Painting Caladium Tubers

Our business practice is to do all we can to make our customers successful. When producing finished pot caladiums, a number of factors have been identified that help assure the success of our customers. Uniform pot crops with full, balanced pots is critical to maximize profitability. To this end Classic Caladiums provides several services. One of the services we provide is tuber de-eyeing. De-eyed tubers, when planted, produce a shorter fuller (more leaves) pot as de-eyeing causes increased tuber branching. Another very important factor is tuber orientation. Tubers need to be planted upright. Many pot producers have mechanized potting lines and employees are measured on the number of pots they can plant/hour. However, once de-eyed it is somewhat difficult to tell the top from the bottom of a tuber. Properly orienting the tubers slows the planting process. To solve this problem, we offer a painting service whereby the tops of the tubers are painted with a water base nontoxic paint allowing for rapid accurate tuber orientation during the potting process. Though we charge for this service it is rapidly gaining popularity as it is actually saving our customers money by:

Increased throughput on the planting line

• Better supervision with less supervisors as proper orientation can be noted with a glance.
• Less production costs because of a consistent uniform finishing time resulting in less consolidation and pulling.
• Less shrink at retail because of fuller more proportioned pots.

Left-Bulbs easily oriented with painted side up
Right-Tray of bulbs freshly painted – looking for a home.