Grow For Good 417 loses entire inventory — around 300 plants — to below-freezing weather
A Springfield plant shop experienced a "devastating" loss over the long wintery weekend due to the below-freezing temperatures.
On Monday, Craig Granger, owner of Grow For Good 417, discovered that the heat in his plant shop went out, leaving all of his plants exposed to the deadly temperatures.
Upon entering the shop on Monday, Granger said he was overwhelmed with the smell of diseased plants and knew what he was about to find would not be good.
"One of the plants I ended picking up to look at it and I could tell the leaves were dead and I set it down and it was just this solid ice block," Granger said. "All the soil had been wet and was just absolutely frozen."
Granger told the News-Leader that he plans on visiting the shop again later this week to conduct a complete inventory but he suspects that he had about 300 plants and nothing will be salvageable. Granger added that he likely lost between $3,000-$4,000 worth of product, including houseplants, cacti and small trees.
"It was pretty devastating," Granger said. "We've spent a lot of time with some of those plants, propagating them and putting some of our favorite plants that we had up there at the shop."
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Upon hearing Granger's news, Tasha Adams, owner of Hickory Lane Plants, created a GoFundMe campaign on Monday. As of Tuesday, the campaign had raised just over $1,000 of the $5,000 goal.
"That is like the worst nightmare that could happen to a plant store," Adams told the News-Leader. "Whenever he (Granger) told me that (his heating went out), I knew that it was going to be catastrophic because it's a perishable good. It's like a freezer going out in a grocery store."
During below-freezing temperatures like Springfield experienced over the weekend, Adams said leaving a plant outside for just 30 seconds can cause damage.
After conducting an inventory of the store this week, Granger said the next big task will be building up his stock again, which he described as a "challenge."
Since starting Grow For Good nearly five and a half years ago, Granger has prided himself in hand-picking the plants he sells.
"I just went on a trip down to Louisiana and grabbed some plants and hauled them back," Granger said. "All of those, of course, are gone now, so now I have to make more trips."
When is comes to disposing of the waste he now has, Granger says he hopes to work with a local organization that could use the soil and dead plants as compost. As for the plastic containers many of the plants were in, Granger will return them to F. Lower's Greenhouse in Fair Play, a wholesaler he frequently works with.
Despite the unexpected surprise of the week, Granger said he is going to make "lemons into lemonade." After removing all of the waste from the shop, he plans on doing a deep clean and rearranging some of the shop's shelving, a project that he's been wanting to complete for some time.
During this time of hardship, Granger said he is grateful for the Springfield plant community, which has been supportive, especially Adams.
"I don't want to use the word 'competition,' but we kind of are but we have never felt like that," Granger said of working with Adams and Hickory Lane Plants. "We just really enjoy working with each other and the plant community in Springfield and the surrounding area."
Granger said he will be posting updates about the shop on Grow for Good's social media, including Facebook and Instagram.
Greta Cross is the trending topics reporter for the Springfield News-Leader. Follow her on X and Instagram @gretacrossphoto. Story idea? Email her at gcross@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Springfield News-Leader: Springfield loses $3,000+ worth of product to freezing weather
