lets talk about palm prices

[trioderob]

lets talk about the general subject of palm prices -

was at a nursery on friday and was thinking about costs,,,,,,,

how much the palms were and how much the price go up as the palm size increased.

so many of the smaller palms were $60 -100 on the smaller (not seedling) sizes

but the really nice size plants were $600-1000 these palms had many feet of truck

so what this thread is about is how you guys and gals view the high costs of the larger plants.

do you see the high prices as fair because of the time and grief the grower went thru or do you

find the prices of the larger palms to be excessive ?

[Wai`anae Steve]

  trioderob said:

lets talk about the general subject of palm prices -

was at a nursery on friday and was thinking about costs,,,,,,,

how much the palms were and how much the price go up as the palm size increased.

so many of the smaller palms were $60 -100 on the smaller (not seedling) sizes

but the really nice size plants were $600-1000 these palms had many feet of truck

so what this thread is about is how you guys and gals view the high costs of the larger plants.

do you see the high prices as fair because of the time and grief the grower went thru or do you

find the prices of the larger palms to be excessive ?

Can't afford them large pots so I buy 1 gal size from Floribunda.

Can't even afford those in thee 60-100 dollar range

[cfkingfish]

Well here is a nurseryman's perspective:

The price of a specimen plant is not just its age. I tend to repot just about all my plants, and taking a 15 gallon, and putting it in a 30 can take up to an hour if the root system is finicky, the plant is spiny, or just outright rootbound and you have to take care to set it in its pot. The original price of the seed or seedling the person grew it from is usually negligible at this point. The number of times that plant was watered, weeded, fertilized all comes into play.

As for seedlings and smaller plants, the price pertains more to the cost of the seed, germination rate, damping off rate, and closer, more skilled attention. Water, soil, and fertilizer come into play less.

Then there are the palms that will always be a little pricey because they may be an easy grow in the landscape, but they are slow, take a while to seed, and have naturally bad germination rates. You tend to get what you pay for with these palms.

[Dypsisdean]

I used to wonder about the same thing.

Try growing a nice sized slow 30 gal palm yourself, and you will have your answer.

But be sure to use the best soil you can find. Don't let it get too root bound on the way up, or ever forget to water it. Make sure it's fertilized and sprayed (bugs and fungus). But most importantly, you need the correct exposure with uniform light from above, and not where debris from overhead trees will fall. So that usually means a tall shade house. And you will probably want a place where you won't have to move it very often. At only 50 cents a day - that's over $900 in 5 years.

[Palm Hound]

Losing a seedling to a teething puppy or to a fungus makes paying more for a larger worth it. but 4 figures is out of the question no matterwhat the species is.

[mnorell]

I personally prefer to buy smaller palms, between 4" and perhaps 10 gallon sizes, and always try to stay well under $100 even for the larger plants unless it's a very special and healthy specimen. I usually plant them out as early as possible and let them grow up in situ...the reason being that, if the palm is strong enough and safe enough to survive at that size in your landscape, it will grow faster than it ever will in a container. I have two Phoenix sylvestris 'robusta' purchased 4-1/2 years ago as small plants. I put them into pots but one of the two went in the ground within a few months...the other stayed in a container for one additional year before being planted out near the first plant in near-identical conditions. The results were stunning. The first-planted palm put on growth like crazy and is now about 12-15' tall, it's really a massive thing. The other is 5' tall and just now starting to pick up some steam. That one year of delay in a container translated to 2 or perhaps more years of lost growth by comparison...that is, assuming I'm correct in thinking they would have grown equally if planted out at the same time.

On the other hand, I had a one-gallon silver Bizzie in 2005 that I put in a protected spot and it grew very slowly. Then I bought a 5' tall, 10-gallon specimen from a big-box store for a very reasonable price and planted it in October 2006. The one-gallon was killed by a rather average winter. The 10-gallon survived that same winter no problem and in fact has stood three winters in the 23-24F range with several long hard freezes, with only slight damage on a few of the leaves. It is very strong and seems completely happy despite not being in quite as much sun as it should have. So in that case the strength of the larger palm outweighed the possible advantages of planting small here.

