Everything in the garden is rosy for a North Shields based family seed business, which has just added 52 Asda stores to its growing list of stockists.
The deal, which will see the company's innovative Seedcell products available in the grocery's giant's megastores nationwide, brings the number of stockists for Grow Sow Simple's products blossom to around 150. And managing director Dan Robson, 34, says the company is poised for even greater growth in the coming years.
Grow Sow Simple was founded in 2015 by Dan, who also who also invented and developed the unique Seedcell concept. The seeds are packaged as all-year round, easy to grow, plantable pods full of seeds. The first of its kind to market, the pods are designed to be simply placed in a pot with soil, eliminating any mess and the need for garden tools.
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The company, which Dan runs alongside his bother Joe, 32, has recently moved to its new Tyne Tunnel factory, which at 6,000sq ft is six times the size of its previous workshop in Blaydon, Gateshead.
“Our ambition has always been to make gardening accessible for anyone – no matter what their ability is – and Seedcell allows people to grow their own vegetables and herbs in the simplest and most environmentally friendly way possible," said Dan. “We are delighted to have secured this contract with one of the nation’s favourite and most recognised supermarkets. It is great to see a retail giant like Asda making products such as SeedCell accessible to its customers, many of whom are becoming increasingly more eco-conscious and adopting more sustainable ways of living.”
SeedCell is also available in British garden chain Dobbies, online at Grow Sow Simple, Costco, Amazon and The Range, as well as a number of DIY superstores and independents. The products are also being exported to a range of clients across the globe from Scandinavia and South Africa through to America and Canada.
Perfect for beginner gardeners, the Seedcell selection boxes comprise 12 varieties of complimentary seeds. With different themes from herb garden, allotment mix, veg and salad patch, right through to pizza topper, chilli mix and cocktail botanicals, each box consists of four varieties of seeds. Once planted, the seed pods absorb and retain the moisture it needs whilst feeding water directly to the seeds using Grow Sow Simple’s pioneering and patented water absorbing technology. The pod protects the seeds as they begin to germinate in a safe micro environment, before breaking down naturally leaving zero waste and high-quality healthy plants.
As well as launching in Asda, the company is also launching its Mircogrow subscription kit this month, which delivers monthly seeds through the letterbox to grow into nutritionally-dense mircogreens in a matter of days.
During the pandemic, the company had to cope with lots of cancelled orders from garden centres, which they repurposed into kits suitable for online sales via certain suppliers. This sowed the seed of an idea for the brothers, who are hoping the health benefits and speedy growth of the microgreens will appeal to a wide variety of families.
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