Haxnicks in 20th Anniversary Edition of Gardener's World Magazine

We're very proud to note that Haxnicks products have recieved some fabulous coverage in the 20th Anniversary Edition of Gardener's World magazine. What we want to know is - what do you think?

Helen Riches, Lila Das Gupta and long term friend of Haxnicks Pippa Greenwood can all be seen in the BBC's foremost gardening publication using Haxnicks products.

Helen Riches, award winning garden writer and garden designer, recommended covering with a cloche overnight to give germinating seeds a better chance in her article entitled 'Summer Pots from Seed'.  Lila Das Gupta also wrote an article about sowing Runner Beans and the benefits of using Rootrainers.

Pippa Greenwood meanwhile chose to recommend our Kitchen Garden Cloche for her article on protecting small groups of fruit and vegetables in their early stages and to extend their growing season.  And scattered throughout as always, our Biodegradable Pots Naturally range.

What can we say?  Well, go out and buy Gardeners World Magazine and see for yourselves of course!

Here's the list in full of products featured:

• Pots Naturally
• Victorian Bell Cloches
• Rootrainers
• Kitchen Garden Cloche

And here for your added info is a list of links to Gardeners World Articles and Blogs - enjoy!

• Helen Riches - 'Summer Pots from Seed'
• Lila Das Gupta - 'Step by Step'
• Pippa Greenwood - 'Pippa's Growing Tips'

 Now we want to hear from you... what did you think, have you seen our products in any magazines or TV shows?  Look out for us, we have great links with gardening experts across England and Scotland and even Ireland.  But don't forget we're a company that wants to produce the best quality garden care products we can and that means listening to your feedback.  Please leave us a comment.

Potato Planting Competition & Amateur Gardening Magazine

Robbie Cumming, our PR and Marketing Executive writes:


In Amateur Gardening this week, gardening editor Kris Collins wrote about how to get started with growing potatoes, explaining how to chit and how many potatoes to use in each planter. 

Before I spoke to him about the article, I had already decided to choose a certain variety known as 'Sharpe's Express', which I bought from my local garden centre (see pic below).

Seed potatoes at Orchard Park in Gillingham, Dorset.

The potatoes were described as being great for all manner of cooking methods and being disease resistant sounded perfect for me.  These factors are obviously rather important as I'm the one who is running the Potato Planter Competition!  The pressure is on, especially as the last time I grew potatoes in containers was when I was 10 years old - almost 2 decades ago now!  Luckily for me, the beauty of growing potatoes in planters such as ours is that it is a much safer bet than sowing in rows - especially as you can move your crop into the greenhouse, or porch, if frost is on its way.

Tip: Chitting


Allowing your potatoes to 'chit' (I said 'chit'!) allows shoots to sprout from the 'eyes' of the potato and can speed things up, essential if you want to start growing early like I am.  However, you can still plant potatoes straight into the bags without chitting.


I placed my seed potatoes in egg boxes (see picture) and placed them on a shelf in the atrium between our office and warehouse - it's light, cool, but protected from frost.  A few weeks have gone by, and the shoots are slowly emerging, but being the inquisitive yet impatient young chappie as I am, I emailed Kris to see if he could tell me anything about the potato variety I was about to plant out.


"I grew Sharpe’s Express in one of your patio planters last year and got 2.5kg of potatoes – ended up being my best yield over all other varieties tried last year. Hope you have the same luck."

Yes, I do have quite a smug look on my face, but my mother told me never to count my chickens before they've hatched (and she should know with all her bantam hens!).  

Having said that, I would like to throw down the gauntlet and challenge you all to a potato duel!  Click here for more information on how to join in the Great Potato Gold Rush! 

Amateur Gardening is available from newsagents, supermarkets and garden centres nationwide every Saturday priced £1.99

Compact Rootrainers - 2 'Best Buy' Awards in the same month



Garden News 18th Jan 2011



We are very proud to announce that our own Compact Rapid Rootrainers have been awarded 'Best Buy' awards in not one but two weekly gardening magazines, Garden News and Amateur Gardening.

