Making Corporate Marketing Budgets Worthwhile, or Better Than a Drawer

Corporate Marketing departments either waste a lot of money, or...um, not sure what comes after the "or"...anyway, rather than trashing a pricey Marketing Department doo-dad, I found a gardening use for it: as a better place to store plant tags than the kitchen junk drawer.



This particular Marketing Department doo-dad is a blank notebook that was sent to us when we bought the brother-in-law a home bar-code reader for Christmas. You were supposed to use this notebook to describe in detail what you did with the home bar-code reader, and the best story would win a prize. There's a Corporate Marketing Department for you! They have a lot of time on their hands, so they think you do, too. Since we bought the bar-code reader as a present, the only thing we could have written in the notebook was "gave it to brother-in-law". Probably not a prize-winner.

Requirements:
1. A notebook of some sort.
2. All the plant tags you know you should save but don't quite know what to do with.
3. A roll of tape. Do not keep the tape in your kitchen junk drawer, because you
want to be able to find it again. Keep it handy.



Using the tape, stick all your plant tags in the notebook, one tag per page.
As you plant new plants, stick the tags into the notebook. When it's pouring rain (a common California gardener's fantasy), look through your notebook and comment on your plants, such as "Purchased March 2008--worth every penny." Or "died the second I brought it home" or "piece of crap, obviously a favorite of the marketing department", and so on. I usually record when and where I bought the plant, and update the notebook every so often with a quick comment like "doubled in size", "smells like armpits", and the like.



It's a quick way to give yourself the illusion that you're organized, or at least keep your junk drawer cleaner, You can make short notes over time, and remember the dud plants so you don't end up buying them again, or what the plant cost, so you can yell, "I paid fifty dollars for that!" if the neighbor steps on it. Resorting to an elaborate spreadsheet to record plants is--work. If you just tape the tag in the notebook when you get back into the house, it's reasonably fast and painless.

Either since you've read this far, or because you are in Marketing, you deserve some Flornography. Better that than a picture of the contents of my kitchen junk drawer.

Hemerocallis 'Victorian Lace':


Rosa 'The Wife of Bath':


Rosa 'Jubilee Celebration':

Comments

  1. Well, let me tell you - you are pretty smart! I know that you knew it already, just letting you know that now I know that as well. I have several of those notebooks and I certainly will try (I am very realistic) to use at least one of them for garden plants tags. Right now, they are in a plastic container from Nonni's biscotti. I love Nonni's biscotti, so I always have those containers. Every time I need a plant tag, I dump them all on the floor and do a search. A notebook should bring some order, structure and organization. There is a question, although - do you keep the tags in an alphabetical order? What if another A or B or Z tag arrives? Anyway, thanks for the post and welcome to Blotanical!

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  2. All the pictures are really very beautiful.I love the roses very much.But after seeing the picture of Hemerocallis 'Victorian Lace' i can say that this can give a tough competition 2 roses. Beth www.iflorist.co.uk

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  3. Great idea! This has to be made for gardeners like me who only know that a rose is a rose is a rose. I usually have no idea whether its a Aida or Red Knight or whatever.

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