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Twenty Five Stories Champion Twenty Five Years

31/12/2018 - 00:00

TerraCottem the leading soil conditioning company is celebrating its 25th anniversary with the publication of 25 customer stories to mark the breadth and depth of the product’s usage throughout the world over the past quarter of a century. 

Saving trees, shrubs, plants and turf and helping them flourish in some of the most challenging conditions, is the role of this pioneering company and its soil conditioners.

With its headquarters in Belgium, TerraCottem is now represented in over 40 countries. It has been used successfully in some 85 countries worldwide tackling temperatures ranging from -35ºC to +50ºC and a wide variety of soil types from sand to clay. And it is not only extreme temperatures where TerraCottem has found a ready market with 22 per cent of its global sales last year occurring in the temperate maritime climate of Belgium.

Originally introduced by its founder Bernard Devos after he tried TerraCottem in his vegetable garden in Spain, the company remains a family business.

I was amazed by the results in my garden and like our Australian distributors like to say, there was ‘furious growth’.

“It was 1992 when I was first approached and told about this soil conditioner and I was drawn by the immense possibilities of the product both from a business and humanitarian point of view."

“TerraCottem offered the opportunity to grow plants in poor or degraded soils and this was not only limited to dry climates. In the early ‘90s water availability and quality were only of concern in certain areas of the world. These days it is a hot subject and growing in importance. Even in areas with typically frequent and abundant rainfall, precipitations have become more erratic and of concern when planting. We have raised awareness and in many areas educated people. Soil conditioning is a much better established concept nowadays in our professional industry and water savings is on everyone’s agenda."

“We have enabled our clients to bring some of their mad planting dreams to fruition: from hanging grass sculptures and trees, to growing a lawn on a beach. There are plenty of examples of less mad projects but challenging ones in a wide variety of climates.”

"They range from repairing open-pit mining areas in Serbia, which with the addition of TerraCottem during planting achieved remarkable levels of establishment despite the harsh environment. In addition extremely high temperatures shortly after planting tested the project’s success, but the two-year-old bare root Pinus Nigra seedlings reached a survival rate of 95 per cent."

"Another project where an area of land has been brought back into a positive place is on the Onkaparinga River’s final bends before it empties out into Gulf St Vincent in Southern Australia. A decommissioned sewerage plant offered a surprising amount of potential for local residents and wildlife to return to this once bare location and become a wildlife haven. All of the 187,000 native plants that were planted had TerraCottem applied, with the success rate conservatively judged at 95 per cent."

Bedding plants are a further target for TerraCottem and in Calais an award-winning display was achieved despite the very short lead times available. Eric Bouton, head of the city’s Green Spaces department is clear that TerraCottem has a big part to play in the success:

This soil amendment gives us a near total survival guarantee. We obtained the 4th Flower award partly thanks to the Ephemeral Garden boosted with TerraCottem. For gardens exposed to wind and sandy soil TerraCottem is a real asset for success.

Today TerraCottem is focussing more than ever on the synergetic effect of all the product’s components, on root and plant growth and the holistic approach to achieve successful planting projects. And technical assistance from start to finish.

The range has been extended and now includes the original TerraCottem Universal, together with TerraCottem Complement, TerraCottem Turf and the latest addition to the range specifically for trees, TerraCottem Arbor.

Carol Devos, daughter of the founder has run the company for the past 20 years and is confident of its continued success:

TerraCottem addresses some of the world’s biggest issues such as lack of water, hunger and deforestation.

"With just 20 grammes and a single application in the plant’s lifespan, TerraCottem helps the plant to settle in, grow faster and survive, often in very harsh conditions, such as sandy soils, reclaimed land, soil with high salt content, areas with little rainfall or difficult access for watering. TerraCottem is a technical product for the present day and the future.”

TerraCottem bvba is located in Vichte, Belgium.
The international sales offices are located in the province of Cádiz, Spain.