Because I live in a marginal climate and am trialing a lot of species, I really can't afford to be paying huge sums for specimen palms. I agree that a well-grown small plant from Floribunda or some of the other excellent vendors out there is a good buy and will give a good-sized, healthy specimen in short order once planted out in the landscape. Even very small plants can pretty easily be nurtured through hard freezes by mulching/burying their crowns while temps are low. I strongly believe that early ground-planting allows them to establish roots in an uninterrupted fashion as they put on acclimated foliage, and also adjusts the plants to the cool soil and average temps of winter. But if you're impatient and have the money to spend, and if you don't mind the possibility of the slow relative growth exhibited by many big containerized plants, then go for it as long as you won't regret spending the cash if the plant croaks for any reason.

My two cents!

Edited November 29, 2009 by mnorell

[John in Andalucia]

  trioderob said:

do you see the high prices as fair because of the time and grief the grower went thru or do you

find the prices of the larger palms to be excessive ?

You love stirring up a good debate don't you Rob? The higher the price, the bigger the palm, the more "man hours" went into it, and the greater the overheads. No different to an expensive house, or a car in that respect. If the price appears disproportionate, then other factors might come into play, such as uniqueness. But the bottom line is, if you don't like the prices (or can't afford them) then look lower. I don't think grief is a factor either. Most nurserymen I'm sure, use simple maths to establish their prices.

[Succulentum]

Here in France in marginal climate, I do not know a nurseryman in palm tree, succulents etc, who won € 2,000 for 35 hours per week is what the average employee earns in a large company here with the employment security benefits of the entrprise etc. ... when you're nurseryman you work 80 hours per week, little or no holidays, climate risks, lots of charges ... more the palm is great, more you have worked for it, the more you risk losing it. In France the least expensive palms are palms imported from across the world because of the price of labor here, like every other product from elsewhere. for me the palms, small or large are too cheap, I often see young plants 1 to 5 years to sell cheaper than what cost me the same has grown from a seed by me! to return to the big palm, in a compagny the cost of stocks are major data, the money must turn over. In automotive production was used to work lean, the product being sold before being paid to the supplier. If you grow tall palm, you have money locked for more than 10 years, you would have probably won more by placing the stock market (not in 2008-2009) or the house market. For me the palms and plants in general are sold at a too low pricce if you compare the time and money put in them. In north EU, only Dutch men owner of big mass product plants company with amazing greenhouses heated by state subsidized gas earn money, but they are not nurserymens, they are big Boss.

sorry for my bad English.

here my opinion

jean-bernard

[Pivi]

  Succulentum said:

I often see young plants 1 to 5 years to sell cheaper than what cost me the same has grown from a seed by me!

Maybe you buy expensive seeds?

I don't think palms are cheap. Here in Croatia on adriatic coast, palms are few times more expensive than the same palms somewhere else in the world (spain, usa, south america, australia)...

Only one example. A year ago someone on this forum said he payed for this palm (ravenea rivularis) 17$, and there was also a discount, only 9$ for this palm.

Here the same palm would cost at least 60$ (if you're lucky). Syagrus romanzoffiana also isn't cheap here. These 2 are cheap palms, but here they cost.

Edited November 29, 2009 by Pivi

[Succulentum]

Hi Piwi and all

>>Maybe you buy expensive seeds?

It's certainly the case... :lol: :lol:

>>I don't think palms are cheap. Here in Croatia on adriatic coast, palms are few times more expensive than the same palms somewhere else in the world >>(spain, usa, south america, australia)...

>>Only one example. A year ago someone on this forum said he payed for this palm (ravenea rivularis) 17$, and there was also a discount, only 9$ for this >>palm.Here the same palm would cost at least 60$ (if you're lucky). Syagrus romanzoffiana also isn't cheap here. These 2 are cheap palms, but here they >>cost.

you must be compared in price equal to the wages and prices of other goods in the country.

You place you only on the side of the buyer, how much it should have cost you if you had grown it as a professional way, including your investment: land, greenhouse, shadehouse fertilizer, water tax burden of wage employees and yours ? The biggest problem is the global market difference between wages and products in the world.

