Hervé Simier chooses the Growcoon

The French magazine ‘Le Lien Horticole’ presents the Growcoon. The growing system is embedded in the impressive success story of our customer Hervé Simier.

Simier, a leading supplier of plants for urban greening, has been successfully using the biodegradable Growcoon to replace plastic pots in plant production since 2020. A special dispenser was then developed to distribute the Growcoons into the pots.

Simier started the first trials with a 7 cm Growcoon for a few customers in 2020. His employees still distribute the Growcoons to the trays by hand. With around 35,000 Growcoons a year, the system works well.

The Agec law and the fight against plastic have made us act. The Growcoon is the only product that does not leave any waste at the end of the day when we have optimal crop management for all our plant types,’ explains Hervé Simier, the company’s managing director.

When a spark from a quad bike caused a devastating fire on 9 March 2022, Hervé Simier decided to reorganise his production. Everything had to be rebuilt, so we decided to use the Growcoon to multiply the seedlings and switch to an automated process,” he explains.

An innovative machine was developed to automate the Growcoon process and distribute the Growcoons onto the trays. Today, Simier produces up to 1.4 million plants a year using this technique – an impressive increase that would not have been possible without the customised machine.

Simier accepted the considerable investment because he was convinced of the benefits of the biodegradable pots. After three months, the netting has completely disappeared, leaving only the roots to hold the substrate together. This means there is no waste when the plants are delivered. The feedback from his customers has also been very good: ‘What they find interesting is that they no longer have to clear out and store pots or trays. The plants are delivered directly in wooden crates and can be planted immediately. This saves the planting teams almost 30% of their working time, as almost everyone can concentrate on planting rather than clearing out and disposing of plastic pots.

For Simier, innovation and investment have paid off with added value for production and customer satisfaction.

The complete article in French can be read here.

Find out more about the Growcoon.