Garden News chose our Rootrainers because they were "Re-useable, rigid plastic containers.  Especially useful for plants that need deep root runs and dislike root disturbance."  Geoff Hodge, gardening expert and tried and tested journalist for the weekly publication awarded it 5 out of 5 for Use & handling, Watering, and Root growth. 



Amateur Gardening 29th January 2011



"Opens like a book for easy inspection of moisture levels, root growth and removal of the plants...my Best Buy went to Rootrainers as they are re-useable."

 

Compact Rapid Rootrainers come with a drip tray, propagating lid and have 20 cells in total.  To top it all off they are made in Great Britain, and as well as being re-usable, with a lifespan of approximately 6 years, they are also manufactured from recycled plastic.

Amateur Gardening have always been fans of our Rootrainers. They regularly feature in gardening editor Kris Collins' weekly articles, in Anne Swithinbanks' column and have now been awarded 'Best Buy' by consumer editor Julia Heaton:

"The shape and grooves promote optimum root formation.  Good way to raise bedding or cuttings as it makes handling the plants simpler. Those produced should be bigger and garden ready due to the larger root system."

So why not see if the experts are right - try out our Compact Rapid Rootrainers and see for yourselves (quite literally) the quality of plant you can produce. Available as a deluxe version with a handy drip tray, perfect for windowsills.

Amateur Gardening and Garden News are both priced £1.99 and available from newsagents and supermarkets every Tuesday.

Haxnicks Helping Schools update: Naas CBS and 'Vegetation Nation'

Before Christmas we were contacted by a schoolboy by the name of Seán Grassick from Naas CBS in County Kildare, Ireland, who explained that as part of his Business Studies course he would be setting up his own company. 

He explained that he needed to purchase products in exactly the same way as any normal business would, to gain the full experience of the buying and selling process.  We jumped at the chance to help him out, not only because we have always had a history of helping schools and societies, but because of Seán's enthusiasm for his project - let alone shrewd bargaining skills!

We managed to settle on a really good deal so that he could buy our planters at a very low cost and sell them as part of a 'grow your own' pack that included other manufacturer's products too. We also provided product information and images to use in his company's promotional leaflets.

At the start of the year Seán sent me an email to let me know what had happened since we sent him the goods...

"Just to update you on our mini-company Vegetation Nation. When we bought the patio planters off yourselves, we packaged them ourselves with five packets of vegetable seeds (different seeds for the different size planters), a guide book and plant labels. We then sold them at the local country market, run by country women, on the 17th of December. They were very well recieved and we sold 32 planter kits. We have now currently sold 46 planters out of 60. We have a very large demand for seed potatoes with the planters. So we have taken this on board and are planning on making improvements to our product for sale in February."

If you live in Ireland and would like to order any planter packs from Seán and his team then get in touch with them: vegetationnation@hotmail.com.

We will be helping Seán again in the future and will let you all know of any exciting developments, and I for one will be keen to know what grade the project gets.  

If it's not an A* then I'll phone the headteacher!

by Robbie (Marketing and PR guy)

Haxnicks 2011 - Ready to Grow!

Welcome to the first blog of the new year.  We've got loads planned for 2011, so without further ado let's take a look ahead...

A New Look for a New Year

As many of you will already know, we have been busy creating a whole new look for Haxnicks.  Our packaging has become more distinctive, refreshing and contemporary than anything we've ever done before, and will be brightening up the grow your own sections of Garden Centres across the UK from January.  Take a look at our 'Garden Products' page for examples.



King Size Victorian Bell - just one
 of the new additions for 2011

New Products

We have already had so much interest in our brand new range of Natural Bamboo products, even before they've hit the shops!  Fruit cages, Sweet Pea frames, Decorative Arches, Pergolas and Tunnel hoops are all coming very soon - watch this blog for more news!

