ColorPoint Supplies Poinsettias to Lowe's Stores in Kentucky

 

By CHRIS ALDRIDGE, Kentucky Agricultural News

 

PARIS, Ky. (Dec. 14, 2018) — If you’re Christmas shopping at a Lowe’s store in Kentucky, those bright red and green poinsettias that the North Carolina-based retailer sells are Kentucky Proud.

The poinsettias were grown in a greenhouse near Paris, Kentucky, by one of Kentucky Proud’s newest members, ColorPoint. The 40-acre facility in Bourbon County is one of the company’s two mega-greenhouses – the other is in Granville, Illinois – encompassing more than 5.1 million square feet of indoor space.

In addition to Lowe’s, ColorPoint ships more than a million poinsettias each November and December to Walmart, Aldi, and other retail stores in Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, and Wisconsin.

Chad Cagle, head grower at the Kentucky facility, compares his job to conducting an orchestra.

“There’s an art to growing, for sure,” he said. “There’s a lot I have to monitor.

“It takes strategic planning to have them flower when we ship them. My job is to deliver an on-spec plant at the height, color, and date they [stores] want.”

Poinsettias, native to southern Mexico, are named for Joel R. Poinsett, the first U.S. ambassador to Mexico, who introduced the plant to Americans in 1828 by giving one to his friends at Christmas. Dec. 12 is National Poinsettia Day to commemorate Poinsett’s death.

Also called the Christmas Star for its star-shaped red bracts (the flower is inside each bract), the poinsettia’s botanical name is Euphorbia pulcherrima, which means “the most beautiful.” In 16th-century Mexico, Franciscan friars used poinsettias to decorate their church altars because they bloomed at Christmas time.

ColorPoint starts growing poinsettias in late May, when cuttings begin arriving from Ethiopia or Guatemala.

“They come in as small cuttings, and we stick them in pots,” Cagle said. “We control 100 percent of the water, heat, and light to create the perfect environment to grow.

“The plants will tell you what they need. If you’re overwatering, they will develop fungus. If you’re underwatering, they will wilt.”

With 250,000 poinsettias under his control, Cagle is assisted by Priva computer software, which monitors for disease and insects.

“Priva allows me to constantly monitor the controls of the greenhouse,” he said. “I get alarms in the middle of the night if something goes wrong.”

Cagle said it is a myth that poinsettias are poisonous to humans and pets.

“If you eat a whole lot of anything, you will get sick,” he said. “I don’t know anybody that would eat pounds and pounds of poinsettias.”

Cagle said if there’s something to avoid about the plant, it’s the milky sap that seeps out when broken.

“It’s an irritant,” he said. “You wouldn’t want to get that in your eye.”

ColorPoint, which boasts the eighth-most greenhouse space (5.8 million square feet) in North America, grows poinsettias in the fall and winter, and mums in the summer and fall. But its most profitable time of the year is spring, when it sells annual flowers.

“We make 90 percent of our money in spring,” Cagle said.

ColorPoint was founded 18 years ago by brothers Art and Ken VanWingerden. Their father, Aart, immigrated from Holland to America in 1948 and began selling flowers on street corners in New Jersey. He started multiple greenhouse businesses that served national retailers.

The VanWingerden brothers have 14 siblings, and they all grew up working in all facets of their father’s greenhouse business – as growers, with seeds and cuttings, in facilities and greenhouse design, and in developing greenhouse automation.

 

“Their family is well known in the horticulture business,” Cagle said. Some of the greenhouse facility and irrigation boom systems were designed and built by members of the VanWingerden family, he said.

For more information about ColorPoint, visit colorpoint.us.

 

 

Alex Vazquez Rivera, a grower for ColorPoint, walks through a sea of poinsettias in the ColorPoint greenhouse in Bourbon County. (Photo courtesy of ColorPoint)