Cloé Lucas
Innovator
Pratensis AB
Sweden
Environmental
Farming
Rural village
The innovation journey
Pratensis AB was established in 2005 for the production and sale of Swedish meadow seed mixtures and seedlings. The company’s ambition is to recreate meadows all over Sweden as they looked in Linnaeus’ time. In March 2023, Cloé Lucas took over the company.
Cloé met the previous owner of the business for the first time in 2012 and started working for the business in 2015.
In 2022, Cloé and her husband built a new production facility that is adapted for the seed business, where the entire business is now located. Last year, Cloé took over the company. The previous owners will continue to work for the company, providing knowledge and manpower.
The innovation impact
In a hundred years, 99 percent of all the Swedish meadows will have disappeared, thereby affecting plant pollination, insect life, and biodiversity enormously. Pratensis AB strives to change this negative trend. The company provides seeds, knowledge, and counselling. Their customers include private citizens who wish to turn their lawn into a meadow, businesses that wish to cultivate the sides of their parking lots as a mini meadow, and authorities that turn large lawns, unused areas, roadsides, and roundabouts into meadows as a perfect natural habitat for bumblebees and butterflies. The company’s goal is to establish as many flower meadows as possible across Sweden.
Pratensis AB has around 100 different species of meadow plants in cultivation and some plants that are collected from the wild. In addition to their own seed farms, the company has approximately ten contract growers in various parts of Sweden. These growers grow different species of local provenance.
In essence, the company is engaged in promoting biodiversity. It has developed special mixes of meadow seeds that can enhance local biodiversity.