Houseplants

How to make your love of houseplants sustainable

The question of how to make my houseplant hobby more sustainable has been on my mind for a couple of years. And I bet I’m not the only one who has been thinking about it.

Houseplant sales have been skyrocketing since 2015, and that was even before we were all confined to our homes for months on end due to a public health crisis.

In the United States, sales have surged almost 50 percent to $1.7 billion between 2016 and 2019, according to the National Gardening Association cited by Bloomberg.

In the UK, the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS), reported that average sales in the second half of 2019 were up 60% on the previous year, according to the BBC.

The popularization of a hobby leads to an increase in consumption, and often this comes at a price. But I promise I don’t want to be all doom and gloom, or guilt-trip anyone for buying too many plants.

I just want to offer you a few tips to keep in mind to help you cultivate a more sustainable houseplant hobby.

This list is by no means comprehensive. Nor is it perfect. I plan to add to it as I think of or come across other sustainable ideas. And if you have any other ideas to add, please feel free to send them to me via the Contact form on this website. The more ideas, the better equipped we are to make better choices.

1. Don’t become obsessed with your houseplant wishlist.

There’s a reason I’m starting with this tip – and that’s because I think this is the root of the problem. I don’t know how to say this gently, so I’ll just say it. You really really really don’t need to own all the houseplants that you see online. And keeping a houseplant wishlist is a recipe for unhappiness. Trust me, I’ve been there!

I often see plant parents become plant collectors, and that’s when a healthy hobby becomes an unsustainable one. Just like any other type of addiction, plant shopping addiction leads to excessive consumerism and, ultimately, dissatisfaction with the plants you already have. You’ll constantly be looking for that next dopamine hit.

There’s a long conversation we need to have about consumerism in the houseplant world, and I’m already mulling it over for another post.

But for now, please know this: it’s ok to only have a few houseplants in your home. It’s ok to not chase after the big-ticket items (I’m looking at you, fiddle leaf fig), and it’s never too late to change your ways if you’ve realized you’re taking this houseplant hobby too far.

2. Buy from small businesses with sustainable practices.

I’ve been changing my mind back and forth about this tip because there’s something to be said about economies of scale. Large greenhouse operations have more money to invest in sustainable plant practices. And some of them really do make an effort to grow houseplants sustainably.

But ultimately I’m inclined to support small businesses, whether they’re already established family-owned garden centers or Etsy stores growing on a small scale.

Every single sale can make a difference for a small business, and I’ve found that it’s easier to communicate with them when it comes to making sustainable choices for your houseplants. You can ask them to reuse packaging materials, to skip plastic packaging, or even to strip the soil off the roots so that the plant can fit in a smaller box.

One time, a small store I was buying from customized my order based on how cold the weather was around the time of shipping.

I cannot imagine having these kinds of requests granted by a large fulfillment center.

3. Buy from local growers.

I admit, I have bought plants from big box stores more times than I’d care to admit. It’s tempting to pop into the gardening section when I’m out grocery shopping. And it’s even more tempting when the plants are on sale for a few dollars.

But part of me thinks that’s the problem right there.

Just like with fast fashion and fast food, we’re sacrificing quality and sustainability for convenience and low prices. So I’ve been vowing to do better and made it a goal to seek out local growers first. This way, I’m not only helping a small business stay afloat, but I’m cutting down on plant miles (the distance the plant is shipped from the grower to the end-buyer).

4. Buy from growers that care about sustainability

As I mentioned in the previous point, there are some greenhouse operations that take the sustainability of their houseplants seriously. And because they work so hard at it, and this is one of their core values, they make it a point to mention it on their websites. You can usually find this information on their About us page.

Here are a few examples of eco-friendly practices from plant growers and some of the growhouses that talk about their efforts on their websites:

Using renewable energy for business operations – Harster Greenhouses
Capturing rainwater and using it to irrigate the greenhouses – Green Circle Growers
Using natural pesticides, such as nematodes or beneficial bugs, to keep the houseplants pest-free – Heidi’s Growhaus
Using recycled packaging materials for deliveries. Some growers also use biodegradable packing supplies, such as compostable coconut fibers and corn-based packing peanuts.
Supporting non-profit work. For example, Cellar Door Plants partners with One Tree Planted and donates monthly to help with reforestation efforts around the world.

5. Swap plants with people in your community.

Propagating your own plants and sharing them with other plant lovers is probably the most sustainable houseplant behavior you can engage in. And it’s also a great way to create a community of like-minded people to share tips, advice and resources.

I have given and received houseplants using platforms such as Craigslist, Facebook and Instagram, as well as groups of friends and neighbors. Plant people – real plant lovers – love sharing their hobbies; but of course, you should do your due diligence before you meet any stranger.

