finished" (often in bud) plants from Hawaii or flasks/seedlings from international sources. Some places have reduced their inventory (and the space dedicated to sales) in order to rent out greenhouse space to hobbyist growers to pay the bills. In addition, numerous vendors seek out and utilize alternative sales channels (like Ebay) to help attract customers, gauge the demand and determine pricing for various plants, and supplement (or supplant) their online sales.

Some of the most disappointing aspects of these changes, aside from seeing some great hybridizers and nurseries go out of business, are things like seeing people selling individual, recently deflasked seedlings and an increase of misidentified/mislabeled plants.

It'll definitely be interesting to see how things change in the future.

[WaterWitchin]

As a former "plant business" owner, I feel your pain, and also applaud all of you for your thoughtful and insightful comments. How true... all of it.

The only other thing I might add... orchids take such a darned long time to reach blooming stage when not just a divide. And sloooow growth to be able to divide. Not many have the patience to go from start to finish who want an orchid. I can't imagine the actual COGS to raise orchids from start to sell, other than as MrRotter says, the orchid baby sellers. And as we all know, many orchid growers don't have the skillset or desire to successfully grow from seedling to adult.

It would be a tough business to be in, in a climate such as mine. I wouldn't have the guts.

[SouthPark]

Originally Posted by WaterWitchin

The only other thing I might add... orchids take such a darned long time to reach blooming stage when not just a divide. And sloooow growth to be able to divide. Not many have the patience to go from start to finish who want an orchid.

The above is absolutely a huge consideration for growers. For relatively young people ----- no problem with getting seedlings and juveniles and waiting several years or more. But for others (me included) ----- let's just say it would be 'nice' to see some of the orchid's wonderful and beautiful flowers earlier, rather than in several to many years time.

A 'darn long time to reach blooming age' is accurate.

[estación seca]

Many growers of all kinds of plants who rented greenhouse space have been forced out of business by sudden rent increases. Cannabis growers will pay far more than orchid growers.

Web sites have become nightmares to build and maintain. Even very large companies rarely do it well. The complexities of designing and updating Web sites make them almost unavailable to small businesses.

Then there is what used to be online search. People don't realize it is almost impossible to appear in the first page or two of "search" results without paying to appear. Many businesses hire people to write fake reviews, for and against. Thousands of people are employed to make fake clicks on Web ads. "Search" has become advertising plus propaganda.

[Paul]

There is also the need for future would-be orchid nursery owners who reside in the "Great White North" to consider turning away from the old greenhouse paradigm.

There is a gentleman I know who used to have a standard greenhouse in which he grew some orchids as well as other plants -- both for his own personal enjoyment and for sale. When he moved to a different city, he knew it wouldn't be worthwhile to take the old greenhouse with him. The new property, in addition to the house, had another building on it -- a pole barn if I am recalling correctly. He decided to use this as his new growing area. It has turned out to be an incredibly good choice for him being far, far cheaper for him to maintain. Because he had the foresight to "insulate the daylights" out of the thing, his heating/cooling costs are extremely low. He doesn't have to worry about the hassle or expense of shade cloth. Humidity is easily maintained. He doesn't have to worry about sheets of glass or plastic cracking/breaking or cleaning algae off said panes. His only real expense is lighting ... and LED lighting goes a long way to keeping that part of the energy bill from getting out of control. (And considering how little sun we get in a typical Michigan winter, lighting is a common expense even for standard greenhouses.)

[Ray]

In my previous home in PA, I had a greenhouse for plants and a walk-out basement for many of the supplies I sold. I seriously considered swapping them, as the propane bill for heating the greenhouse over a winter was around $5000. I can buy a lot of electricity and LED's for that!