IMPORTANT ANNOUNCEMENT: Regarding group purchases (Co-ops)

I appreciate anyone willing to do a co-op. I am so disorganized, that I wouldn't attempt one (at least not now) However, I don't think any of the co-op organizers should take a loss on shipping. If a person owes more $$, let them know. I, for one, never want any extra postage returned - I just don't want the organizer to take a hit for anything extra. Hats off to those who ran such successful co-ops!!

Frankly, my only criticism of co-op coordinators is that they must be a little crazy because they take on a project that lasts for months and is tons of work from start to finish and they get absolutely nothing extra for it (unless you consider being criticized and getting stuck paying for other people's plants and shipping an extra).

I have a tremendous amount of respect and admiration for the people who are willing to run these co-ops. I couldn't do it and I don't know why they are willing to do it but I sure am glad that they are.

Dstartz makes a good point, when she says people expect a lot of coop organizers. I have been told that someone couldn't pay until they got an invoice. Excuse me, but I'm not in the business, and while I am happy to help people figure out their orders, I'm NOT sending out invoices. (If Cherishlife hadn't taken over that part I'd have totally lost track of the last coop.)

Of course, I blame Langbr for this, she was so terribly organized and efficient at hers she did invoice everyone! (JK, Brenda)

There are a lot of reasons for a host to end up in the hole on a coop. As previously mentioned, checks can bounce, or not show up, paypal has been known to delay payments, and suppliers can change prices, add last minute "packing" fees, or seriously underestimate shipping. The bigger the coop, and the more changes there are in orders, the more likelihood there is that you will end up with overages or underages. I know I spend extra money on packaging the plants carefully, but that is my choice, I want them to arrive in the best condition possible.

Any coop host needs to have a backup plan, (especially for that "life happens" stuff) and a financial cushion. Yes, if shipping is increased, all participants need to pay the additional, but if you figured every dime, have a sudden increase in expenses, and have nothing in the household budget to allow you to wait for reimbursement, that is a problem. And to an individual purchasing a plant, an increase of say 50cents per plant on your order is no biggie, right? You'll get it out. Tomorrow. Or next payday. Soon. But to someone who ordered 1000 plants, and has had to lay out the money up front, that is $500 that has to come from somewhere. Right now.

And with all that said, Yes, I think there is a bit of crazy involved. But I'll tell you one other thing that I get from it. I've made a lot of friends here that I wouldn't have had otherwise. (Cherishlife, for one!) That baby shower still boggles my mind!

And I get a warm fuzzy seeing all the people who patiently waited through my first coop, joining the second. Either they are gluttons for punishment, greedy for plants, or maybe I did something right.


This message was edited May 3, 2005 7:45 PM

LOL, Terre! I did that for myself to pull the orders and pack them, not so much for the participants. I had no idea someone would "require" one.

I love just being able to offer people plants that I love at good prices. I hope in some small way that the 2 lily coops I did got some new folks interested in lilies. I think it did and now I have more people to trade with in the future and to help me with my questions.

Aww Shucks! It wern't nuthin'. LOL Actually, I was just glad I didn't have to deal with the money and shipping. Terre was great to work with and I actually got to do the fun part. I probably won't volunteer to host any coops anytime soon though. I think I got a pretty good sense of how much work went into it, other than what my part was. Terre, I think you did something right in spite of everything going on in your life at that time. You had a full plate and still pulled it off. Hats off to you!!!

HI Terre..........Read through this thread as well as the coop on the Canna's out of curiosity to see what had happened for this new policy.....and noticed everyone figuring out what they owed "Eyes". Since this coop started, lets face it, the cost of gas really went up, and couple that with her living so far from the shipping office, I can identify with that, as I too live out in the country, miles and miles from anywhere. But if I may add my 2 cents worth to this Policy. What if everyone just "rounded" off the amount that they needed to send.....for instance, if your total amount was 15. 38 cents.....just round it to $16.00 dollars.....it would give the person who is doing the coop a few extra pennies and help defray the cost of gas, etc. Just a thought....We are not talking rocket science here....

