according to a news release<\/a>. CEO Jamie Mattikow will continue to lead the company.<\/p>\n\u201cBurpee is an iconic American brand with a remarkable 150-year legacy of innovation, quality and consumer trust,\u201d said Niko Lahanas, chief executive officer of Central Garden & Pet. <\/p>\n
Lahanas said Burpee\u2019s established relationship with its customers and digital capabilities \u201cmake it a compelling addition to our garden portfolio.\u201d<\/p>\n
Based in Walnut Creek, Calif., Central Garden & Pet has been in the pet and garden industries for 45 years.<\/p>\n
Its portfolio includes Pennington, Ferry-Morse, and American Seed in the lawn and seed categories. It also includes pet foods, plant fertilizer, flea and tick control, and aquarium products.<\/p>\n
It had net sales of $3.1 billion in fiscal year 2025 and employs over 6,000 people, mostly in North America, according to the company.<\/p>\n
Burpee\u2019s iconic seeds<\/p>\n
Burpee began introducing what would become its iconic seeds starting in the 19th century. Over the decades, it developed iceberg lettuce, Big Boy tomatoes, Snowbird sugar snap peas, and Golden Bantam sweet corn.<\/p>\n
Burpee\u2019s growth exploded when it became an early adopter of mail-order catalogs. Its catalog became a rural household staple.<\/p>\n
In 1888, Burpee bought a farm on New Britain Road in Doylestown. He named it Fordhook and transformed it into the company\u2019s experimental garden and began conducting thousands of seed trials. The 60-acre property still opens to the public once a year.<\/p>\n
Burpee expanded beyond seeds long ago and sells other products such as live plants and supplies like soil and cages. Its products can be found in big box stores and online.<\/p>\n
In a previous interview, Mattikow, Burpee\u2019s CEO, declined to share financial details or an employee count. But, he said, consumers spent $242 million on Burpee products in 2025, a 120% jump from 2019. <\/p>\n
On Monday, Mattikow said in an email that \u201cthe Burpee team and I are excited about the news.\u201d<\/p>\n
He called Central Garden & Pet \u201ca successful company committed to the gardening category who appreciate what makes Burpee special as a brand and a company\u201d and has \u201cresources to help us accelerate our growth and provide opportunities for our employees.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Listen to article \u2022\u00a00:00 min Bucks County-based W. Atlee Burpee Co., which celebrated its 150th anniversary this year,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":310251,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[127009,69,71,70],"class_list":["post-310250","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-burpee-seed-garden-sold-central-garden-pet-company","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/310250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=310250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/310250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/310251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=310250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=310250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=310250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}