Maybe garden centers these days reflect the fact that people seem to just have less and less free time on their hands. I remember something similar; my parents would put in 100s of little annual plants every spring, and the place would be ablaze with color by summer.
I'm surprised there isn't more gardening activity where you are, given that Florida has so many retirees... with (presumably) free time.
I don’t live in a retirement area. Most here are by definition rednecks and maybe once every decade they paint their house. It’s just nice when there yard is not covered in trash and old broken down things. So the garden centers here are not that great.
Of the couple of retired people that I know that have somewhat decent lawns they have gardeners that do that work. They are far too old even with their free time to want to be in the hot sun all day long. Not to mention it’s really not easy to for them to move around like younger people. Those getting up and down off the ground is something a little too much risk for injury for some of them. Many retired people here don’t seem to have much money to spend. I don’t know if that just because it’s a cheaper areas or if they grew up during times of hardships and are just tight with their money.