Gardeners aren't only eating their veggies, they're planting them, too.

by Lucinda Dyer -- Publishers Weekly, 1/18/2010

These days, the most famous garden at the White House isn't filled with roses, but rows of tomatoes, peppers, and squash. And it's not just the Obamas who are digging up the backyard to grow vegetables. Statistics from the National Gardening Association show 43 million U.S. households planted food gardens in 2009--up 19% from 2008. At the venerable Burpee Seed Company, chairman George Ball reports the company saw a whopping 30% increase in vegetable seed sales in 2009.

The economy has definitely sent people to their backyards with a shovel and a hoe," says Gibbs Smith's gardening category manager, Madge Baird. "If they gardened before the boom went bust, they've now increased their numbers of rows and crops. If they hadn't previously been gardeners, they're at least nursing a couple of tomato plants and maybe a cucumber in the flower garden or on the patio."

Food gardening, notes Perigee editor Maria Gagliano, "appeals to a new generation of DIYers, who care about the quality of what they're putting in their bodies." While the economy is still a factor, Gagliano says, "an even stronger pull is this generation's urge to be more self-sufficient and to connect on a deeper level with what they're eating. Much like the back-to-the-land movement of the '60s and '70s, we're sewing, pickling, baking, and planting our way to a simpler lifestyle. Only this time, we're doing it in our own backyards."

So what can publishers do to cultivate a potential market of millions of enthusiastic new gardeners who may not know a Brandywine from a Cherokee Purple? One challenge, says Storey editorial director Deborah Balmuth, is that "many of these people are so new to gardening, they don't even consider themselves gardeners. Growing food is an extension of their efforts to be more independent and self-sufficient." Storey is responding to the challenge with books like Barbara Pleasant's Starter Vegetable Gardens, which assumes no prior gardening knowledge and features 24 small-scale organic garden plans, each set up like a cooking recipe, with a list of ingredients and a basic plot plan.

"Today's new gardeners are a sophisticated bunch," notes Timber Press associate publisher Mikyla Bruder. "They're active, media-savvy, and have high expectations for the content and design of their books. We're taking our cues from the success of the craft category and aggressively marketing books like Stephanie Cohen and Jennifer Benner's The Nonstop Garden: Easy Designs and Smart Plant Choices for Four-Season Landscapes online to get the buzz going among young gardeners and DIY folk."

An author's ability to reach out to these new gardeners using blogs or social networking has become key for many publishers. "Gayla Trail was one of the first young, hip, urban gardeners to host a robust interactive Web-based community," says Clarkson Potter editorial director Doris Cooper. "That was as much a draw to us as her clever ideas and clear, prescriptive voice in acquiring Grow Great Grub: Organic Food from Small Spaces. "Cooper also notes the gritty, hip nature of many of the book's photographs--"it's gardening for newbies without alienating the tattoo crowd." San Francisco Bay-area gardening maven Maria Finn had already cultivated an online audience through her weekly e-newsletter and blog (CityDirt.net), when Universe/Rizzoli came calling. Her book, A Little Piece of Earth: How to Grow Food in Small Places, says Rizzoli publisher Charles Miers, "is a small package that's not intimidating for new gardeners as well as a stylish package that can--as with all Rizzoli titles--seamlessly fit into the chic décor of a home." ...