Deann

Deann, that is a very nice idea in my opinion. I always round up to the next dollar and if it is only a few cents, I normally add more. I figure postage will be off on a few, the gas mileage, the trouble of getting boxes and packing materials along with the probability that some will send the exact amount, it is just an extra buck or so here and there.

I personally think that every participant ought to add at LEAST $2.00 to $5.00 in addition to postage and plants. It takes hours and hours of time to take the orders, (on the last one that Terre and I did together, I probably spent 60 to 80 hours on orders alone trying to keep it straight, it was a big one) deal with the money, pack the plants and mail out, in addition to the higher gas cost. I think if we were to at least compensate for some of that, more people would be willing to host a coop and we would get a wider variety to choose from. As it stands, I'm personally not willing to face having to foot the bill, AND do a lot of work, not to mention if anything goes wrong, to run the risk of getting yelled at, or even cussed at. And I'm sure I'm not the only one that feels that way.

The only problem with that, is that it goes against co-op rules. If 50 people participate and all send an extra $5, then that would be an extra $250. Gas and supplies should not cost that much and if best efforts were made on shipping (I do realize sometimes plants and bulbs are bigger and heavier than anticipated), it should not be that much higher. That would end up being a profit which is a no-no. I do realize how much work the co-ops are and it does seem unfair to the person hosting, but you cannot charge for your time, the work or extra without showing what it is going towards. :(

Good point! Rounding up to the next dollar would probably be the best thing then.

Badseed is correct on all counts. It may not seem fair the organizer can't be compensated, but the lack of a profit motive is intended to keep co-ops squeaky clean.

I know I'm probably beating a dead horse on this, but I'm tellin' ya'll - small co-ops are the way to go. Case in point: when I decided I *needed* a 'Jack Frost' Brunnera, I got sticker shock in a big way - $9 - $20 per plant, plus shipping. Yikes!

A plant broker was willing to sell to me, since I have a small greenhouse where I sell plants locally in the spring (not this year, tho!)

We got a sweet deal of under $5 apiece on their plants. Most people ordered 1 or 2 plants, which weighed right at a pound, so shipping was $4-$5. It was still a good deal, compared to us ordering individually through a retail mailorder vendor.

I got two plants for the price I would have paid for one on my own, and that was reward enough for me. As I recall, I limited the co-op to to three flats (60 plants) to keep it easy.

I had everyone send me a mailing label along with their $$ and a note of how many plants they were getting, so it took a few hours work to assemble boxes, shred newspaper, tuck plants in the box, seal them shut add the label, then haul them all to the P.O.

It was a VERY quick process for me as an organizer. The main thing was advance planning - getting our order in early and making sure I had USPS boxes on hand when the order arrived.

I'd do another small co-op like that again in a heartbeat. But I'm not willing to tackle a 2,000 item (50 different plants, 40-some participants) co-op for daylilies or wildflower anytime soon again. Those are killer co-ops, and I've lived and learned my lesson to not do them anymore. It takes days to sort, package and send everything to everyone, and it's a frantic race against the clock, as every day that goes by for the plants not yet shipped, the plant quality decreases.

I always try to round up a dollar or two as well. I just think it makes sense - it is difficult to estimate exact shipping costs and this gives a little extra padding so I am less likely to have to send an additional payment. Plus in my excitement at opening my box I usually forget to look at the postage to see if I owe something - this way I might be covered. LOL

Many people have rounded up on what is sent, but it isn't usually a big issue. I, fortunately, don't have a long trip to a shipping point, and also, gas isn't an issue when the Post office will pick up at my door. Supplies are not much, I think for 1200 hostas, I bought a case of paper towels at Sams, and several rolls of saran wrap. Total under $20.

It is the unexpected that can get you. But, no, once there starts being extra money involved, you aren't a coop organizer then but a business, complete with all the rules and regulations that go with. And if extra money is sent, then that creates the issue of having to send it back! It is better, to me, to just figure the amounts as closely as possible, but then if you owe a host money, respond quickly.

