Expands distribution of Home Run®, the most disease resistant rose on the market today

Grand Haven, Mich., July 1, 2010 – Proven Winners® ColorChoice® today announced an exclusive agreement with Weeks Roses to distribute and market Home Run® rose across North America within the Proven Winners ColorChoice line of flowering shrubs.

Home Run rose is a recently developed hybrid, derived from the bestselling black spot-free rose, with the added benefit of total resistance to powdery mildew. Home Run is easy-to-grow, thrives in most landscape conditions and requires little maintenance. It also is tolerant of heat, humidity and drought, blooms from spring until frost and produces nearly non-stop blooms of showy “fire–engine” red.

“Home Run rose is the most disease resistant rose available on the market,” said Tim Wood, product development and marketing manager for Proven Winners ColorChoice. “You will be hard pressed to find something to stop this rose from blooming. Both of these unique qualities make Home Run Rose a perfect fit to join the Proven Winners ColorChoice line up.”

Home Run rose is a hybrid cultivar fathered by the Knock Out® Rose. But unlike its famously popular forerunner, Home Run has natural immunity to black spot and powdery mildew – diseases common with other rose bushes. Black spot and powdery mildew distort the leaves and reduce the foliage of roses. Both often spread to infect other rose plants in the garden. Home Run is the first rose on the market that will remain completely free from these diseases over the entire lifetime of the plant.

Craig Reiland, supervisor of the Tyler (Texas) Rose Garden stated, “We have grown Home Run for three years. It did so well in the main garden, we’ve used it in many other median, park and City Hall plantings around the city. It’s nearly always in flower through the growing season, and we’ve never observed any black spot or powdery mildew at any of the locations, with absolutely no spraying required.”

Proven Winners ColorChoice is the leading brand of flowering shrubs in North America, marketing over 100 varieties specifically chosen for their hardiness, unusually bright colors and easy care, including best-sellers ‘Limelight’ Hydrangea and Wine & Roses® Weigela. Based in Wasco, Calif., Weeks Roses (www.weeksroses.com) is one of the largest commercial rose growers in the United States. Weeks Roses ships 3-4 million bare-root field-grown roses every year.

“With six years of research and development to breed this rose, and now four years of market testing behind us, we felt the time was right to expand distribution of Home Run rose through this partnership,” said Tom Carruth, director of research and marketing for Weeks Roses, and breeder of Home Run. “Plant buyers love this rose because of its ease of care, resistance to disease and repeated frequent flowerings. Simple, brilliantly beautiful and tough, Home Run is the best rose for the driest summers or the wettest springs, from coast to coast. With our new wider distribution, this rose has the potential to become the next best-seller.” Continued