I bought this 2 meters Majesty palm €59, 4 hours of the medium wages here. the price of $9 of yours is the price of cigarette parcel or cinema ticket, mad crazy.

the run to down is not a good thing it would be kill the market; BTW if you can find me a container of majesty like yours at $3 ($9 / 3 it's the wholesale rule) I will pay the shipment from Croatie to France. :drool:

hereagood link http://www.ubs.com/1/ShowMedia/about/news?...me=Tables_E.pdf

jean-bernard who would love to be a (rich) nurserymen :lol:

[Pivi]

You got it all wrong.

Someone in the USA payed for it 9$ and for the other 17$. Here's a link here

Here in Crotia the same palm is at least 60$. And i said 60$ if you are lucky.

ps. i don't think your medium wages are 15€/hour in France. That would mean that you have lower wages than the ones in croatia are. And that is not the case as much as i know.

Edited November 29, 2009 by Pivi

[peachy]

I can understand the higher prices for big or rare palms. The large area needed for storage, the wages, the insurance and land taxes and water bills, not to mention all the pots, soils and sundry items. Personally I cant see the value in the palms over about $1,000 or so. Unless they are delivered and planted for you, but even then surely $1250 would be ample. Palms go through fashion periods also, so while demand is high on certain palms the price rises accordingly. That is just business plain and simple. Some nurseries through their own efforts or good publicity get a reputation for quality or variety etc and can charge higher prices because people think they are buying from a special place. The golden rule of palm shopping for myself is to look around and compare prices. Recently I bought some seedlings for 90cents each when another nursery here wanted $15 each !! A very large difference in price. Nurseries can only charge what people are prepared to pay. They would go broke if their customers were all like me !! As a $250 palm can die as fast as a $10 palm can, I guess its how much you are prepared to gamble, anything in nature is a risk.

Peachy

[Kathryn]

  mnorell said:

I have two Phoenix sylvestris 'robusta' purchased 4-1/2 years ago as small plants. I put them into pots but one of the two went in the ground within a few months...the other stayed in a container for one additional year before being planted out near the first plant in near-identical conditions. The results were stunning.

Palm Foul!

You can't mention things like this without sharing pictures!

[Kim]

Market forces -- supply and demand -- determine palm prices. You may find many seedlings of a certain rare palm, but almost no larger sizes at all, so when you find a big one, it's going to be expensive. Other more common palms may be a dime a dozen at any size. Availability, or lack of availability, accounts for prices varying from one part of the world to another. Any very slow growing palm will command a higher price in a larger size, not so much because of production cost, but the rarity of finding one. The seller will take what the market will bear. However, there are limits to what the market will bear. Witness entire palm gardens, filled with mature, rare species, languishing on the market...why? It seems most palm freaks, even those with money to spend, prefer to grow their own.

[tropicalb]

  Kim said:

Market forces -- supply and demand -- determine palm prices. You may find many seedlings of a certain rare palm, but almost no larger sizes at all, so when you find a big one, it's going to be expensive.

Kim pretty much hit the nail on the head.

Although, when you find butia capitatas that should be in 24" boxes selling retail for $15 each, i think that goes a little farther than your typical "supply and demand" scenario, and more towards desperation on the part of the grower to keep his business afloat during overtly harsh economic times.

[Succulentum]

  Pivi said:

You got it all wrong.

Someone in the USA payed for it 9$ and for the other 17$. Here's a link here

Here in Crotia the same palm is at least 60$. And i said 60$ if you are lucky.

ps. i don't think your medium wages are 15€/hour in France. That would mean that you have lower wages than the ones in croatia are. And that is not the case as much as i know.

Pivi sorry I misspoke.

I red your thead and I must say that this Majesty palm was bought in a bigbox store, not in a nursery. I just ask me if these palms was U.S. grown or imported from abroad. if US grown is the grower make money ? or if it was just for not loose more money keeping them. I am in automotive and I am happy than our cars are not sold by bigbox store, if so, my wage will be lesser...

if I was in the united states I would prefer to buy healthy palms of Jeff ,Christian, Pioupalm, or other nurserymen than in these big stores. it is notorious than these are market killer. all people should live of their work

happy to discuss with you and sorry to highjack the thread of Robert.

nb: the net average wage in France is less than 15 € hour and the median wage is less than 10 € we are poor European people.

jean-bernard

[Pivi]

  Succulentum said:

nb: the net average wage in France is less than 15 € hour and the median wage is less than 10 € we are poor European people.

jean-bernard

I apologize. I was wrong. Here medium wage for one day (not one hour) is about 21 euro.

