Seattle's NW Flower & Garden Show has new owner

The Northwest Flower & Garden Show, a late-winter tradition in Seattle for 21 years, has a new owner, ending months of uncertainty for area gardeners.

Show owner Duane Kelly said the exhibition had been sold to O'Loughlin Trade Shows of Portland, Ore. O'Loughlin currently puts on 12 trade shows in Washington and Oregon, including home and garden shows in Portland and Tacoma, plus RV and outdoor and boat shows in the two states.

Besides the Seattle show, the nation's second-largest, Kelly's Seattle-based company, Salmon Bay Events, owned the San Francisco Flower & Garden Show, the third-largest in the country. Philadelphia has the largest such show in the nation.

When Kelly, 59, announced last October that he wanted to sell the shows and do other things, including writing, landscapers and gardeners feared the poor economy would scare away potential buyers and the popular events would wither and die.

Kelly told The Herald of Everett last week that he chose O'Loughlin because of its decades of experience, financial stability and commitment to the show's traditions, including elaborate display gardens, 300 retail vendors and more than 100 seminars.

"I feel really good about it," Kelly said. "The more I've talked with them, the more I've appreciated how they are committed to quality."

Kelly long ago booked space at the Washington State Convention & Trade Center, where the next show will run from Feb. 3 to 7.

The Northwest show was the first public event produced at the downtown Seattle convention center after the venue opened in 1988. It is the largest annual event at the center in terms of attendance, attracting 54,000 people last year.

O'Loughlin President Bill O'Loughlin, 48, said he plans to retain the style of the event by hiring the show's exhibits manager, Linda Knudsen, and garden and feature manager, Cyle Eldred, who recruits the show's 25 or so display garden creators.

The display gardens are a popular feature of the shows. Nurseries and landscapers each receive between $3,000 to $5,000 to produce the elaborate indoor scenes, plus free dramatic lighting, water, electricity and use of heavy equipment.

"We have no intention of taking it in new direction," O'Loughlin said. "My goal would be, in about 10 years, to invite Duane back and have him look at the event and go, 'Wow, this was a great move and I'm really proud of what they've done.'"

Kelly sold the San Francisco show in May to San Francisco Garden Show LLC, a group that formed to purchase the event.

He did not disclose the sale price of either show, except to say that he received a combined total of less than $1 million.

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Information from: The Herald, http://www.heraldnet.com