Comments regarding Direct Gardening

I tried ordering about 60 dollars worth of plants from them twice. The first time they emailed me a week after I ordered saying that it had been canceled but didn't give a reason. I called them that day and re ordered the plants. I called back the next week and my order was fine. I called the week after that and talked to Gina, hoping to find out when I would be receiving the plants. My order had been canceled and I hadn't been notified. Gina was not particularly helpful and told me that my order had been canceled because of my card and I needed to call the bank.

I proceeded to call the bank. The bank had not received any charges from direct gardening and therefore could not deny any of them.

I called them back the next day, determined to try to place it again. Their computers were down. I don't remember who I talked to but they were rather snarky. I finally decided that if they couldn't be helpful and considerate when I was trying to give them money, how would they be if one or all of the plants died during the warranty period?

I have quite the idea by reading all of these other posts. :(

I ordered $46.70 for plants that arrived in pitifully poor condition. Ordered 6 hostas and received 3 of which 2 were barely alive with one lifeless and yes they all are now deceased. Yes, i know that mail order plants need TLC, but there was nothing there to give such care. I have been gardening for 40 years and have ordered from Park Seeds and Shrubs with beautiful plants that thrive. When i emailed them to let them know that 3 items were missing I was told to ship them back within 14 days. You can not ship back what was never received. NEVER AGAIN..... You got me once, but not a second time......

So far the worst online company I had to deal with. Make sure you don't buy from them because you are wasting your money. Their warranty doesn't exist. They send bad, bad products in plastic bags without any soil or moisture of any type. I have always bought from Michigan Bulbs, Spring Hill and Brecks and I am very satisfied with them. Direct Gardening just take your money without any warranty. Customer service is rude and aggressive. i spent $46 dollars worth of plants that never made it. I had to send 3 letters and nothing! I received as replacements the same garbage they sent in first place. I returned the bags with the 3rd letter and they denied getting it. I could keep going on all day long. I truly regret placing the order. I wish I would never had the idea of trying another online gardening place. I will make sure that I tell everybody about this unpleasant experience.

How I wish I had read these reviews before placing my order with this company. DO NOT DEAL WITH THESE PEOPLE.

I ordered a total of $36.48 plants (including $9.49 shipping charge). Never received them. I understand things can get lost in the mails but the way they responded makes my blood boil.

I e-mailed them with all details (my name, address, their purchase order number, merchandise ordered, date of order confirmation). They replied that they couldn't deal with me until I gave them all the details. I repeated those details. They told me I could expect delivery in 1-2 weeks. Never got anything. E-mailed them again with all details. They replied that I needed to give them the details. I replied by hollering at them (in writing). They replied by telling me to expect delivery in 1-2 weeks. This was repeated over and over again for two months straight. It was clear they were prepared to stall me forever.

I had my my credit card company reverse the charge and issue a credit to me for the purchase.

Never did get the plants. Never did hear anything from the company. They will never hear anything from me again.

I was not entirely pleased with Direct Gardening, but after reading all the other comments here, I guess I should feel lucky that my experience was not nearly as bad as these poor folks.

I placed my order in early Feb., hoping that I get an early start in temperate California. The order consisted of lots of hybrid willows, forsythia, mock orange, Hall's honeysuckle, hydrangea trees, firethorn, wintercreeper, and candy tuft. I got an email confirmation of my order, and that was that. Nothing was said about shipping date. When I inquired a couple of weeks later, I was told it would take several more weeks. I finally received the green bag in mid March.

My experience is that most of the bigger plants survived the tortuous shipping and some are doing reasonably well and some are alive but not really growing, while most of the tiny ones like the candy tufts were DOA and the ones that survived are still looking puny bad after 4 months. I requested for replacements for the dead ones, and after 4 weeks, I again had to inquire about shipping for the replacement plants. I got the replacement plants 3 weeks later, and they too were DOA. I doubt I will request for more dead plants. My inquiries were always answered promptly by email, but I was bothered by the fact that I have to make inquiries at all.

Last week, I bought quite a few of gallon potted plants at Walmart for $1 each on clearance!! These are beautifully lush good sized plants that are making an immediate visual impact in my yard already, unlike the sticks that I got from Direct Gardening. I doubt I will ever buy plants through mail order again. What I will do is to keep an eye out for sales at the local nurseries. In summary, I may pay a little more, but I get so much more back in return. As for the plants I bought at Walmart. they turned out to be cheaper than the ones I got from DG.

