Olympia FFA online plant sale sees great success

 

[June 01, 2020] 

Despite facing many challenges this year, Olympia FFA members put together a very successful plant sale, selling over $7,300 worth of plants! At the start of second semester, agriculture students began planting plugs and seedlings for the plant sale. As the semester continued, students and the greenhouse managers would take care of the plants by watering them, giving them fertilizer, and transplanting them when needed. Just about the time that the greenhouse was getting full from all the growing plants, students at Olympia were sent home due to coronavirus, making the future plant sale plans up in the air.

However, Olympia students, FFA alumni, and Mr. Hoffman worked together to produce one of Olympia’s most successful plant sales yet! Mr. Hoffman and the greenhouse managers, Rebekah Magee and Noah Reber, took turns taking care of the plants while remote learning was in place. Since the FFA chapter could no longer have an in-person plant sale, Alyssa Casey and Ellen Springer worked together to create a website to sell the plants on. When asked about creating the website, Alyssa Casey said, “It was very helpful to make the site with Ellen. It seemed like a lot of work at first, but once we both began to work on the site we were able to create it quickly. It was fun and I’m glad it was a success!”

Customers were able to order plants from the website then go through a curb-side pick-up process.

Only the Olympia FFA Alumni and Mr. Hoffman were able to work the plant sale. They organized orders in advance so they would have each order ready for its designated pick-up time. There were only a few instances where they had to substitute certain plants due to the inventory not being quite right.

To receive their plants, customers pulled up to the curb, had the plants loaded into their car, and then paid for their plants.

The alumni that took turns working shifts for the plant sale included: Gina Schaefer, Michele Ott, Joan Harrison, Dwayne Hancock, Dawson Banister, Bailey Hoerbert, Molly Schempp, Beth Fasse, Susan Litwiller, and Monica Rogers.

When asked about the very successful plant sale, Mr. Hoffman stated, “I’m very grateful for our supportive community that purchased plants this year. The horticulture class did an amazing job, especially Rebekah Magee and Noah Reber who served as greenhouse managers. I’m also very thankful for Alyssa Casey and Ellen Springer who created the plant sale website.”

[Submitted by Chloe Scroggins, FFA Media/Marketing Specialist]