The Garden Centre Association says its members can make up for April losses by the end of May, despite figures showing sales were up to 52 per cent down in some sectors and around 14 per cent down so far this year.
What a wretched contrast to the start of the garden retail season in 2011 this season's opening has proved to be. This time last year, industry stalwarts such as Peter Seabrook were hailing the best ever spring for retail sales for 50 years.
Barbecue sales fell from £360m a year to £330m over the period 2007-11, with garden furniture sales down from £1,154m to £841m, TGI/Kantar Media has found.
Further evidence of the reorientation of Dutch fresh produce exports from west to east has come from the latest figures to be released by the Dutch Horticulture Production Board.
Latest Defra figures have confirmed the differing fortunes of Britain's fruit and vegetable growers, with fruit showing continuing strong returns while those from vegetables have slipped back.
Morrisons has said it will not be drawn into a price war with its rivals after it announced a one per cent drop in sales for the first quarter of the year - its first quarterly fall since 2005.
The global trade in potatoes rose by more than 11 per cent in value to £6.8bn last year, according to the World Potato Markets report.
Garden centres see April sales fall by 36 per cent on 2011 and no let-up in early figures for May.
Solus tool brand Yeoman has upped its market share to 10.6 per cent.
Retailers nationwide are feeling the pain in line with garden centre owners, some of whom have reported trading at 40 per cent less than 2011 for the last five weeks.
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