Holy Cow - Don't deal with this outfit.
After ordering in late April and having my credit card charged the next day - so far (August) no order.

Not only that - they charged my account TWICE

When you call Direct to complain they say they are "only billing agents" and "you must write a letter to complain". Of course they are a division of House of Wesley (Burgess Seed) and simply want to give me the run around.

If you order from them you have no one but yourself (literally) to complain to.

Ordered thornless blackberries about may 2007. planted same day all lived except one.Sent label one replaced. Later all turned out to be with thorns direct gardening refused to send right plants.

Almost same problem with blueberries-ordered 6. Planted same day
3 died in 2 weeks one was just a green 6 inch stem black on top.
kept thinking all would be fixed. Last order arrived with yellow plants all dead. I have finally given up on the managers of this company.

Still waiting on replacements for blueberries and for them to correct the blackberries i ordered.

The free seeds with order were good.

Have no hope for either.

I visited the Direct Gardending website 7/10/09 for the first time. I placed an order around 12:30 PM and had my order confirmation within an hour via email.

After reading the notes regarding the plants being shipped to specific areas during the planting season, I really didn't expect to receive them all at once, or so quickly.

My plants arrived this past Saturday, July 18th, just after noon via FedEx. I was shocked...and pleasantly surprised.
I inspected the plants, and immediately began reading the Plant Care Guide included FREE in my shipment.

I received just what I expected.....barerooted plants, and all seem to be doing OK. I followed the instructions and I also placed my shipping label away for the future, if necessary.

Sorry so many of you had trouble, but plants are like babies....they need lots of TLC, they can overcome a few bumps and scratches, but they cannot grow on their own.

As for one, I am very happy with my purchase, and will continure ordering from Direct Gardening until "they" loose my business.

I ordered over $30.00 + the $9.49 for shipping from Direct Gardening. What a mistake. I ordered 10 of the Hybrid Willow Trees (more like little sticks) and all of them died.
I asked for a refund and of course I had to do that within 14 days. Then I could have gotten more of these with the ORIGINAL SHIPPING LABEL. Who's gonna save that from the bag that these were shipped in. This place is a rip off and I recommend that NO ONE buy from them. Go to a greenhouse in your area instead of throwing your money away on this company. I always have to learn the hard way I guess.

I bought 6 lilies that were supposed to be "Electric Orange" lilies, and 6 lillies that were supposed to be "Lollipop"-dark pink & white, along with "Blue Light" clematis & 1 bougainvillea. The clematis withered & died but I continued on good faith. When the lillies bloomed, I have all WHITE lillies, not a sign of orange anything or dark pink. When I emailed the company about this discrepancy, they informed me they would do nothing unless I returned the ORINGINAL SHIPPING LABEL-worded just like that. Since several months have passed, I couldn't find it, but I did have my confirmation email, shipping statement with the list. This isn't good enough. Each time I contact them, they become more snide & downright rude.

my first order from direct gardening contained dead walk-on-me thyme so brown and moldy i would have done better to hunt for something dead in the woods. trying to be cooperative, i gave directgardening the benefit of the doubt and against my better judgment did not return the "plants". i planted the dead junk, cared for the withered, tangled, crumbly whatever it was and of course nothing close to an actual plant developed, they just disappeared completely.
still not expecting a transaction this atrocious again or that this insult would actually be repeated by direct gardening, i ordered again. this time they rewarded me with molded irish moss, dead blue light clematis, and dead pink salvia (as labeled on the bags, i could not even tell by looking at the brown things what they were supposed to be). i mailed a detailed letter explaining why i am entitled to return shipping. their policy does NOT say "if we send dead plants the return is the customer's cost" or anything to that effect. i spoke to several customer service reps trying to get my return shipping cost ($1.75) refunded, most recently on 07/01/09. while they didn't uphold their representation to not sell dead plants, they did consistently uphold their policy that
return shipping is the customer's cost. the bottom line is that their policy causes customers to lose money for them not fulfilling an order as implied. i asked them if their policy was to send dead plants, they said no. i told them i have pictures and asked why they didn't uphold that statement, yet upheld the return shipping policy. the response i got was that its only a dollar and some change. this has been the most horrible customer service experience i have ever had. how can they think they should be allowed to do business this way?

