Can we talk about that overpriced monstera I saw at a shop in Portland?

I was visiting this boutique plant store on Hawthorne last weekend and they had a regular monstera deliciosa in a plain pot for $180. The thing had yellowing leaves and spider mites, man. Am I the only one who thinks some of these shops are just preying on people who don't know better?

3 comments

3 Comments

coleman.gray1mo ago

You gotta look at it from the shop's side though... they have rent to pay and that plant was probably imported with a big markup from the supplier. For a lot of people who just want a cool plant without hunting around, that's the price of convenience in a trendy part of town. If it bugs you so much, just don't buy it and let the folks who don't mind pay the premium.

tylerj221mo ago

Honestly, this whole argument just reminds me of how we've gotten used to paying way more for anything that's been packaged as a "lifestyle" item, not just plants. @coleman.gray makes a fair point about shop overhead, but it's crazy how a basic houseplant becomes like a hundred bucks just because it's in a nice pot on a shelf in a hip neighborhood. We're all kind of trained to just accept the upcharge as the cost of not having to dig around for a deal.

riley431mo ago

...which is exactly why I kinda laughed out loud when @coleman.gray said "if it bugs you just don't buy it" like that somehow fixes the whole system. Yeah sure, I CAN walk away but that doesn't make it less INSANE that a pothos in a ceramic pot costs as much as a nice dinner for two. It's wild to me that we've all just accepted this. I'm not even mad at the shops, honestly, I'm mad at how normalized it is to pay 80 bucks for something that was probably 12 dollars at a nursery two years ago.