At Glee 2025 we spoke with Lee Connelly, the Children’s Gardening Coach, and Nigel Thompson, Sales & Marketing Director at Sipcam Home & Garden. The conversation was frank, practical and quietly ambitious. If you work in garden retail or supply, there are clear signals here about where demand is heading, how to reach it, and what to change in-store and in comms.
Schools are the future, not a photo op
Lee’s school tour put scale and intent behind a simple idea: get children gardening and support teachers long after the van pulls away. In one week he reached 10,000 pupils across 30 schools, including a 600-pupil activation in Manchester, with a plan to keep the link alive with staff who carry the work forward. “We got 10,000 children gardening in just one week,” he says, before stressing the importance of continued support.
The feedback matters. Teachers reported pupils starting gardens at home and described it as some children’s “best day… all year.” The lesson for brands is to design programmes with continuity baked in. One-off classroom selfies do not build future gardeners. Ongoing teacher contact does.
Garden centres as family destinations
Many centres have embraced school links and holiday programming, though some activity is still ad hoc. As Lee put it, too many efforts amount to “a bag of compost and some pots on the side and hoping that that will do.” The opportunity is to curate small, repeatable activities that give families a reason to dwell, loop the store, and return.
Lee has also softened earlier views of garden centres, now seeing them as vital community hubs with expertise on tap. “They have such an important job to bring community together,” he says, pointing to simple on-site activities that keep children engaged while adults shop.
Greener gardening, proven
Sipcam’s focus at Glee was “greener gardening” presented in language consumers and staff can use. The balance between sustainability and efficacy is handled through trial data rather than slogans. For ecofective® Nourish & Bloom, Nigel highlights seven strains of bacteria with a track record in professional lawn applications. “We can stand behind that rather than we’ve just developed these products, fingers crossed.”
The market is ready to hear it. “It feels a lot easier to have that conversation,” Nigel says, noting how retailers now understand peat-free challenges and opportunities with more nuance.
A challenger’s advantage
Sipcam’s approach is iterative and open to critique. That posture allows faster moves on brand and range. “You can roll the dice a little bit sometimes and… adjust,” Nigel says, contrasting the freedom of a challenger with the defensive posture of a category leader.
The new Nourish & Bloom sub-brand is a case in point. Early buyer reactions at Glee were strong. “Nourish & Bloom has been the talking point,” says Nigel, because it combines clearer benefits with a brighter, more emotive presentation that “puts a smile on a buyer’s face.”
Houseplants: Presentation and proof
With Fito, Sipcam is repositioning houseplant care for a discerning, often younger, audience that looks for simple direction and a packaging that fits an aesthetic. As Nigel reminds us, “the Fito brand was the first to bring drip feeders to the UK market, 20 odd years ago.” The job now is to update the offer and education for how people actually buy and care indoors.
Partnerships that ring true
Perhaps the clearest signal for marketers is how Sipcam activated with schools. This was not a cheque and a logo. Staff volunteered locally and joined school days in person. “The best days I’ve spent this year at work have been genuinely in schools,” says Nigel. Authenticity travels. Retail buyers notice when a brand does the hard yards.
What to do next
Start with intent. If you want younger customers and future colleagues, set a three-year schools plan with teacher follow-up, not a campaign window. Build small, reliable family activities into the store calendar. When you talk greener gardening, show your working. Bring data. Make it easy for staff to explain. And if you are a challenger, use the advantage. Test, learn, adjust.
As Lee puts it, the goal is to create memories that stick. Those memories become the prompt for a purchase next season, a workshop next summer, or a career choice in a few years’ time. That is a strategy worth investing in.
Check out the full episode of The Underground Podcast, featuring Lee Connelly, The Children’s Gardening Coach, and Nigel Thompson, Sales & Marketing Director, Sipcam Home & Garden, below: