Italy has enjoyed a certain degree of political stability since October 2022. Florists and garden centres in the fifth-largest Dutch export market have not been afforded that same stability; they are feeling the pressure from an advancing retail sector. Over the past fifteen years, supermarkets have sprung up like mushrooms, and many of them now have a plant and flower section.
Italy long seemed a country trapped in an ongoing political and economic crisis. Prime ministers came and went as cabinets were formed and then quickly collapsed. This unrest had an impact on the Italian economy, which appeared barely able to recover from the 2008 crisis. Since October 2022, when Giorgia Meloni became Prime Minister of Italy, the Southern European country seems to have entered calmer waters. This may also have a favourable effect on the Italian economy. Then again, apart from an overheated housing market, the situation is comparable to that in the Netherlands: Italy, too, cannot escape inflation.
Products that have become more expensive in Italy include plants and flowers from the Netherlands. Machiel Rijsdijk of Kobitex says that the value of a trolley of plants has doubled. “That trend began during Covid, and prices have not fallen back since.” On top of that, there are increased transport costs. Onno Piet, Sales Director at OZ Export, says that ten years ago it cost EUR 90 to send a trolley of flowers to Milan; now the price is EUR 140.
