Unwrapping Fun Packages: Garden-related Kits Make Perfect Gifts

Bill Calkins

No matter who your customers are shopping for—there’s probably a cool kit to make them smile. Offer a wide range of options at reasonable price points to encourage garden gifting.

At holiday time, just about everyone has a long list of family and friends to buy for, and often, that list requires visits to multiple stores to find something to fit each unique interest. We won’t even get into the outliers—the folks who’re impossible to shop for and the ones you just don’t know well enough to find the perfect gift.

Pictured: An example of gardening gifts from Dickman Farms.

Pictured: Terrarium kits from Esschert Design.

No matter who the recipient is, there’s absolutely no reason a garden center shouldn’t be a holiday destination, especially for avid gardeners who feel comfortable in a nursery or on a garden shop website. Maybe a shovel doesn’t seem like an appropriate stocking stuffer, so perhaps it’s best to think in terms of kits—collections of smaller products bundled to fit a hobby or trendy interest. That’s the path we’ll take in this article. (However, if you’re shopping for this author, feel free to put a bow on a shovel.)

Is your store a holiday gift destination? You can be confident it is for some customers, but do you offer enough product diversity to capture the most sales possible?

Here’s a collection of holiday gift ideas that should cover just about everyone on the list, from the hipster nephew to a garden grandpa. Note: Feel free to think outside the box and bring in more unique kits and collections for the holidays. As long as you sell through them during the shopping season, they can only help your bottom line.

Garden Gifts

Let’s start with the easy ones: true gardening kits. Of course, your store is known for gardening items and it seems logical that it’s the place to go when your customers need something for the gardener on the list. Don’t disappoint them. There are many gardening kits available, from seeds pack bundles to hand tools and even small greenhouses. This list is by no means comprehensive and is meant to inspire you to search through your vendor catalogs and talk to your salespeople to find products that make sense for your store and target shoppers.

•  Seed Starter Kit

•  Seed Saver Kit

•  Garden Bed Materials

•  Hobby Greenhouse

•  Heirloom Seed Collection

•  Garden Hand Tool Set (with gloves)

Digging Deeper

The last group of gifts covered traditional gardeners who like to plant seeds and start plants themselves. Most of the kits above are easy to find and easy to gift. But let’s kick things up a notch, while remaining squarely focused on garden-related items—outdoors AND indoors.

•  Living Wall System

•  Terrarium Kit

•  Tabletop Hydroponic Garden

•  Indoor Herb Garden Kit

•  Sprout Growing Kit (with seeds)

•  Rain Barrel System

•  Compost Bin Kit

•  Garden Lighting Kit

Pictured: Multiple types of Flower Cocktail Kits from Floral Elixir Co.

Pictured: Always offer gift cards to your garden center and don’t forget to put them online.

Outside-the-Box Gifting

We have casual and advanced gardeners covered—now to tackle the tougher folks on your customers’ shopping lists. Here’s where creativity comes in to play and finding the right items to fit each recipient’s niche interest. The more diversity you have in-store and online, the better your likelihood of being the ultimate holiday gift destination.

•  Homebrew Components

•  Wine-making Kit

•  Mushroom Growing Kit

•  Kombucha Starter Kit

•  Salsa Garden Collection

•  Grill Garden Collection

•  Fountain Kit

•  Beehive Starter Kit

Gifts for Kids

Once the adults are taken care of, your customers might want to begin instilling a love of gardening in kids and grandkids. Encouraging children to get outside and engage with nature is top of mind these days and garden-related gifts for kids could prove very popular with holiday shoppers. When it comes to putting kits and collections together for kids, remember they need everything on hand before any project begins. The last thing parents want to do is stop mid-project and run back out to the store.

•  Habitat Garden Collection

•  Birdfeeder and Birdhouse Kit

•  Butterfly Kit

•  Kids Garden Tools

•  Miniature Garden Components

•  Make-Your-Own Garden Stone Kit

At this point, hopefully your customers’ holiday shopping lists are just about complete. They’ve gotten gifts for traditional gardeners, advanced gardeners, home improvement types, hobbyists and kids. They even found something for their college-aged nephew who swears by the gut-healing effects of kombucha. (Don’t worry—next year, he’ll be into pollinators and beekeeping, and once again, you’ll have perfect gifts on the shelf.)

When you display kits in your store, be sure to keep all of the components together and try to offer a couple different size and price options. Seed kits can be large or small, composters can be a range of sizes and prices, and indoor gardening kits can be simple or quite extravagant.

Topped with a Bow

To wrap things up (pun intended), gift cards are often the safest option for many gift givers. Be sure to promote their availability in your store and online. And it might also be a good idea to post your return policy during the holiday shopping season. We all know many gifts are returned and when you make it easy, you’re more likely that the gift will be exchanged for another item on the same trip.

Good luck this holiday season. Work closely with your vendors to find a mix of traditional and unique garden-related gifts and make your store the place to go for one-stop gifting. GP