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OCTOBER 2015 SEEDWORLD.COM 65 Contact us Today Ask for Erick at 800-992-2824 ext 111 erickks-ka.com www.krautersolutions.com Your Seed is in Good Hands Climate-Controlled Storage Growth Chambers New Retrofitted Systems Our patent-pending Krauter Solutions frequent mowing requirement participants were willing to pay 3.92 per 1000 ft2 more for a turfgrass requiring infrequent mowing and they were willing to pay 2.97 per 1000 ft2 more for a turfgrass requiring moderately frequent mowing. Compared to the high fertility requirement the premiums for turfgrasses with low and moderate fertility requirements were not significant and they were 2.00 per 1000 ft2 and 1.10 per 1000 ft2 respectively. Conclusion and Recommendations Irrigation was the most influential maintenance attribute affecting consumer choice followed by mowing requirement. Fertility was the characteristic least likely to influence consumer buying behavior. Likewise participants were willing to pay the highest premium for a turfgrass with a low irrigation requirement. It is likely that the strong preference for water conservation is not only due to cost savings but also due to environmental concerns. More than 75 percent of participants slightly-to-strongly agreed with the statement water use on home lawns is an environmental concern. Mowing requirement was the second most influential input studied affecting buying preference and behavior. Although participants did not indicate a significant preference between having to mow every other week versus once or twice a week they did indicate a strong preference for mowing on a monthly basis. The results indicate there is great market potential for some turfgrass species e.g. fine fescues that can provide acceptable quality when mowed on a monthly basis or only twice per year. Fertilizer requirement did not affect consumer willing- ness to pay. Participants responses to the questionnaire show that approximately half of participants did not know the total amount of fertilizer applied to their home lawn per year. Previous research has also found that most homeowners are unfamiliar with the recommended fertility practices. This lack of knowledge could be a potential reason for the lack of significance of fertility requirement. Another possible explana- tion that fertility requirement did not affect choice behavior is that participants already perceived their fertility practices to be low-input considering more than 70 percent of participants fertilized their lawn two times per year or less. REFERENCES Yue C. K. Hugie and E. Watkins. 2012. Are Consumers Willing to Pay More for Low-input Turfgrasses on Residential Lawns Evidence from Choice Experiments with Real Products. Journal of Agricultural and Applied Economics 44549560. Participants preferred turfgrasses with dark green color and fine leaf texture and the most important aesthetic charac- teristic was the absence of weeds. Efforts should be focused on developing cultivars that are competitive against weed encroachment. We also found more than 80 percent of par- ticipants agreed with statement pesticide use is harmful to human health and the environment. Results suggest that future plant breeding efforts could be directed to increasing the aggressiveness or allelopathy i.e. natural weed suppres- sion of turfgrass varieties as a means of providing nonchemical weed control for low-input or organic lawns. The development of low-input turfgrasses deserves further consideration as a strategy to reduce the environmental and economic costs of home lawn maintenance. These results sug- gest that changes in residential turfgrass management could potentially benefit the turfgrass seed industry because of the considerably large price premiums associated with low-input attributes. Low-input turfgrasses could also provide a means for the industry to take advantage of increased regulatory action. As environmental concerns continue to manifest the turfgrass industry might develop a greater interest in producing and marketing low-input turfgrasses. Prices Consumers Are Willing to Pay for Low-Input Turfgrass Attributes Low-input turfgrass attributes Priceper1000ft2 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 Waterlow Water medium Fertilizerlow Fertilizer medium Mowinglow Mowing medium