I made the mistake of ordering from this company and like many received dead plants. The shipping time took over 2 weeks, they were shipped in a plastic bag and were broken, slimey, moldy and looked like someone had gone in their backyard and picked up dead twigs to send . The time from placing the order to mailing was over 3 weeks. I returned the labels (total of 4) and here I am 4 weeks after returning them, still being advised they have no record of receivng the labels back. The people on the phone have been nice and polite, but the plants and the shipping department are another story all together. I will not order from again.

On March 18, 2009, I put in an order for $68. The items arrived slowly, and in 2 seperate shipments on April 11 and 20th. Some items arrived very small, others all tangled (to the point where you had to destroy the stems to pull them apart), and some looked completely dead. I did receive the free items and I got a free hosta using a coupon. I did exactly what they said: I planted everything, even the dead looking stuff, and to be fair, some of the dead looking stuff did come up. The prices are super cheap, so I figured I should give it the best shot. I emailed them with some questions and they responded promptly with a personalized email.

June 6th I decided to write them a letter asking for replacements of all the things that didn't live to this point. Here is a summary of the items:

NAME #plants that lived/ total
5102 Butterfly Bush Bi-color 0/2
6826 Butterfly Plant Orange Glory 1/3
5728 Blue Festuca 0/3
6811 Periwinkle 0/50
7753 Sedum, Improved Golden 10/24
5103 Walk on me Plant 0/18
5799 Amaryllis Miniature 9/10
6837 Torch Lily 3/3
6992 Grass, Japanese Blood 1/1

I did not list the free gifts, and they also don't replace those.

Today, June 26, I received a bag with all the replacements I asked for, in fact, they sent more than I asked for, replacing ALL of any particular plant that had some not live. The replacements all look better than the original shipments, bigger plants with more green, therefore more alive looking. Just beware that when you order from them, SAVE the packing slips on the packages you receive! Very important! You also must be willing to take the time to snail mail them the packing slips with the request to replace. I find this company to be reliable although their packing skills are less than stellar. So, for the price, I would order from them again. Just know what to expect! :)

Like other suckers, I ordered before checking this website. I ordered in early spring to ensure good selection, good quality plants and good weather to get them in the ground. My $76.00 order was for a wide variety of plants -- this seems to be what many people spend with them. All of the specials and "double your order for a penny" offers encourage you to keep adding more and more to your shopping cart because "it's all so cheap". Well, guess what?

The order was slow to arrive (3 weeks) and came in 2 packages a week apart. They do NOT really "package" the plants ! They just wrap the bare roots in plastic, stick them all in a big green plastic bag with no bubble-wrap or other padding and ship it United Parcel or via the Post Office (I got one package from each carrier). Naturally, the plants arrived all broken and twisted. Not that it mattered, as more then half of them were obviously dead... dried up and brittle with nothing like "roots"... *before* they were put in the bag to begin with. I immediately planted the 40% that looked like they might still be alive... about half of them were, but only a few are anything like healthy and growing well after 6 weeks.

So, I ended up with only 1 out of every 4 plants that I ordered. So much for "cheap" -- I could have done better at the local nurseries or mail-ordering from one of the top-rated websites on this website. Lesson learned. Oh yeah, sure, I did call them and complain and and sent back my shipping label and they say they will send me replacements, if they still have what I ordered and if not they will get back to me next year. Great. They will replace the dead plants they sent me with more dead plants. I can hardly wait.

I ordered a row of mockorange shrubs. and a pair of Manchurian apricots. the order came quickly. of the ten mockorange, four did not leaf out. the manchurian apricots were dead on arrival. I contacted first by email to ask could they reship just the apricots, so I could hold onto my "original shipping label" to see how the mockorange fared. I was told they could not do it that way unless I returned the dead apricot trees. I had not saved those.

so I waited another couple weeks to see if any growth would appear (it didn't), and mailed the shipping label and my request for replacements.

I worried that they might not have received my request, and emailed them, but later that same day the replacements arrived. they are all leafing out nicely.

for the price, I cannot complain about anything in my transaction, and will order again from this company (or any of the many affiliated companies). my neighbors giggle at bit at my "sticks" but after decades of gardening I really do prefer to avoid the transplant shock of larger specimens at the box stores. my little "sticks" take off by their second year, and I am in no rush.

