U.S. Home & Garden Inc.’s
an online wholesale B2B e-marketplace for
the lawn and garden products industry, containing more than 26 product
categories and 3,000-plus stock keeping units.
The Egarden.com site also features an auction operation. The marketplace site
was designed to deliver online supplier information to members of the lawn
and garden industry, including small and medium size manufacturers,
independent retailers and specialty stores, contractors, and landscapers.
US Home & Garden also said that it has
retained the Internet investment banking firm of Wit SoundView Corp. to advise on
capital structure and future financing for Egarden.com.
Egarden.com said that the nation’s three largest hardware cooperatives in the
do-it-yourself industry, TruServ Corp., Do it Best Corp. and Ace Hardware
Corp., have entered into exclusive strategic alliances to provide access to
about 18,500 retail stores.
In addition, Egarden.com began a marketing campaign that is targeting the
more than 47,000 independent retailers, 400,000 commercial landscapers and
building contractors, and 25,000 vendors that comprise the lawn and garden
industry.
The company said that industry participants at Egarden.com will have access
to a broad range of products, including barbecue grills, bird feeders,
fencing and edging, flower pots and planters, garden tools and supplies,
irrigation equipment, landscaping supplies and equipment, outdoor furniture
and accessories, and live-goods.
Egarden.com, through an alliance with GardenTrend Inc. to facilitate the
buyer and supplier registration process, anticipates that over 500 individual
suppliers with more than 100,000 total SKUs will be listed for sale on
Egarden.com by the end of fiscal year 2001.
“Our new e-commerce platform has created a marketplace that has not existed
before,” said Robert Kassel, chairman and CEO of U.S. Home & Garden. “Not
only can the global lawn and garden industry be accessed by buyers and
suppliers cost effectively, but also process and product costs can be managed
more efficiently.”
U.S. Home & Garden Inc. is a manufacturer and marketer of consumer lawn and
garden products including weed preventative landscape fabrics, weed trimmer
replacement heads, fertilizer spikes, decorative landscape edging, shade
cloth and root feeders.
