Marysville, Ohio
October 2, 2003

Company site named "Best General Interest Web Site" in prestigious 2003 competition

The Scotts Company (NYSE: SMG), the global leader in the consumer lawn and garden market, announced today that its Web site, www.scotts.com , was named "Best General Interest Web Site" by the Web Marketing Association in its 2003 WebAward Competition. This premier annual award competition for Web site development has consistently recognized some of the world's largest and best known companies for their innovative use of the Internet.

With close to 10 million visits so far this year, Scotts' Web sites play an integral role in establishing the Company's lead role in the lawn and garden market.

In addition to the top award in the general interest category, Scotts received a "Standard of Excellence Award" for the Lawn and Garden Center the company created as part of an integrated marketing program with The Weather Channel and weather.com. Judges recognized the site for the "standard of excellence by which all corporate Web sites should strive."

The Web Marketing Association is the producer of the WebAward Competition, which judges Web sites on design, innovation, content, technology, interactivity, navigation and ease of use. The panel of judges is comprised of media representatives, advertising executives, site designers, content providers and webmasters.

"Our team has worked hard to build a site that meets the high standards of our brands, while providing quality lawn and garden information for our consumers," said Gordon Hecker, Senior Vice President of Marketing. "It's extremely gratifying to receive such recognition for our efforts, especially when you look at who you're being recognized alongside -- companies like Forbes, Disney, Hewlett Packard, L.L Bean and The Wall Street Journal."

Scotts redesigned its Web site last year to integrate all of its industry- leading brands into one online lawn and garden destination. These brands include Scotts, Miracle-Gro ( www.miracle-gro.com ), Ortho ( www.ortho.com ), Osmocote ( www.osmocote.com ) and the consumer Roundup brand ( www.roundup.com ). The redesigned Web sites include more timely, relevant lawn and garden content to help consumers create and maintain a more beautiful yard, while integrating useful product information.

This year, Scotts has witnessed a surge in Web traffic due to the new site and related marketing efforts. User sessions are up 97% over last year, and page views are up 310% over the same period. Close to 10 million users have visited Scotts' sites so far this year.

"A lot of corporate Web sites are designed to simply move products," said Joel Reimer, Manager of Interactive Marketing at Scotts. "While our site certainly includes information on our products, it primarily serves as a valuable resource for information on how to achieve the best results in your lawn and garden. Our site is as much about growing the industry through customer knowledge as it is about growing our business."

Scotts also offers e-mail reminder services on its site, where users can sign up to receive periodic messages that will "remind" them of certain activities they need to perform in their lawn and garden each month. To date, over 600,000 users have signed up to receive e-mail reminders from Scotts.

The Scotts Lawn & Garden Center at www.weather.com/scotts features geographically specific tips and advice for lawn and garden care, including a variety of interactive tools and other resources for solving common lawn care and gardening problems. It is part of a multi-level agreement that Scotts entered into with the Weather Channel and weather.com earlier this year.

With 2002 sales of $1.76 billion, The Scotts Company is global leader in the consumer lawn and garden market, with a full range of products for professional horticulture as well. The company owns the industry's most recognized brands. In the U.S., the company's Scotts®, Miracle-Gro® and Ortho® brands are market leading in their categories, as is the consumer Roundup® brand which is marketed in North America and most of Europe exclusively by Scotts and owned by Monsanto. Scotts LawnService® also is the No. 2 company in the "do-it-for-me" lawn service market. In Europe, Scotts' brands include Weedol® Pathclear®, Evergreen®, Levington® Miracle-Gro®, KB®, Fertiligene® and Substral®.