GLAS Special: An insight into Bord Bia’s services for the horticulture industry

The Celebrity Dream Garden by Declan McKenna, inspired by Brendan Courtney

From Carol Marks, sector manager for horticulture at Bord Bia

Horticulture

Read More: Bord Bia Carol Marks GLAS 2026 GLAS Special

15 July 2026

Bord Bia actively supports the amenity horticulture sector through various programmes, such as consumer and trade promotion, business development, market research, and quality initiatives.

Here’s a report on key activities from the past year and an overview of services available to the industry.

Garden Market Report

Ipsos B&A has tracked consumer activity and spending in the gardening market since 2001. The survey aims to provide Bord Bia with a tool to measure and track consumer spend, purchase channels, and purchase motivations.

The biennial study was conducted in 2020 during the onset of COVID-19 and repeated in 2021 to monitor the pandemic’s impact. It recorded exceptional growth in the gardening market, surpassing the previous highs of the Celtic Tiger years.

While the 2023 study revealed that habits returned to pre-Covid times, stabilising with an overall value of €966 million, down 35% from the €1.5 billion peak in 2021. Despite high inflation in 2023, the market has grown 21% since 2018, indicating that Bord Bia’s focus on outdoor spaces during Covid has left a lasting impact on attitudes towards gardening.

The 2025 study went into field in July 2025 and will conclude in July 2026, with full results available in early autumn. Interim results for the final quarter of 2025 and the first two quarters of 2026 show positive results.

Kieran Dunne, Kildare Growers Group with Noel Grealish TD, Minister of State at the Irish Bred Plants Feature

Market trends and consumer spending

total gardening spend for the same period increased from €641m in 2023/24 to €869m in 2025/26
consumer occasions rose by 20%, indicating higher engagement
outdoor flowering plants and indoor potted plants saw significant spending increases
fresh cut flowers also experienced a 20% growth, reflecting sustained demand.

Size and trends in gardening market

the market size in occasions for the same period grew from 15.4 million in 2023/24 to 18.8 million in 2025/26
market value rose from €509m to €980m over the same period
gardening activities like planting bulbs, bedding plants, and shrubs increased in frequency and value.

Outdoor and flowering plants

occasions for outdoor plants like bulbs, bedding, and trees increased, with some categories peaking in 2021/22
spending on outdoor plants grew by 31%, with notable increases in bulbs and planting seeds
hanging baskets and outdoor containers remain popular, with fluctuating but generally rising occasions.

Bord Bia was Bloomin’

Bord Bia Bloom, celebrating its 20th year, attracted over 90,000 visitors to Dublin’s Phoenix Park throughout the June Bank Holiday weekend. Event organisers reported that business was thriving, and spirits were high all weekend long in part due to the sunshine, which made a welcome appearance and remained constant throughout.

The Celebrity Dream Garden by Declan McKenna, inspired by Brendan Courtney

Many exhibitors reported strong sales and a need to restock throughout the weekend, while at the Plant Emporium, sales of plants from Irish Nurseries maintained a similar level as the previous year.

A new addition for this year was the Irish Bred Plant Feature – showcasing the wide range of plant varieties bred by Irish Nursery Growers including Betula ‘Spider Alley’, and Cistus ‘Little Miss Sunshine’, a specimen of each was presented to the President of Ireland Catherine Connelly, Patron of Bloom.

Presentation of Irish Bred Plant (L-R: Mr. Jim O’Toole, CEO Bord Bia, Catherine Connolly, President of Ireland and Kieran Dunne, Kildare Growers Group)

Bord Bia Bloom 2026 in numbers

Some facts and figures:

over 90,000 attendees across five festival days
20 spectacular Show Gardens
a brand-new Wellness Village
17 plant nurseries, alongside the Botanical Hub and Plant Emporium
14 Postcard Gardens created by communities nationwide
100+ Irish food & drink producers in the Food Village
300+ talks, demos and performances across five stages
3 indoor restaurants, including A Taste of Bloom curated by Neven Maguire
70+ food trucks across three vibrant outdoor food areas
the return of visitor favourites like the Conservation Area, Craft Village and Budding Bloomers.

Dates for 2027

Bord Bia has confirmed that Bloom 2027 will take place from Thursday, 3rd June to Monday 7th June next year.

The Celebrity Dream Garden at Bord Bia Bloom 2026

To celebrate 20 Years of Bord Bia Bloom, a very special Celebrity Dream Garden was commissioned as an addition to the Easy Steps to Dream Gardens suite of seven gardens by Bloom award winning garden designers.

We teamed up with Declan McKenna, inhouse designer with Silverstream Landscapes, and TV and radio personality Brendan Courtney, to help him bring his dream garden to life.

Declan worked with Brendan over 2025/26 to bring Brendan’s vision for his own garden to life, to demonstrate how working with a garden designer can benefit anyone, and to make garden designs and plant recommendations easy and accessible to all.

The full design, planting plan and plant list is available, alongside the other seven Dream Gardens, on the Bord Bia Bloom website for the public to download.

An interview with Declan and Brendan, from the Celebrity Dream Garden, featured on the BLOOM SPECIAL TV programme, aired on RTE One on Thursday evening 28th of May, immediately following the Super Garden Finale!

A suite of social media assets, along with downloadable Point of Sale material was sent out to garden centres to help them promote the plants contained in the garden.

Brendan Courtney, and Bord Bia/Bord Bia Bloom, posted about the garden design process and progress, while a full social media campaign was conducted during Bloom and over the following months, encouraging the public to recreate the design/planting in their own garden.

The publicity also directed the public to the other seven Dream Garden designs on the Bord Bia Bloom website, and we witnessed a huge uplift in downloading of all the designs.