Who ships nursery stock, and when do they book?

Commodity playbook

Who ships nursery stock

Four growers, each running production sites in several states. The trade association behind them is the largest horticulture membership in North America.

Ask for the logistics or transportation manager, and ask early. These are sophisticated shippers with real distribution operations, because a plant that arrives late is not late, it is dead. Big box garden centres and independent garden centres are the receivers, and the grower almost always controls the freight. Some run their own fleets for the core lanes and broker the surge, which is the opening.

Where it hauls

Production follows climate and the freight runs north out of it. Florida is the winter engine, with Miami-Dade the densest growing area in the country. Southern California around Vista and the San Diego hills runs succulents and container stock. Oregon's Willamette Valley ships woody ornamentals and shade trees nationally, and the upper midwest and Carolinas supply hardy nursery stock to their own regions. Most large growers run sites in several of these at once. The growers to know:

How to open

Leading with temperature rather than price is the whole difference on this freight. A grower who has lost a trailer of plants to a cold night will take that call, and everyone else is calling about rate.

Qualifying questions

• What temperature, and what is the low tolerance? This is the first question on live goods. Plants want cool, not cold, and a reefer set wrong or a door left open at a fuel stop kills the load. Get the setpoint and the minimum, and confirm the unit runs continuous rather than cycling.
• Racked, carted, or floor loaded? Much nursery stock ships on rolling racks or Danish carts that come back empty, which means a return leg and a piece of the customer's equipment in your trailer. Confirm what comes off and what has to go back.
• How long can it sit? Plants in a dark trailer are on a clock even at the right temperature. Ask the maximum transit time they will accept and whether a weekend layover is allowed, because on this freight it usually is not.
• Is the receiver a distribution centre or a store? Big box garden centres often take direct store delivery in spring, which means many stops, tight windows and unloading in a car park. That is a different job from one drop at a distribution centre. Ask before you quote.
• Who owns the risk if it arrives damaged? Live goods claims are unusually expensive and unusually contested, because condition on arrival depends on the grower, the trailer and the weather. Agree in advance what evidence settles it, and whether they want a temperature download.

When to call

December and January, before the load-in starts. From February to May the growers are shipping flat out against a spring that will not wait, and there is no bandwidth to qualify anybody new. The freight is also unusually loyal: a carrier that delivers live plants in good condition through one spring generally has the lane for the next one.