The stupid thing is this. Unless you are part of the 60+ generation who belong to clubs and societies, you won't know that AGM can stand for Annual General Meeting anyway. And you'd have to be too dim to read a plant label to look at one and think AGM stands for a meeting in that context. Old fogey attempt to rebrand for how they think the young will read things: vaguely patronising?
I get that the RHS wants to make more of its award, and so it should. But a rebrand? The trials team is perfectly capable of coming up with their own ideas, but would need a little extra funding at a time when they’re being told to reduce spending.
There’s money for outside companies of course, but not for their own teams to instigate change.
Question: do you know whether they paid some kind of PR firm to come up with the rebrand or if they had someone, clearly needing to justify their job, think it up in house? Possibly by committee?
Sadly although a professional gardener I left the RHS when I saw an imbalance in passing on knowledge compared with their perceived desire to make money.
However, RHS accounts must have been hit when they invested heavily at Wisley on a large retail store before roadworks on the main road were finished. There was no visible attempt at temporary signage directing visitors to Wisley resulting in staff outnumbering visitors the day I went (with the aid of a SatNav).
Wisley struggled at times through the roadworks, although let’s not forget that a wedge of the overall project involved providing Wisley with a new access road that could cope with its large number of visitors, and that disruption would have been reduced had they been willing to lose part of their shelter belt…
The RHS has a baffling policy of making its gardens fend for themselves financially most of the time. There’s money for capital investments, like the new shop building but otherwise gardens are expected to be largely self-funding. What’s the point of having investment portfolios and a large property empire if you can’t dig in to those funds to cover a three year long ‘rainy day’?
The stupid thing is this. Unless you are part of the 60+ generation who belong to clubs and societies, you won't know that AGM can stand for Annual General Meeting anyway. And you'd have to be too dim to read a plant label to look at one and think AGM stands for a meeting in that context. Old fogey attempt to rebrand for how they think the young will read things: vaguely patronising?
Very true.
I get that the RHS wants to make more of its award, and so it should. But a rebrand? The trials team is perfectly capable of coming up with their own ideas, but would need a little extra funding at a time when they’re being told to reduce spending.
There’s money for outside companies of course, but not for their own teams to instigate change.
Question: do you know whether they paid some kind of PR firm to come up with the rebrand or if they had someone, clearly needing to justify their job, think it up in house? Possibly by committee?
Yes, it was an outside company.
I don’t know how much experience with the horticulture industry that company has, but I can hazard a guess…
Sadly although a professional gardener I left the RHS when I saw an imbalance in passing on knowledge compared with their perceived desire to make money.
However, RHS accounts must have been hit when they invested heavily at Wisley on a large retail store before roadworks on the main road were finished. There was no visible attempt at temporary signage directing visitors to Wisley resulting in staff outnumbering visitors the day I went (with the aid of a SatNav).
Wisley struggled at times through the roadworks, although let’s not forget that a wedge of the overall project involved providing Wisley with a new access road that could cope with its large number of visitors, and that disruption would have been reduced had they been willing to lose part of their shelter belt…
The RHS has a baffling policy of making its gardens fend for themselves financially most of the time. There’s money for capital investments, like the new shop building but otherwise gardens are expected to be largely self-funding. What’s the point of having investment portfolios and a large property empire if you can’t dig in to those funds to cover a three year long ‘rainy day’?
I hope the cost of the rebranding can be justified in the RHS accounts.
It will be in there somewhere.
But whether it will be possible to tease out individual elements… that is the question.
Do you plan to write a post on your Baptisia trial by any chance? It’s a plant I don’t think gets enough ‘love’ in the gardening world.
I will be, and I’ve got a lot of it written out in my head.
Question is whether it will be a good idea to write it before the end of the trial.