Baby Boomer Garden Survey Results

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Soooo. Um. Yeah. I kind of forgot to post the Baby Boomer search results. Sorry. Better late than never. I hope…

If you remember, following a Garden Writers of America presentation on Gen Y Gardeners, there was quite a brouhaha on the internets about whether Gen X & Y were gardening, joining gardening associations, where they were buying their plants, etc. First, I surveyed members of Gen X & Y to find out what they thought about gardening (see my thoughts here). Then, several people suggested surveying Baby Boomers as well, to have a comparison.

Here is a bird’s eye view of the results:

74% of Baby Boomer gardeners report knowing 10 or more people their age that also like to garden.
Approximately 75% of Boomers have a yard in which to garden (only 49% checked the “I have a yard” box, but the overwhelming majority of people who checked “Other” wrote about their yards).
Learning from gardening mentors, reading books and trial and error were the most popular ways to increase their gardening skills.
An impressive array of sources were mentioned as places to acquire new plants. More than 50% of respondents said they buy plants and seeds online, and in the nursery, and that they get seeds and cuttings from other gardeners. Catalogs seem to be unpopular among Boomers and most didn’t care to buy full grown plants online either.
Unsurprisingly, most listed social networks and blogs as places they interact with other gardeners (both were the only places I promoted the survey), but 40%+ also went out of their way to mention that they enjoy talking with their “real life” friends about gardening too.
42% are members of an offline gardening organization. The most popular organizations seemed to be general interest garden clubs or a membership at their local botanical garden.
The most common reason given by those who aren’t members of a gardening organization was lack of time, followed by a dislike for group politics or just groups in general.
49% of Boomers reported spending 20 or more hours in their garden.
52% spend between $100-500 on gardening per year.

Interestingly, the areas where Boomers and the younger generations seem to differ are not where you’d expect. More Boomers, for example, reported buying seeds and bulbs online than Gen X & Y. And it wasn’t just a few people more. 13% more Boomers bought seeds and bulbs online than the younger folks. And 17% more Boomers were willing to buy plants online than their Gen X & Y counterparts.

Another interesting difference, though I’m not sure what it means, were the number of known contemporaries who also like to garden. Overwhelmingly Boomers reported knowing 10 or more people their age who also like to garden. Almost exactly a third of Gen X & Y knew 10 or more people, a third knew 6-10 gardeners, and the remaining third knew less than five fellow Gen X/Y gardeners.

In addition to those areas where people might guess the results would be switched, there were areas where Gen X & Y and Baby Boomers reported nearly the exact same thing. For example, 50% of each group’s respondents have a yard to garden in. Likewise, all three generations said they learned about gardening the same way: mostly from mentors, books, websites and from trial and error. Neither group reported taking very many gardening classes, but nearly twice as many Boomers had taken a class than the younger generations.

Then there were the comparisons that are totally unsurprising. Way, way, way more Boomers are members of gardening clubs than Gen X & Y. 42% of Boomers have joined up, while only 18% of Gen X & Y have forked over any membership dues. Though the reasons both groups’ non-joiners gave for their lack of membership were largely the same: no time and dislike of group dynamics.

Also in the category of “I didn’t need a survey to tell me that” is how much each generation spends on gardening. While most gardeners, regardless of the age group, spend between $100-500 a year, twice as many Boomers spend more than $500 per year than Gen X & Y.

What do you think? If you’d like to download the results and analyze them yourself, you can read a pdf summary or view all of the results in an excel spreadsheet.

November 9, 2009 | Filed Under General