I agree. I personally don't want people to round up. I feel obligated to return extra over a $1 and on my last coop I don't know how many $1.05 checks I wrote. I learned something on the dahlia coop though and that is buying bags to split up all the tubers. I hadn't anticipated that. Also I've done 4 coops and up until the dahlia one I had packing tape on hand. I ran out and the PO didn't have the priority tape in stock so I went out and bought 3 rolls of clear tape. Those things do add up but I figure that as an organizer it's my job to anticipate all of those things and make the rules of the coop upfront to cover those type of expenses. If I fail to state extra fees for packaging in my rules then I don't feel right about asking for money later. But again that's just me.

So far as I understand, the post office will no longer be offering priority or express tape. According to my guy here, people abused, overused and didn't use it for the right things (shipping with USPS so they get their money back). They are also thinking about doing away with labels. Apparently people were cutting off the USPS parts of the label and using them for personal use. They now have a water mark on the white part so that they can bust you if you use it in a manner not approved. I just thought I would throw this in here for people that are accustomed to using them, as I am. Once supplies are used up, there may not be anymore. Of course, that could just be here.

I did my first co-op recently and it was (to me) a pretty good sized one. Plus it was daylilies which I think most of you are considering a more difficult item to "co-op." I had 50 participants including me, almost 500 plants total. Just from my own experience here, I personally didn't find the large selection of cultivars to be an issue. For me it was the sheer volume of boxes to pack. That is where the time consuming part was- to shred newspaper and carefully pack 50 boxes, double check the order, go back and give "extras" when we realized we had lots of fans left over, weigh each box, enter the info in the USPS website, run shipping lable with postage, write out the checks for overages, etc. Maybe this was because Mike so graciously labled anything I had less than 6 of and put in a separate boxes, but I just didn't find the large selection to be a problem. That is key too- your supplier!

Which leads me onto the next item. Mike provided me with twist ties and plant labels. Terrie and Staci brought a bunch of newspaper and Staci brought a shredder. So the packing material was free as was the labor (thanks again guys!). The boxes were free- ordered ahead of time from the USPS website. All I bought was 3 rolls of clear packing tape. That, and the little hits you take on PayPal fees. I don't know if that was addressed yet, but even when the person adds the 30 cents plus 2.9% to their order, it doesn't matter b/c PayPal calcuates the fee on the TOTAL they send you. So, if the order was $15 and they send you $15.74 to cover the fees, PayPal will charge you the fee on the $15.74, not $15. It's just a vicious cycle and the organizer does end up losing a little bit of money on that. To me it was worth it for the convenience factor.

As to postage, I feel your pain Brenda! I wrote a bunch of $1.05 checks! But many of mine were more than that. And like I said in my co-op, I did appreciate everyone who said to not repay them or emailed me and said they tore up the check. But if I just kept the overages on everyone, I would have been ahead something like $180 total. That would violate the "no profit" rule... and I certainly did not LOSE that much money on the tape and PayPal part!

I don't know where you draw the line as to how far ahead the organizer can come out on the end, but I can tell you it will never be a 100% "break even" kind of deal and in most cases the organizer will be out of pocket extra funds, and not "in the black".

Why did I do a co-op? NO, not because I'm crazy!!! Why does everyone keep saying that? The men in white jackets in this place won't let me have sharp objects and keep adding padding to my cell,,, but I'm not crazy! Really! LOL! :)

Jamie

Jamie! You're the one in the room next to mine making all those funny noises??

Quick secret. If you are really good, they let you have a spoon to dig in the window boxes and pretend to garden!

Good point on the PayPal, Jamie. It is usually just pennies, but nonetheless a loss to the organizer.

Thanks for the heads up, 'Chele. I didn't know the tape was possibly going away. Better get online and order me 5 rolls or so. :-D

Idea: What if co-op participants were allowed to round up one or two dollars to make sure iffy postage is covered? What if any excess postage, like the $180 texasgarden mentioned, went to the Garden Angel fund? No profit for the co-op organizer, all the extra goes to a worthy cause, everybody involved can feel good about it. Of course this can't be monitored and it is possible for a scammer to take advantage of this but anybody who runs a co-op to rip us off is going to do that anyway. It will be entirely up to each participant to decide whether or not they want to round up and if they decide to, they can specify no refunds. In the extremely rare case of an organizer taking advantage of it, no participant has lost a great deal of money and as for the scammer, shame on them.