New Offers

2011 sees the launch of many great offers, here's a brief run-down of the first to sprout:

Free Book when you spend £50
'Down to Earth' by Madeleine Cardozo is a refreshingly simple A-Z guide to growing your own fruit and veg, and you'll be able to get a copy ABSOLUTELY FREE when you purchase £50+ worth of Haxnicks' products.  For example, you could buy a Haxnicks' Speedhoe, a pack of Vegetable Patio Planters, a 3 pack of Bell Boy Propagators and a pack of Birdscare and on top of all that a free book worth £14.99 - all for £51.96 - great value!

New Competitions
Our 'Love to Grow' competitions are always great fun, not only for winning great prizes but as a way of encouraging those that are not sure about growing their own fresh produce to take the plunge.

Coming soon: The Love to Grow Potato Planter competition - open to all and is the biggest and most exciting yet, featuring some fantastic cash prizes.

There will be three competition classes in which to enter yourself/family/school/company:

Potato Planter Photography Award- £100 for the best photograph of your Haxnick's planter full of potato flowers
Hugest Harvest - how many can you grow in a single bag? £100 worth of Haxnicks' goodies up for grabs
Supersized Spud - Another £100 of Haxnicks products for the largest spud grown in a Haxnicks planter

We will give more details on exactly how to take part when we formally launch the competition with terms and conditions, but you'd be wise to get ahead by ordering seed potatoes from your local garden centre ready to start chitting and a Haxnicks Potato Planter in time for planting them out in the spring.

But that's not all.  Stay tuned to this blog (click the 'follow' icon on the right) where we will announce more really exciting new product developments, a new catalogue, shows, updates on media activity and some more Youtube videos all on the horizon.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of our customers for their patronage in 2010, and wish you all a very successful year of gardening ahead.

~Love to Grow with Haxnicks in 2011~

Snowed Under!

Looks like snow Jackets
will remain in great demand
even after Christmas!

Due to the recent heavy snowfall, delivery services have pretty much ground to a halt here in Wiltshire, so we are finding it very difficult to get any more orders out before Christmas!

We aim to keep you updated on the situation - currently we are being told by our couriers that they have a huge backlog to get through, and are unable to guarantee the delivery of any further orders before the 25th.
We are still taking orders as normal through the website and over the phone, and expect things to return to normal after the New Year.

Seasons Greetings,

The Team @ Haxnicks

Gardening Books

Now, we could just tell you to buy all of our great products for Christmas and give them all to your friends and family, with the hope that they will suddenly become overnight horticultural successes!

So, with this in mind, here are some great examples of books to help any budding grow-your-owners!

• The Vegetable Gardener's Bible (10th Anniversary Edition)
• Home vegetable gardening; a complete and practical guide to the planting and care of all vegetables, fruits and berries worth growing for home use
• How to Grow More Vegetables and Fruits (and Fruits, Nuts, Berries, Grains, and Other Crops) Than You Ever Thought Possible on Less Land Than You Can Imagine
• Vegetable Gardening For Dummies
• Starter Vegetable Gardens: 24 No-Fail Plans for Small Organic Gardens

Specifically about Vegetables:

• The Essential Root Vegetable Cookbook
• Farmer John's Cookbook: The Real Dirt on Vegetables
• The Garden-Fresh Vegetable Cookbook
• Down to Earth: An Easy Guide to Growing Your Own Vegetables
• The Farmer's Wife Guide To Growing A Great Garden And Eating From It, Too!: Storing, Freezing, 
• and Cooking Your Own Vegetables

And gardens in general:

• Rosemary Verey's English Country Gardens
• The English Cottage Garden
• One Hundred English Gardens: The Best of the English Heritage Parks and Gardens Register
• Gardens in Time
• The Gardens of English Heritage
• Gardens of the National Trust
• The English Garden (Phaidon)

If you're stuck for ideas I hope that some of the titles listed above will help your first time or more experienced gardening enthusiast friends and family.

If that fails - our own Madeleine Cardozo has written a truly beautiful and well laid out book on vegetables and we'd always recommend that of course!

Love to Grow and Good Tidings to all!