Editorial: Flower show must survive this setback

It seems barely conceivable that there will be no Ellerslie Flower Show this year. Such is Auckland's luxuriance in all things horticultural, and such is the popularity of the event, that it had quickly become a major date on the region's calendar. People came from around New Zealand, and from overseas, to visit what had blossomed into the Southern Hemisphere's biggest outdoor gardening event. It seems inconceivable that the show will never be held again because of growing pains associated with its organiser, the Rotary Club of Auckland, and the loss of a major sponsor.

Perhaps, however, the seeds of the difficulty were embedded from the outset. Started by the club in 1994 as a fundraiser for local charities, the show has grown into an exercise that occupies hundreds of Rotary volunteers, as well as seven full-time workers. Quite simply, it has prospered well beyond its original brief. If this made the club feel somewhat out of its depth, that is hardly surprising, the more so when the withdrawal of Television New Zealand, one of the three major sponsors, raised the spectre of financial risk. For Rotary, this could well have been the final straw.

Having failed to find a replacement for TVNZ, the club has now, sensibly enough, decided to sell out and refocus its charity work. The resultant cancellation of this year's show has drawn an odd response from some in the gardening industry. They suggest the Ellerslie show has done its dash, and that gardening extravaganzas, in general, are faded flowers.

Certainly, the attendance at last year's show was down. But that probably reflected bad weather, and nothing else. In fact, the popularity of Ellerslie and its inspiration, the Royal Horticultural Society's Chelsea Flower Show, show little sign of waning. Chelsea packs in 157,000 visitors each year; the numbers have to be capped. Ellerslie has regularly drawn 70,000, with a capacity of 20,000 visitors a day.

Of course, any flower show will soon appear tired if it trots out merely the same formula and features every year. But Ellerslie, like Chelsea, can hardly be accused of that. Both have constantly evolved and, even at the risk of courting the wrath of gardening aficionados, have diversified into stalls featuring all manner of things hinging on the horticultural, along with food, art and live music.

Ellerslie's ongoing popularity makes it an important asset. For that reason, the Auckland Regional Council should be prepared to strike a deal that waives rental costs for the Botanic Gardens site at Manurewa. If that is what it takes to get the event restarted next year, it would be a small price to pay. It seems unlikely, however, that the show will not be sold, such is its obvious commercial potential, or that a new major backer will not be found, whatever the difficulty of securing sponsorship dollars at the moment.

Certainly, the show's potential is well recognised elsewhere. Hamilton officials have started to murmur about taking it to their city. They gain full marks for initiative but, in reality, everything points to Auckland being the logical location. Most of the exhibitors are from this region, as are many of those who attend, and Auckland offers more accommodation choices and convenient travel links for visitors. A show in Hamilton would not be so successful.

The non-appearance this November of the Ellerslie show should not signal its demise. It has survived one other such lapse, when it was in the throes of shifting from the Ellerslie racecourse to Manurewa. Its potential, under a new organiser, suggests there is no reason it should not return refreshed, reinvigorated and ready for a growth spurt. The forerunner of the Chelsea Flower Show began in 1862. If Ellerslie is merely a sprig in comparison, the groundwork for healthy growth has been laid, present setbacks notwithstanding.