I'd gladly add a $1 or 2 to my orders for that and will from now on!!

Thanks for the idea!

I would go for that. I think it's a great idea.

I think this would have to get approval first from Dave and Terry.

It would be pretty easy to add a column for excess shipping on the spread sheet. Then when the co-op is over the organizer would be able to write one check to the Garden Angel fund instead of a bunch of $1.05 checks to participants. LOL

Brenda, the tape has been missing from the website for some time. I got a couple of rolls from my local post office several months back, by promising the lady that when I mailed the packages, I wouldn't go to her window!

woah guys, think about what your're saying... we're not allowed to profit from the co ops, you're suggesting adding even more to the overages that sometime exist.

I've personally found that usually the overages that some people have make up for the shortages that some others have.

I"m in the middle of packing one right now. Sitting here for little breaks.... but, believe me, the co op itself is enough to keep track of without adding another dimension to it..... and it's not what the co ops are for.....

I personally go back after the co op and do refunds or report shortages, and generally the ones who say "keep the change" make up for the ones who are short, so it evens out usually. But, you're suggesting giving a co op organizer something else to keep track of... OK... so and so wants their refund, and so and so wants their refund sent to the GAF... more calculating, more figuring...more room for mistakes.... yes, less checks to write... but then you add a whole other aspect to it... everyone wants their overage to the GAF.. but the ones who are short never send their additional postage. I wouldn't keep monies that were earmarked for the GAF and use it for someone else's postage costs....I"d just take the loss myself.

I thought long and hard before I did this one... and opted to NOT take paypal for the reason Jamie mentioned above.... a quarter, 50 cents, a dollar here and there multiplied times 50-60 participants adds up quickly. So far, just by eyeballing it, my postage has been right on the money, save for one person-- ususally if you use the USPS calculator, you can hit the postage right close to the mark... I didn't add anything for the gas to drive to pick up the plants, because I'm getting a good deal just like everyone else...and I hate having the double shipping costs... they eat away at the "good deal" too much.... but if you add that into the costs YUCK.... gas is expensive! I had one co op where the vendor failed to mention they were charging me for the shipping boxes and added $$ to my bill. That came out of my pocket, and several people did mail me a dollar to cover their share... but I felt horrible about it because I felt like it was my cost for not being thorough enough....

I've done 4 co ops, and so far I've lost money on every one of them... not a lot of money, but a loss none the less. I just don't like the idea of adding this other dimension to it. If you want to send a dollar or 2 to the GAF... then when you make out your check for your co op, make out a second one and send it on to the GAF.... but please, don't expect co op hosts to do this for you.

Ok, back to packing....

I don't mean send all overages to GAF before you cover your expenses. I mean anything left over after the co-op is complete. I don't think coordinators should have to eat shipping expenses for participants and I think a lot of people feel that way - that is why we send a little extra. Since you are tracking that extra anyway (to send refund checks) I am just suggesting that once all of your shipping costs are covered, rather than have you write a bunch of refund checks, you write one check to the GAF. I definitely don't want to create more work for you co-op coordinators; I think you do a tremendous amount of work already.

I think it is going to be difficult to administer a fund and keep it honest. You see the issues involved collecting $1.0 overages from participants of a co-op. How do you then convince participants in all co-ops that money they have paid are distributed evenly and fairly between all co-op's ? it is easy for the dedicated DG'er who participate in every and all Co-Ops but the butterfly-weed co-op participant is going to have very little sympathy for a bufferfly weed host who over estimated shipping charges giving the money to a hosta co-op host who underestimated charges.

I think a better solution would be to round-up but in a structured manner. If the host ends up with a small income, then fine and that must be communicated and understood by all participants in the co-op. Don't like the shipping charges or terms ? don't participate. easy. As long as the incremental payoff per participant (not per plant) is small it think it should be acceptable.

