What plant is best for you? A Vancouver-based online shop is here to help
Made in Vancouver is a collaboration between Vancity and Daily Hive. Together, we’re turning the spotlight onto local businesses, organizations, and individuals who are helping to create a healthy local economy.
Based in Vancouver, Frondly Plants is an online shop for indoor plants and pots focused on helping you decorate your home and life.
They aim to help customers find the right plants for them even when they don’t feel like they’re “plant people.”
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Vancity has been supporting people in our communities since 1946, like local entrepreneurs. As part of our Made in Vancouver series spotlighting local businesses, we talked to Chad Camacho, founder of Frondly Plants about helping people find the right space to take care of their plants. Learn more about what Vancity is doing in your community at vancity.com
“I’m trying to build a knowledge base, services, and products that make it easy for people to learn about plants, find the right one for them and their space, and take care of them, no matter their skill and experience level,” Chad Camacho said.
His company starts by helping people choose the right plant, rather than worrying about taking care of it after.
“Once you have a plant that needs lots of sun in your basement apartment it’s too late,” he said.
“I try to avoid plants that are super hard to care for because I want our customers to be successful, so I choose plants that are a bit more forgiving if you forget to water them from time to time, or if the light in your apartment is not perfect.”
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Camacho had always dreamt of starting his own business, but it wasn’t until the pandemic, after he was diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at 31, that he decided to go for it.
“I realized that life was too short to not chase my dreams and that I didn’t want to look back on my life and ask, what if?”
Now, he wants to help people feel confident bringing plants into their homes, and not feel anxious that their plant is going to die in a few weeks or months.
“There are some cool things being done with plant technology – apps, sensors, smart pots etc. that I think are helping make this easier and reducing the barrier for new plant parents. I’d love to create an intersection of style and technology that makes people more successful with plants but looks great too,” he said.
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He got the idea for the company as he always grew up with greenery around him which affected his mood in a positive way.
“I grew up on the tropical island of Trinidad, so I was always surrounded by greenery and the wildness of the tropical rainforest. When I moved to Toronto in 2007 to go to university, I realized how lucky I was to have grown up in Trinidad and how important those surroundings were to me and my mental health,” said Camacho.
Frondly’s mission is to make it easy for Canadians to bring nature into their homes and enjoy all of the great physical, emotional and psychological benefits that plants can deliver.
His own primary goal is to be able to support his family and the families of at least 10 employees or partners.
His secondary goal is to run a carbon-neutral company and to make improvements to the industry that I’m in to get rid of single-use plastics and reduce their carbon footprint by 25 per cent.
“For the business itself, I think what makes us unique is the way I think about the role of business in society.”
“I could be a shoe store or a glue factory and my principles would still be the same: for the business to contribute to the community in a positive way, to care for our employees, customers, and the environment equally, to leave the world a little better, and greener, than we found it,” he told us.
Make sure to check out more of their plant options on their website and Instagram.
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