 | |
| Industry | Gardening |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1876 |
| Founder | Washington Atlee Burpee |
| Headquarters | |
Key people |
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| Products | Seeds, plants, and supplies for home gardening |
| Website | burpee |
Burpee Seeds and Plants, officially W. Atlee Burpee & Co., is an American seed and plant company that was founded by Washington Atlee Burpee in Pennsylvania in 1876. [1]
W. Atlee Burpee & Company was founded in 1876 by Washington Atlee Burpee in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, after starting a mail-order chicken business in 1876. The company expanded to selling garden seeds, farm supplies, tools and hogs after customers began asking for seeds they had grown in their native farms. In 1888, the family farm, Fordhook Farm in Doylestown, Pennsylvania, was established as a family farm and crop field trials after Burpee began traveling to Europe to collect seeds which needed to be adapted to North American climates. [2] [3] The farm was likely the first experimental test field station in the United States. In 1900, distant cousin Luther Burbank visited the farm inspiring him to create his own experiments. He later created additional research stations, including in California in 1909, to test seeds. [4] [5] By the turn of the century, Burpee's had created one of the largest mail and freight businesses of the time. [6]
The direction of the company began to change with the death of its founder in 1915, when his son, David Burpee, inherited the company. [7] David was interested in victory gardens and was an early promoter of the concept during World War I. [8] He also prioritized flowers and initiated several flower hybridization breeding programs. Geneticists also began to modify the genes of seeds using X-rays and colchicine. [8]
Under his leadership, the advertising and catalog also improved. The advertisements began to include full-color advertising to include Burpee's strengths of reliability of seeds using the motto "Burpee's Seeds Grow" and leader in the industry while the catalog was compact, arranged by category, and easy to find the order form. Any information not included in the catalog was sent to the customer requesting it in a handwritten letter. The catalog's sales averaged $4 per order (equivalent to $70.3 today). [7] : 38 Various artists illustrated the catalog including Paul de Longpre and Alois Lunzer. [9]
After Burbank's death in 1926, Burpee acquired the rights to his experiments but no notable vegetables or flowers were to come from Burbank's work. [5] In 1949, Burpee introduced its 'Big Boy' tomato hybrid which quickly became its best seller. [3]
In 1970, David Burpee sold the company to General Foods for $10 million. [8] [10] In 1974, Burpee moved from its north Philadelphia location to its current headquarters at 300 Park Avenue in Warminster, Pennsylvania. SEPTA extended its Warminster Line commuter rail to Warminster, the train station being opposite Park Avenue from Burpee's headquarters.[ citation needed ] In the 70s, the company introduced seed-starting kits for beginners, an innovation in the seed industry. [5]
In 1979, the company was acquired by ITT. David Burpee remained as a consultant until his death in June 1980. [11] In 1981, experimentation and seed production left Fordhook Farm. [3]
In the 1980s, gardens had begun to shrink in size from an average of 600 square feet to 325 square feet while chain stores began selling a better selection of plants to their customers who preferred plants over seeds. These market changes and mismanagement by ITT led Burpee's sales to slump, and the company was purchased for $15 million by new investors McKinsley & Co. in 1987. [11] [10]
In 1991, the Burpee company was acquired by George Ball, Inc., a diversified horticultural family business. The new leadership diversified the business by selling new and unusual varieties; more plants than seeds; opening its own retail stores in 2000; and utilizing its web store to boost business. Jonathan Burpee, the founder's grandson, was the last Burpee family member to work for the company. [11]
In 1998, Ball purchased the family farm, where notable varieties such as Iceberg lettuce and Big Boy tomato were bred, to renovate and establish the property as a horticultural center. The seeds Burpee produces are almost exclusively grown in California. [12]
In March 2019, James Mattikow was named the company's president and CEO. [13]
In 1919, David Burpee began working to hybridize the marigold to overcome its limited colors, scrawniness, and late blooming flowers. It was at this time that he first had the idea of a white marigold competition but held off on it due to his belief that the hybridization would be unsuccessful. [8]
In its 1954 catalog, W. Atlee Burpee & Co. first advertised a competition for the development of the first white marigold flower, offering $10,000 to any gardener whose efforts produced a flower deemed to be pure white. Twenty-one years later, in 1975, the prize was awarded to 67-year-old Alice Vonk of Sully, Iowa, who received $100 the previous year as one of six gardeners nationwide whose marigolds came closest to being white. [14] [15] [16] [17] [18] Vonk kept seeds from the lightest flowers in her garden each season, replanting for over two decades before achieving a pure white marigold that measured 2.5 inches in diameter. Her entry in the 1975 edition of the contest topped 8,200 other entrants and produced what was then described as the "costliest flower ever". [14] Burpee's branded the flower as "Burpee's Best Whites." [5]
By 1960, the odorless flower was the best-selling flower in the United States. [8]
Washington Atlee Burpee was the founder of the W. Atlee Burpee & Company, now more commonly known as Burpee Seeds.
