Garden Press Event 2019

by Michael Smith (Veshengro)

Wednesday, February 27, 2019 saw the Garden Press Event held at the Business Design Center in Islington, London (UK) and the event was well attended as far as exhibitors and press visitors are concerned.

This is is the first year when the event was entirely organized by GIMA rather than via the Garden Media Guild but, as usual, visitors were made very welcome indeed and the venue is much better than the previous one at Barbican 2.

It was good to meet old acquaintances from companies and see new stuff from the “old” companies as well as make new ones and to see products from newcomers to the show as well as the field.

Some of the new products and those from companies that have not been at the event before that caught my attention were Makita's new cordless chainsaw with a cutting power equal to that of a 35cc gasoline engine, the ARS tools that Sorbus was showcasing, as well and especially the Rotating Handle System from Itip (review to follow) that will make using, and especially emptying, a wheelbarrow so much easier for everyone, but especially people who are older, suffering from arthritis, back problems, etc.

There was also the range of light gardening tools from Fiskars, some of which are of nylon while others of a lighter metal (alloy). All to make gardening easier.

Burgon & Ball presented the new range of tools for container gardening (review/s to follow), as well as showcasing the range of Corona cutting tools from the USA, which they are now representing in the UK. I had seen the latter ones before often on US media but actually handling them had not been possible before. Having done so I must say that I very much like them. Hopefully I will be in a position, at a later date, to actually test and review some of them.

I would like to use this also to thank the organizers for another great event and for allowing me to be part of it.

© 2019