So 21 euro for day, not hour.

That makes palms here even more expensive

So to buy that ravenea above, we have to work 2 days (about 42 euros).

[Kathryn]

  Pivi said:

So to buy that ravenea above, we have to work 2 days (about 42 euros).

Wow! Two days work for a Ravenea. That's unbelievable.

What other items (non-plant) sell for two days of wages?

[John in Andalucia]

  Kathryn said:

  Pivi said:

So to buy that ravenea above, we have to work 2 days (about 42 euros).

Wow! Two days work for a Ravenea. That's unbelievable.

What other items (non-plant) sell for two days of wages?

PALM FOUL! Inciting your opponent to go off-topic!

[Pivi]

Not necessarily John.

You have to work 2 days to buy eight 50-liter bags peat moss/compost, or three 100-liter bags of perlite.

Syagrus this size costs about about $140 (cca. 100 euros).

Edited November 29, 2009 by Pivi

[John in Andalucia]

  Pivi said:

Not necessarily John.

You have to work 2 days to buy eight 50-liter bags peat moss/compost, or three 100-liter bags of perlite.

Perlite? Luxury!

[palmislandRandy]

Not a palm, but last week I stopped by a pretty well known nursery to pick up a couple of crotons. I'd been there a dozen times, without any problems. I asked an employee how much & she $30 ea, so I picked out a couple & went to with her to pay. Inside the office, the price went up to $45 ea because I was a RETAIL customer! I walked out! Although I will gladly overpay for a palm I really want.

[peachy]

Walking out is exactly what I would have done too . However I would have walked out for being expected to pay $30 for a croton. They are so easy to propigate from cuttings, that no more than $8 or $9 is the most I will pay unless its something really out of the ordinary. You did the right thing however, some people are just too greedy and if more people balked at a blatant overcharge then maybe they would learn to be more realistic in their pricing and realise that a customer with cash to spend should not be treated with disdain. Its people like us that keep their businesses in business.

Peachy

[Gtlevine]

Most nurseries survive in good times and go out of business in bad times, it is not easy and very few make a killing. Nurseries can grow many species from seedlings and even if the plants survive to a large size, they may not be able to sell them. And as the plants get larger they get more expensive and harder to maintain and it me reach a point that it is in the best interest of the nursery to throw away hundreds of plants that they spent years growing.

I don't have a problem with a nursery asking high prices. If someone offered to give me a nursery I would decline to take it, just too much work and risk to deal with plants. I am happy we have such dedicated nursery people in San Diego where I can just show up and buy a plant that they grew for 10 years.

Gary

[Pivi]

People, do you think that you pay high prices for palms in USA?

What would you say then about european prices? In general, i think you get great palms for not much money.

Edited November 30, 2009 by Pivi

[MattyB]

(In Monty Python Voice) Luxury! When I was a boy we had to work for 17 days just to pay for a phoenix canariensis seed, then the fruit from that seed had to feed all 12 children, and we had to hike to the top of a hill, bring back dirt in our pockets to plant the plant in. We'd cry over the dirt to water it, until our Phoenix would germinate, only to be eaten by a rabbit.

[Pivi]

Crying as a water resource? Interesting. Something to think about today also.

Was it 17 days, or maybe more like 16?

[John in Andalucia]

  MattyB said:

(In Monty Python Voice) Luxury! When I was a boy we had to work for 17 days just to pay for a phoenix canariensis seed, then the fruit from that seed had to feed all 12 children, and we had to hike to the top of a hill, bring back dirt in our pockets to plant the plant in. We'd cry over the dirt to water it, until our Phoenix would germinate, only to be eaten by a rabbit.

We never had pockets - nor dirt. There were 15 of us, living naked on a sand dune in the Sahara desert. We never cried, or entertained thoughts of owning fancy Phoenix palms! If we saw so much as a mirage, we considered ourselves lucky!

