Flower power

Twenty-two years ago CCOC started a pretty cool thing: giving away flowers to tenants. Our original motivations were pretty pragmatic: it was cheaper for us to buy all our tenants some pretty annuals than it was to hire professional landscapers.

The program has expanded a lot since 1992. We’ve added perennials, we’ve added herbs and vegetables, and we’ve added over 700 tenants since then too.

We now give away over 10,000 plants each year. In return, tenants make lovely flower boxes on their balconies, dig gardens in their front and back yards and make their homes that much prettier. And it still saves us money on professional landscapers.

So this spring, on the first weekend in May, a whole bunch of volunteers will spend two days sorting and delivering plants to their neighbours. Flower power can be very pragmatic.