6. First, look at the “as-is” section of your local plant store.

This depends a lot on the store policy, of course. But a lot of garden stores and even big-name stores such as Ikea, have an “as-is” section. You’ll usually find plants that are not in the best of shapes, but that can still be salvaged with a bit of careful pruning, watering and sunlight.

This strategy will keep the plant from going to waste, and it will also save you some money.

I’ve only had one miss buying from the “as-is” section, with a very stubborn succulent that refused to recover. Other than that, I’ve managed to revive all the sad houseplants that have crossed my path from the discount shelf.

7. Get plant containers from the thrift store.

This is an easy one to think of, I admit that much. But it’s worth mentioning just to help you think outside the box. Or rather, outside the flower pot. I know a lot of plant lovers who have repurposed the wackiest of containers for their plants: tea tins, beer cans, baskets, drawers, old boots, the odd pair of jeans and even tea kettles.

My personal favorite lately has been buying old plates from the thrift store and using them as water-catching trays or saucers for the pots that come with a drainage hole. This saves the old, often chipped, plates from going to the landfill, and it also reduces the need to buy plastic saucers (which, for some reason, are sometimes as expensive as the pots they match).

8. Offer excess containers for free to a local nursery or garden center.

We’ve all been there – with a stack of plastic nursery pots taking up space in the shed or the garage. And this happens a lot especially if you buy seedlings for your garden too. In most places, these types of pots aren’t recyclable.

What I usually end up doing is keeping half of them to use for propagating and sharing plants (also a very sustainable houseplant habit), and return the rest to a local plant nursery or garden center.

If you do decide to return them, you should first ask if they have any use for them. Some garden centers are just retail operations, while others grow their own plants. And as a courtesy, please peel off any labels or bar codes that might make the reuse of the pots confusing.

9. Look for biodegradable containers.

This may be a regional thing where I live, but I can sometimes find plants (especially herbs) in biodegradable nursery containers. The pots are often made of cellulose, a natural resin or other compostable materials.

And even though they look just like plastic pots, they do biodegrade in the municipal compost or even in your own garden.

I’ve had the pleasant surprise of pulling out some pots that I had stored only to notice that they had broken down in the shed over winter.

10. Stay away from synthetic fertilizers.

Ok, this may be a bit controversial. But I have never fertilized any of my houseplants, and they’re all growing beautifully. This helps me avoid synthetic fertilizers and the plastic waste that comes with them (not to mention the runoff and having to dispose of the bottle responsibly).

But how can I keep plants happy and growing without fertilizer?

What works for me is paying very close attention to the soil. Fertilizer is often needed when the soil has become depleted of nutrients. That’s when your plant starts to suffer and starve.

To keep the soil healthy and nutritious, I repot the plants and refresh the soil every spring (and sometimes in the fall too, depending on how fast the plant has grown over the warm months).

I also top the flower pots with fresh soil when I notice that the level has dropped – this often happens either due to soil compaction or because soil escapes through the drainage holes.

About once a month, I aerate the soil using a chopstick or some popsicle sticks. This means I poke a few holes in the surface of the soil, and gently wiggle the stick to break down the clumps of soil that have become compacted. Soil aeration is important because it allows the plant roots to take in more water and have access to oxygen.

11. Take care of your plants to minimize damage and loss.

Yes, I know we all do our best. I also know there’s virtually no plant owner who hasn’t lost at least one green friend (almost typed ‘fiend’ there). Accidents happen and houseplants die despite our best intentions.

The crux of this piece of advice is more about not turning houseplant keeping into another chore that we’re likely to procrastinate on until finally get it done out of guilt. Ultimately, the sustainable houseplant choice is having only as many plants as you can realistically take care of.

If you’re just buying plants for the sake of buying them, that’s not a sustainable habit – for multiple reasons, time management and financial reasons included.

Before you buy your next plant, challenge yourself to fully take care of the ones that you have. And that doesn’t just mean remembering to water them. Make sure you have enough time, energy and passion to still be taking care of the mundane aspects of plant keeping: repotting, soil aeration, dusting, pruning, dealing with bugs and moving the plants around the house to get the best light of the season.

12. If you order online, choose smaller plants or cuttings

I get the allure of buying plants online. Just a few days ago, I ordered some Sedum succulents, and I can’t wait to get them in the mail.

But the bigger the package, the more resources it takes to get to our homes. If you find a plant that you like from an online store, see if you can opt for a smaller version. This will often be cheaper (both in terms of purchase and delivery cost) and will have a lower footprint.

And the good thing about small plants is that it’s sometimes easier to get them acclimated to your indoor environment. And if the plant gets damaged during shipping, at least you’re not out too much money.

Do you have any other sustainable houseplant tips that you want to share with other plant lovers? You can send them to me via the Contact form on this website. Or you can add them as a comment to this Instagram post.

If you want to read more about houseplants, hop on our once-a-month newsletter list. There’s no neverending email sequence here. Just a monthly email to keep in touch and chat about plants.