Help Future-proof Our Industry
By Mike Senneff
Better than your best employee! Always present, and always producing results. When someone or something is this good, you want it to grow and never end. Endowments are that way and we’re announcing a big one today!
Green Plants for Green Buildings (GPGB) is thrilled to announce the creation of the Interior Industry Growth Fund (IIGF). This all-new endowment will be managed by the National Horticulture Foundation (NHF). The principal balance will never be spent, and continuously grow through contributions. The annual investment income will be spent to produce results in interior landscape research, education, and marketing projects.
With the creation of the Fund, industry professionals and practitioners now have a vehicle to put investment dollars to work to specifically grow our interior industry. This creates an opportunity for a lasting endowment that will never go away. Only the investment earnings spent, so the fund is sustainable now and for future generations.
The Interior Industry Growth Fund has been established with an initial $10,000 gift by GPGB and the merging of NHF’s Fund for Interior Horticulture Research and Education (FIHRE Fund), previously established in 2001. The new Fund will have a $37,603 beginning balance to be invested in ESG and similarly aligned businesses. Additionally, to further kick start the endowment, iPlants Magazine has pledged all proceeds from the 2022 International Plantscape Awards Gala to the Fund.
We are all aware of 12% increases in productivity, 15% reduction in stress and 19% improvements in concentration with indoor plants present. And the tremendous ROI plants have in the workplace. But where did these numbers come from? They came through funded research much like what the IIGF will drive. How did you know this? You heard it through marketing.
New research, marketing and education are just a few examples of how proceeds will be used. We will now have a sustainable way to get the message on the incredible benefits of interior plants out to designers, specifiers, and decision makers for years to come.
Let’s relate this endowment to your top company performers. Most employees work 40-hours a week, 50-weeks a year, for a total of 2000 hours. Who would be willing to contribute the equivalent of $1 an hour for an annual gift of $2000 to create an everlasting fund with perpetual results to grow our industry? Many will hire 5 such employees today for a $10,000 gift to the endowment. Others may go with a part-timer for now, and pledge more later.
So come join us and go to the National Horticulture Foundation and CONTRIBUTE HERE. Select the Interior Industry Growth Fund as the endowment name. Every person has the chance to make a change for good—no matter how big or small. Whatever amount you can give, know that your contribution makes a difference in the future of the interior industry.
Your donation, together with those of our other industry supporters, will bring us ever closer to our 2022 goal of $100,000 to fund interior horticulture research, education, marketing, and related projects. And, once your individual contribution reaches the $5,000 level, it will become a named endowment for your family or company. A gift may be a cash contribution or pledge, and all contributions are tax deductible.
Make a difference today. Along with your industry colleagues, let’s contribute to what even our best hires have been challenged to do—to be always present, always growing, and always producing results. This is your new Interior Industry Growth Fund at work.
Questions? Please Contact:
Linda Reindl
NHF Executive Director
1533 Park Center Drive, Orlando, FL 32835
407-295-7994
lreindl@fngla.org
www.nationalhorticulturefoundation.org