US: Proven Winners certified training now available

To help independent garden centers prepare for the spring season, Proven Winners® is once again offering the Certified Garden Center Training Program to provide the knowledge and know-how employees need. In under an hour, participants will learn key information about new plants and programs, and also come away with solutions to help them educate customers.

"We know that trained teams are more confident, provide their customers with the right solutions and sell more products," says Jessica DeGraaf, director of retail accounts. "But we also know that one of the biggest struggles garden centers face is staff education. Finding the time and resources to train team members each spring can be a challenge. That's why we created the Certified training program more than 20 years ago – to support garden centers and help them set their staff up for success."

Over more than 20 years, thousands of garden centers have participated in the Certified program by watching the training video and answering the accompanying questions. And 98% of employees who took Certified training in the past said they would take it again and recommend it to a co-worker.

Along with vital education, news and tips, Certified garden centers receive priority listing on provenwinners.com through the Find a Retailer tool, a choice of a t-shirt, hat or POP credit for each staff member who completes the program, a pizza party courtesy of Proven Winners to celebrate their accomplishments, and access to Proven Winners' professional photo library.

To make Certified training more widely accessible, this year's training video is available with closed captioning in English, Spanish and French. And to help viewers find the information they need faster, the video is now divided into chapters, allowing viewers to easily jump from topic to topic to find the information they need.

"We are thrilled to play a small role in this process and are grateful to be a part of team training at well over 1,500 garden centers across North America. We want to thank our IGC partners and look forward to playing a part in team training this spring." DeGraaf says.