I would rather that the co-op host said:

- all shipping charges are to be round up to nearest dollar.
- I need $25 for misc expenses such as overages of postage, boxes, tape, etc (I think this level is ok for a medium sized co-up)
If we have 25 participants or less, add $1.0 to your total. If we have more than 25 participants, add $0.5 to your total order.
- paypal charges are $0.3 + 4% (unless payment is $50 or above, in which case $0.3 plus 3%)
- money order, only (no checks)

Any overage would likely be small enough that no-one would engage in a co-op just for $25 when you consider the time and effort put into it. (corresponding to $0.5 - $1.0 per participant extra).

It would absolutely NOT be fair if the co-op is the one who has to put out $25 PLUS put all the effort and time into it. In that case, I think it is only reasonable to err slightly on the side of the co-op host (within reason)

I do believe the co-op host has a responsibility to try estimate shipping fairly (e.g. 3 oz per plant, unless you can come up with something better), but in cases were good judgement has been used, and a descrepency occur it is ok for a small amount (and I like the $25 level) to go to the co-op host.

What I absolutely don't like as a participant is the necerssity to have to pay a second time. I don't like mailing checks, and while I can always pay by paypal, I don't like making a paypal payment for $2.5 and add fees for that. Obviously, the co-op host should not be out these money, but then I would rather that there is a small rounding up initially than asking participants to pay twice.

I think that as long as you state up front what the "rules" are going to be, such as "round-up shipping charges to nearest dollar, add $0.5 to your total order, add 4% for paypal, etc" then everyone who decides to participate should be ok.

In any event,
- I believe some rounding up should be allowed (within reason)
- I believe that as long as you communicate (the higher) prices up front all participants will be ok (or they wont be participants)
- If the co-op host then can save the co-op participants money after the fact (not required, but if possible) then everyone wins.
- guidelines could be established for what a "reasonable" rounding off means.

Terre- it's that "being good" part that's getting me. :)

I think I see what NoH2O is saying makes sense. Basically you keep track of all overages and shortages anyway right? So at the end of the co-op, the organizer would make themselves whole as far as covering extra postage, shipping supplies, etc. so that they do break even. Then write ONE check for the entire amount of "extra" money they have and send that to GAF. The only way I would agree to that is if EVERYONE agreed that they would NOT get their refunds back. Like Melissa said, I don't want to keep track of who owes me and who I owe, then ADD the element of "do I send the participant the refund or GAF?"

What if the co-op host adds up any overages and ends up with say, $20. Then held a raffle where one of the contenstants would be the winner, and get the money (not the co-op host). ??

Let me make sure I'm understanding the proposition:

1) Any overages within a single co-op (after netting out for any postage shortages and unforseeable expenses such as extra packing materials, etc.), the co-op host could (if announced up front during the co-op announcement) simply write one check for this net amount to the GA fund, rather than reimbursing each member who paid a little too much.

2) Unless the organizer is a glutton for punishment (well, they probably are, but that's another story...) they would not leave this decision up to each participant to choose whether to get a refund or donate their overage to the GA fund. It would be clearly stated on the front-end of the co-op that the organizer will announce at the end how much remained after all expenses were paid, and that amount will be sent to the GA fund.

3) Overages would NOT be shared with any other co-op that had a net shortage. Each co-op is independent of all others. If a co-op organizer runs short, it's up to them to seek reimbursement from those that owe more money.

If that's what's being proposed, then I think it's okay for an organizer to ask everyone to round up to the next dollar amount, and - at their discretion - choose whether the overage will be donated or reimbursed to each participant. (I don't think it should be an across-the-board rule that every co-op must "up the ante" to donate to the GA fund.)

One last thought - raffling off the overage is a nice thought, but I think even something as casual as that would run afoul of most state laws on gambling. (Yeah, I know I'm being nitpicky, but we ARE a public site, and as such we need to keep things aboveboard. It's not a bunco party in someone's home, where your $5 goes for the gifts that are given away at the end of the game ;o)

Well... if you include 3) (I may have had something to do with that comment, sorry) then 1) and 2) are somewhat irrelevant because what is the fund there for then ?