Canna 'Yellow King Humbert' Burbank is a medium sized Italian Group Canna cultivar; foliage green, but often variegated purple markings and occasionally whole leaves purple, oval shaped, spreading habit; oval stems, coloured green + purple; flower clusters are open, spotted, colours yellow with red spots, often large red markings and occasionally whole flowers red, staminodes are large; seed is sterile, pollen is sterile; rhizomes are long and thin, coloured white and purple; tillering is prolific.
George Watt Park was an American businessman who founded the Geo. W. Park Seed Company, Inc., now known as Park Seed Company.
David Burpee was a seedsman and president of the W.A. Burpee Company from 1915 until 1970. He was known for his experimentation and hybridization of vegetables and flowers that were for the general population.
The Early Girl tomato is a medium-sized globe-type F1 hybrid popular with home gardeners because of its early ripening fruit. Early Girl is a cultivar of tomato with indeterminate growth, which means it produces flowers and fruit until it is killed by frost or another external factor. It grows tall, therefore it needs support as the plant grows. Fruit maturity ranges from 50 to 62 days after transplanting, depending on the source, which appeals to growers in climates with shorter growing seasons. Early Girl can tolerate temperatures as low as 40 °F (4 °C) and is well-suited to hot, dry climates. Early girl is reliable and prolific.
Daniel John Hinkley is an American plantsman, garden writer, horticulturist and nurseryman. He is best known for establishing Heronswood Nursery, in Kingston, Washington; and Windcliff, on the Kitsap Peninsula near Indianola, WA; and for collecting, propagating, and naming varieties of plants new to the North American nursery trade.
Heronswood is a botanical garden located in Kingston, Washington, in the Northwestern United States. It is also the name for a now defunct mail order specialty plant nursery business that originated at the gardens.
Jackson & Perkins Company, commonly known as Jackson & Perkins, is an American company that cultivates roses. Since its founding in 1872, Jackson & Perkins has grown to sell other products including live plants, garden accessories, holiday gifts, and home decor.
Luther Burbank was an American botanist, horticulturist and pioneer in agricultural science. He developed more than 800 strains and varieties of plants over his 55-year career. Burbank's developments included those of fruits, flowers, grains, grasses, and vegetables. He developed a spineless cactus and the plumcot.
The White House has had multiple vegetable gardens since its completion in 1800. John and Abigail Adams, Eleanor Roosevelt, Hillary Clinton and Michelle Obama all have had their own versions of vegetable gardens. Roosevelt planted the White House victory garden during World War II to promote the use of victory gardens by American citizens in a time of possible food scarcity. Hillary Clinton had a vegetable garden constructed on the roof of the White House. On March 20, 2009, Michelle Obama broke ground on the largest and most expansive vegetable garden to date on the White House lawn.
Breck’s is a mail order gardening company and importer of Dutch flower bulbs. Based in Guilford, Indiana, and Noordwijkerhout, Netherlands, Breck’s was founded in 1818. Originally a family-owned garden supply business, Breck’s gradually expanded into a catalog company. Breck’s is now the largest U.S. importer of Dutch bulbs.
Joseph Breck (1794–1873), a businessman and horticulturist of the 19th century, was born in Medfield, Massachusetts. He moved to Pepperell, Massachusetts, in 1817, working in the chaise carriage manufacturing business while also exploring his passion for horticulture in his gardens. His interest in flowers and plants developed into a career as an editor, from 1822 to 1846, of the New England Farmer, one of the earliest agricultural magazines established in the U.S., and the first of its kind in New England.
George Carl Ball Jr. is an American seedsman who has served as chairman of W. Atlee Burpee Company since 1991.
The Ferry-Morse Seed Company is a supplier of seeds, and was at one time the largest such company in the world. It is currently part of Green Garden Products, a privately owned gardening company based in Massachusetts.
The D. Landreth Seed Company is an American seed company founded in 1784 by David and Cuthbert Landreth in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Alice Vonk (1908–1997) was an American floriculturist. She received the $10,000 prize for creating the whitest marigold in David Burpee's seed challenge. The competition was run by Burpee's seed company, W. Atlee Burpee & Co, founded by his father Washington Atlee Burpee. The $10,000 prize makes her flower the costliest marigold in the world, and the costliest flower in the world at the time.
Albert Etter (1872–1950) was an American plant breeder best known for his work on strawberry and apple varieties.
Gardens Alive!, Inc. was a privately owned multi-title catalog company founded in 1984. It sells garden and lawn supplies, specializing in organic products under its namesake catalog. The company has expanded by aggressively purchasing other catalog companies, including expansion into gift and games after acquiring the assets of defunct catalog company BlueSky Brands in 2008. As of 2010, the company has annual sales of approximately $170 million, 60 percent of which was from garden-related business.
Theodosia Burr Shepherd was an American botanist, horticulturist and pioneer in plant breeding. Called the "Flower Wizard of California," and "The Pioneer Seed-grower," Shepherd was the first woman in California, and possibly the first woman in the United States, to hybridize flowers.
Tom Carruth is an American rose hybridizer, who has created more than 100 rose varieties, including eleven All-America Rose Selections (AARS). He is currently the E.L. and Ruth B. Shannon Curator of the Rose Collections at the Huntington Library in San Marino, California.