[MattyB]

That's great John!!!!!!

[osideterry]

Ah you were loocky! We didn't actually own a palm tree, it was more like "a palm tree to us". In reality it was an old artificial christmas tree with all the lower branches missing. But we liked it that way, we LOVED it... (I think I just drifted into Dana Carvey's grumpy old man)

[peachy]

Although all 23 of us were very poor, some us were lucky enough to see quite a few palm trees daily, at the research clinic that our parents sold us to for medical experiments.

[Kim]

...there's a palm tree on the telly...

[AggiePalms]

You have actually seen a Phoenix seed? I cannot even dream of a seed. I'm just glad we didn't have it so bad as some of you. When I was a mere tiny boy hoping against hope to grow up, fortunately there were only six generations of orphans to share the small spot in the dry desert sand we called home...well, ok not home. Some third generation orphans believed there might be a hint of a thought of a vision of a possible theoretical palmito (small palm, NOT palm tree) called Palmus eldoradoito, somewhere far out over the horizon. In her utter desperation and hoping to grow a theoretical palmito of her own to give her shade from the 134 degree sand, my great aunt ( 4.2 times removed) enticed the three youngest of us to grind up our left arms and legs to use as fertilizer, to be spread where she desperately hoped the palmito could possibly sprout.

Success! Milagro! No, no palmito...but two of the three of us did learn how to hop with no left arm or leg. That is true success; I am so pleased my life had such a happy ending, unlike some of you poor people.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

[J. australis]

  peachy said:

Although all 23 of us were very poor, some us were lucky enough to see quite a few palm trees daily, at the research clinic that our parents sold us to for medical experiments.

Try tellin' the young people of today that. They won't believe yer.

[BS Man about Palms]

Ah cant beeleeve how looky each and every one of you were! I had to walk 3 miles in a blinding hailstorm just outside our desert city uphill, both ways, getting home before I left, just to get a stack of National Geographics for my father, only to have my mother cut the pictures of the tropical wimmen with their breasts to their waists out of the photos just so I could SEE a PICTURE of a palmtree! Being the eldest twin of triplets born prematurely after the others I was the most brilliant of our underdeveloped family.

I had devised a way in order to germinate a palm seed if any wuud ever fall from the sky. We had many gophers passing underneath our dirt yard on their way to greener pastures. I surmised that if I could just capture just two and then fashion a device to harvest the breath of the same I could muster enough moisture after a week to make a damp medium for one seed of a TALL, LOOXURIOUS, WASHINGTONIA PALM. I DREAMED of HERD of Gophers in a large pen that I could get a enough moist breath from to grow my seed from. But we just had to carve up our coconuts from the store and eat them without a complaint and be THANKFUL for it!

Yungins dunt know how good they have it.

[LJG]

OK, we have officially jumped the shark.

[BS Man about Palms]

  LJG said:

OK, we have officially jumped the shark.

Shark?

We had to make do with cooked sushi with gravel stuffed inside. We would have killed to have Shark.

[Ken Johnson]

Not SHARK, snark!

[Moose]

  palmisland said:

Not a palm, but last week I stopped by a pretty well known nursery to pick up a couple of crotons. I'd been there a dozen times, without any problems. I asked an employee how much & she $30 ea, so I picked out a couple & went to with her to pay. Inside the office, the price went up to $45 ea because I was a RETAIL customer! I walked out! Although I will gladly overpay for a palm I really want.

50 % over wholesale ? - that is pre cow compost . Randy PM me the nursery, I gotta know!

[sarasota alex]

Neighbor across the street is selling a 25' tall P. sylvestris to a landscaping company. They agreed to pay him a $1000 for it. They came out, made it look nice, took pictures and it's now waiting for a prospective buyer. I'm not sure how much they're selling it for, but given that they sent a crew of 3 with a bunch of equipment to trim it, would need to do the removal, transporting and replanting, and would need to provide some kind of a guarantee to the buyer, I'd say over $2000 for sure.

I asked them how much I could get for one of my queens (was just asking, not gonna sell them) and they said no more than a $100.