Taxi drivers plant a seed of hope in troubled times
GARDEN centres and taxi drivers are teaming up to save millions of plants from being dumped on compost heaps – thanks to the Daily Express.
We revealed last week that the horticultural industry faces having to throw away plants worth £200million after centres and nurseries were forced to close by the lockdown.
But we linked up the industry with Britain’s taxi drivers, many of whom have seen their work vanish as people stay at home because of coronavirus.
The National Private Hire and Taxi Association said that hundreds of its members have responded.
The Garden Centre Association sent the NPHTA and the National Taxi Association a list of its members who are still selling plants but need help with deliveries.
Iain Wylie, of the GCA, added: “If garden centres can distribute their plants in this way, we will be grateful. It will go some way to ease the problem with lockdown.”
The Horticultural Trades Association has set up a website
– plantsnearme.hta.org.uk – to let taxi firms know who is still selling plants.
The HTA’s Martin Simmons said: “It’s great that the Daily Express has come up with this initiative.”
In Leicester Tracey Whitbread of Swift Fox Cabs described helping the garden centres as “a great opportunity”.
People around Chichester, West Sussex, were being given a helping hand by a firm set up in response to the coronavirus crisis, Hope Plants. It is ferrying plants ordered online or over the phone to local customers.
Matthew Skinner and fiancee Camilla Chapman say they have been overwhelmed by demand since they posted their business online.
Matthew, who has three sons, was about to start a new job when coronavirus struck and his post went.
He said: “I had to work out how to pay the bills so we posted on social media to see if people wanted plants delivered. The response was phenomenal.
Within 24 hours we had to turn our website off because we had 450 orders. We turned it back on today and got another 450.
“But I have mixed emotions. It is good to be busy but I am constantly reminded of the scale of the problem. Every time I go to into a nursery and take a fraction of their stock I can see the worry on their faces.”
Some garden centres are battling to keep up with demand. Knights, in Godstone, Surrey, which delivers orders, has been “inundated”.