The other day we talked about how a lot of the houseplants we buy in stores, and greenhouses and online aren’t quite as environmentally friendly as we might have thought. This is because most of these plants are grown in peat, which, it turns out, is a finite resource. (It does grow back, but at a rate of 1 mm annually.)
Anyway, one of the ways to make sure your houseplants aren’t contributing to the whole peat situation is by growing your own. Sure, you could go the whole plant-a-seed route, but growing plants from cuttings is faster and easier. And according to a study by investment researchers at money.co.uk, you could also be sitting on a horticultural goldmine—or at least a mini side hustle.
Apparently, growing new plants from cuttings of your existing plants can turn out to be pretty lucrative (and also hard work, but that’s not the focus here). But some plants are a better investment than others. Here are the ones that are more likely to earn earn their keep.
How to determine the profitability of plants
To be clear, the aim of the study was to determine which plants are the best investments (as you’d expect from a site with “money” in its name)—not necessarily which are the easiest to grow or are the lowest maintenance. This was a number-crunching situation.
G/O Media may get a commission
Here’s how the team reached these figures:
Prices of fully grown houseplants and cuttings were collected by using scraped data from Facebook marketplace, Farmer Gracy and Etsy. Once we collected the data we calculated the average price for both cuttings and fully grown plants for each variety of houseplant. We then calculated the percentage of change between the plant cutting and the fully grown plant to show the increase in investment for each houseplant.
How to pick the most profitable plants
Based on the money.co.uk team’s research, Monstera Dubia plants are the best investment. According to their calculations, cuttings from a Monstera Dubia will set you back between $20-30, while a grown potted plant goes for between $255-280: up to a +766% increase from your initial investment.
Before unveiling the chart that will make you rich, we should point out that as you probably guessed from the website, the plant purchasing and selling took place in the United Kingdom. Sure, that’s something to keep in mind in terms of the plants’ availability, but mostly we wanted to let you know that the prices listed will be in GBP, not USD, so you’ll need to do some math.
OK, here you go:
And as with any other financial decision, it’s a good idea to do your homework before jumping into something.
“Houseplant investments are a fun and alternative way to explore the investment world from the comfort of your own home,” Salman Haqqi, personal finance expert at money.co.uk said in a statement. “Like all investments, with a bit of knowledge and research into the market these plant parents could be growing their home jungles into profitable investments in no time.”