I think you could limit it to 1) and 2).

That's okay - I was just seeking clarification for myself and everyone else. I don't think we want to get in a situation where we're keeping a revolving fund for co-op shortages to dip into. (Talk about a bookkeeping nightmare - eeek!)

But how the organizer handles overages is up to them - they just need to be very clear about it from the get-go. If they're going to reimburse, that's fine. If they want to contribute the overage to the GA fund, that's okay too - as long as all participants know that going into the co-op.

Personally, I've always handled my co-ops with the one-dollar guideline. If the amount owed either way is less than a buck, I don't reimburse or ask for additional money - everything pretty much balances out. If it's over a buck, I send a reimbursement or ask for an additional payment. Since my bank account (credit union) has online bill payment, I can send a check without incurring postage or physically writing a check - the only hassle is setting up each person as a payee.

Well now there's a bright idea, Terry, that you could have shared months ago! I never even thought about online bill pay. That might eliminate some of the paypal junk as well.

Terry-

I have BofA and can pay individuals online through the bill pay feature as well. However, I don't like asking strangers for the info I need to pay them that way- that would be their bank account number, the name on their account and their ABA (routing number). Even though this exact same information is provided on the face of each check you write, people can be hesitant to give out that information and I don't like asking them for it. I guess if it was someone who paid me by check, I could just refund any overages that way without asking them- just take the info straight off the check they sent me. Again, that's why I find it amusing that some get defensive if you ask for that info. If you write checks, you provide it everytime you do that. Anyway, I would have much prefered that over writing all those checks!

Sorry, I wasn't clear - this isn't an electronic payment or wire transfer, but a check that gets printed and sent to the payee by my bank. There's no need for them to provide anything to me except their name and address, which I need to send 'em their plants anyway.

bill pay is a wonderful thing :-)

I always thought that the under/over 1.00 was like an unwritten rule... I think that maybe kdjoergensen is thinking the GA fund is a fund for co op stuff?

Well guys, I'm glad this came up! What Terry said, coupled with the fact that I just remembered that the bank I send my husband's car payment to told me that they get a CHECK from BofA when I use bill pay, made me decide to check this out.

I just went in to my account and pretended to try and set up an individual in my Payees section. All it asked for was name, "identifiying information such as account number" and their mailing address. It says the account number is just to help the Payee credit my payment correctly but it's optional. So technically I just need their name and address just like Terry said. Man! Why didn't I check this out before I wrote all those checks?! :)

I'm glad to know this now- I'm sure it will come in handy!

I tried it on my account and the only thing it wants that I couldn't provide was the recipients phone number. But if I put mine in, that works as well. It's not quite as fast as paypal, but no fees and it is about as fast as the mail service.

Anyone wants to bill pay me for a coop, that is fine.

Gads. I must have caught a serious brain cramp . . . I was going to apply to host a small co-op! LOL! What was I thinking????

I can't deal with all of this insanity.

It's no wonder co-ops are few and far between these days. More power to those of you who actually host these things.

Cheri'

Cheri'-

It truly, honestly, sincerely is NOT that bad! Mike (the supplier of my co-op) actually told me that he said to his wife "if I ever say the word 'co-op' again, hit me." Ha! BUT, after it was all said and done he said he would love to do another one sometime- but a SMALL one. Digging all those daylilies was no treat anymore than packing them up I guess. But we did have so much fun! You should check out the "Jamie's packing party" thread in the daylily forum. That made it all worth it. We had a blast and got a lot of great plants at a great price.

On that note, I was going to share my other "why did you do it?" with those wondering what is wrong with us that host co-ops. For me, it was winter. It was cold and nasty and there are only so many gardening catalogs one can look at before you need a bigger and better "fix" than that can provide. So the co-op was my way of having a garden related project going on and fill the time before spring got here. And I like BIG projects- even outside. So a co-op was a good thing to keep me occupied. It was fun and provided me with an outlet for my gardening obsession. :)

Jamie