co-ops

I am really disgusted the way the co-op forum has went..Next to nothing offered this year...Over the last several years I have gotten alot of plants cheap and now this year nothing...Could the rules be eased somewhat so that people could do co-ops????

Why don't you start a coop yourself. The rules were changed to protect members from abuses and have worked quit well

Worked quite well as no one does them anymore..I have no place to get plugs and really liked getting them from the co-ops....If I could get plants like that near me I would have no need for a co-op.......

Blupoppy,
Yes, you are right!! But, I doubt the rules will be changed:( It also used to be fun on the co-ops, but not in a few years, sorry to say.. :)Anita

I'm afraid I'm ignorant = how did the coops work; what has changed?

bluepoppy, Paul's advice is good - if you want to jumpstart the co-ops, sometimes the way to make it happen is to organize one yourself. Especially if you know how much you've saved from them, it's a way to "pay it forward" so to speak, and help yourself and others save money, too.

stillwood, the "co-ops" (or group buys) require organizers to complete a form and submit it to a committee for approval. It is a bit of a hassle, but it was put in place at the request of members,after some co-ops went bad. to put it in historical context, co-ops going bad are a chronic problem that goes back almost to the very beginning, when they were introduced.

Generally what happens is several purchases go off without a hitch, and then we start to see activity from inexperienced or unscrupulous organizers who decide to try their hand at running one (or several).

Things can go south in a hurry when that happens:
- money is lost when the organizer vanishes;
- plants aren't shipped timely and a high death rate occurs;
- details leak out that an organizer is padding the prices to make a small (or big) profit for themselves;
- vendors see the potential for free advertising, and/or an outlet for their overtocks, so they approach a member with a pre-arranged co-op deal, where the vendor chooses the plants to offer, sets the prices, and the organizer simply posts the announcement and "fronts" for them to run a sale.

a few bad exchanges ruined it for everyone, like most good things go.
No problems now, because there aren't any co -ops.

I've never been involved in a co-op -- I guess I don't see how that last one, about the vendors basically setting up a sale, is a bad thing -- ?? Or is it because they offer the member some sort of payout? Sorry, I really am totally in the dark here, other than I've read in various places that there has been trouble with the co-ops previously.

It's a cart-and-horse thing (you need to have them in the right order for everything to work properly ;o)

The group buys were always intended to be initiated by the membership deciding to combine their purchasing power to obtain a discount on items they want.

That means the members should decide what they want to buy as a group, and who they want to buy from.

If a vendor wants to offer a discount to DG members, or have a sale, that's fine - but it's not a co-op and it shouldn't be mixed in with the co-op forum. We offer many ways for vendors to get the word out about a sale or special discount offer, from their free Garden Watchdog listing, to very low-cost classified ads and marketplace listings.

That makes sense -- thanks for the explanation!