Little Garden is back at Checkers

As far as South African supermarket toy-based loyalty schemes go - Checkers' Little Garden concept really stands head-and-shoulders above the competition.

If I remember correctly, Pick n Pay came out with their Stickies toys (that everyone hated because the plastic toys were the same size as a turtle's mouth), and Spar offered miniature versions of popular grocery items - in a thinly-veiled attempt to harness the pester-power of kids to drive sales.

Now, the Checkers Little Garden series is back by popular demand with locally-produced seedling kits

Checkers Little Garden is back by popular demand, with millions of locally produced seedling kits that created employment for more than 150 people.

There are 24 new, season-appropriate and bee-friendly Little Garden 2 seedling kits to collect - including 10 vegetables, 8 flowers and 6 herbs.

“Little Garden was a hit when we first launched it two years ago, and our customers have repeatedly asked us to bring it back. Gardening is a great activity for young and old, especially now that people are spending so much more time at home,” says Willie Peters, General Manager: Marketing at Checkers.

Production of the Little Garden 2 seedling kits took place at a local facility in Johannesburg, managed by a team of 156 employees - mostly women - who were provided with specialised training in order to get this intricate job done.

“Finding a local production facility with the capacity to manage the volumes required for an initiative such as Little Garden was a top priority for us, and we are especially pleased that it created much-needed employment for so many women,” explains Peters.

Each Little Garden 2 seedling kit contains a compostable pot, a soil pod, seed tape and pop-out name tag. The materials are all either compostable or recyclable: the compostable pots are made from paper pulp, the seed tape is made from paper which is compostable, the soil pods are made of coconut husk and the collector’s tray and packaging are recyclable.

There are also opportunities to win big prizes with the many exciting competitions and present fun ways for the whole family to get involved.

Little Garden 2 runs from Monday 24 August 2020 until stocks last. Xtra Savings members will be rewarded with a seedling kit for every R200 that they spend in Checkers and Checkers Hyper supermarkets.

This will most certainly be great news for lockdown parents who's brains are by now fried from trying to think of creative things for their kids to do.

Plus - strategically, as South Africa emerges from months of strict lockdown - this is a very clever tactical move from Checkers - who are no doubt using this to lure just some of the new grocery spend their way.

Somebody is thinking over at Checkers.