An order was placed in mid March. My credit card was billed 3/31 and no merchandise was received for nearly a month, I ordered knock out roses and Canadian hemlock trees. The roses arrived with black spot so I returned them along with the original invoice as required. The hemlock trees died shortly after planting so I emailed to ask what to do. They told me to send a copy of the invoice with a note about why it wasn't the original along with the dead trees. I did that and they returned what I sent minus the dead hemlock with a note that I had not sent the original invoice, and dead sticks were returned with no explanation. I sent everything back to them again, explaining what had happened. Today I received another letter from them with a copy of the invoice saying that they do not know what I want credit for.
Bottom line is that their abysmal customer service makes their low prices not worth the trouble. The email chain regarding this order is 30 pages long. I intend to file a complaint with the BBB.

I ordered: dwarf fig, dwarf pear, dwarf apricot, dwarf cherry, sweet cherry bush, hazelnut, indian currants, grape vines and siberian elms.

This is June and I recieved my order in a timely manner. They gave me nice healthy bareroot plants. I will be ordering again this coming month. I am totally completely 100% happy!

I ordered 6 iris' that were supposed to be shipped as live plants. They all arrived in containers with the dirt completely spilled out. I quickly repotted them, but it looks like only 3 are going to survive and they all are less than 1 inch tall. Very disappointed in the packing of these items and will not order from this company again.

I also ordered 2 butterfly bushes a few months ago and they arrived in poor shape as well. I think they are going to survive, but they could have done a much better job packing them.

One month ago my husband and I placed two separate orders with Direct Gardening.

My order was filled in 3 weeks with plants that are struggling to survive in my plant shed ICU, not chance of them seeing the ground this year.

The other order was not filled at all. After a month I called the company and was told they could not find the order. I gave them my order number, date, name, address, amount and everything on the order as it was printed on the email they sent to confirm the order, but they still could not find the order. What is the point of an order number if they cannot use it to find an order?

I have asked to cancel the order but they told me I'd have to mail them a copy of my credit card statement and a letter to prove they charged me in the first place! What a terrible mess this company seems to be! I'm so sorry I wasted my time and money on this company. I wish I had read this website first.

DO NOT DO BUSINESS WITH THIS COMPANY!!!

I ordered one rose bush climbing blue moon from them.When I received it was obviously dead.It was diseased because it was completely black roots and all.It also had fungus growing on it which is ridiculous.Still have the shipping label but it seems rather worthless to ask for a replacement when I will only receive the same crappy diseased plant again.This company is a joke and the packaging is just plan stupid.Use a box not a bag you stupid retarded idiots.I do not even feel like dealing with the bullshit customer service.

I placed an order of about $75 with Direct Gardening last fall.

I have seen enough negative feedbacks about this nursery from Dave's Garden, I wish that I know this website before I placed my order with DG. I just don't understand why DG can still in business with the following bad issues.

poor packing
poor customer service: unhelpful, never address to your questions
poor quality of products: small, half dead, never grow
complicated replacement procedure
unable to cancel items of an pending order
$2.5 extra charge for adding items to an pending order

In my inital shipment, only one iris is growing and have produced flowers.

In my first replacements, only 2 crokscrew vines and 3 Elodie asiatic lilies are growing. Of course, the lilies are so mini. All other replacements are dead or not growing well.

I recently requested for second time replacements. I do not want to plant the dead items anymore because I had already planted them twice, so I asked for some new items with 2 pennies over the total amount of dead items. The company sent me back my letter together with the original replacement labels and asked me to pay additional shipping charge of $9.49 plus 2 pennies.

I then called the customer service and talked to supervisor to find out that the total amout of replacements can't exceed even a penny of the total amount of dead items. So, I changed the replacements by losing some money. I resented my letter with the shipping labels again. I wish God bless me that I will get nice growing plants this time. I really don't want to deal with this place anymore. It's more than enough!

You get what you pay. Never never do business with Direct Gardening.

So far, I am satisfied with our Direct Gardening experience. I ordered 3 fruiting trees and some bulbs. The trees arrived with several leaves and looking good. And the bulbs arrived looking fresh. I have saved my shipping labels just incase. We all know some plants don't like to be shipped. But they look good now!

Do not order from this company! It took a full 35 days and several phone calls to receive 2 dead eucalyptus trees and various plants that were yellowing and/or had dead leaves. I am still "babying" these, but the outcome is doubtful. