Colombia: Hydrangea market continues to grow

The hydrangea is the fourth most important flower in Colombia in terms of value and volume. 2022 has been a positive year for this sector. They exported over 90 million USD and were the third product category with the largest growth, according to statistics from Asocolflores.

Catalina Arango

From 2017-2022
The hydrangea exports peaked in 2022, with exporting a value of 90 million USD. Before the pandemic, from 2017 to 2019, the export value was quite stable, between 75 and 72 million USD. Then, in the covid year 2020, it dropped to 54 million USD and recovered in 2021 to 77 million USD. 

216 companies
In total, 216 companies are responsible for the 90+ million USD value that has been generated through the export of hydrangeas in 2022. They all have only a 5% or less percentage share of the market, and CI Global Exchange being at the top of the list. Interesting to see is that CI Global Exchange, also known from their brand Flores Del Este, is the only company that has one farm at one location of one family owner. "The others are mostly brokers with many farms," says Catalina Arango of Flores Del Este, but the main trend is that these brokers are growing their own farms and own production and buying less from small growers.

Flower exports
All in all, the exports of flowers from Colombia to the world increased from 1.7 billion in 2021 to 2 billion in 2022. After the rose, carnation, and chrysanthemum, the hydrangea is the most important crop in terms of value and volume in 2022. And when looking at the products that grew the most in value from January till November 2021 compared to the same period in 2022, statistics show that lilies had the highest growth with 40%, followed by flowers/bouquets, increased by 38% and third hydrangeas, by 19.9%. 

Reason for growth
According to Catalina, one of the reasons for the growth in the exports of hydrangeas may be that more people may be buying more flowers for everyday use/ "Since the pandemic, we've seen that many people started to buy flowers for everyday use instead of for a particular holiday - which was quite common in the US. If we look at the total exports of flowers, we see that they grew by 22.8% in value and 9.3% in volume. But why this sharp increase for the hydrangea?

If you see, the other category that is increasing a lot are the bouquets ( hydrangeas, greens, chrysanthemums, and many types of flowers in them) selling through supermarkets.

Also, Catalina sees a new modern-day movement focused on a healthy lifestyle. "In the last half-decade, there has been more discourse online about mental health, bringing more awareness to concepts like self-love, self-care, and childhood development. We have an entire generation of people getting more up-to-date information on the importance of self-love and our relationship with ourselves. We are becoming more emotionally intelligent as a human race, and bringing your energy up with meditation, buying yourself flowers, being around nature, gardening, hugging trees, etc., is a new trend, having plants in your house."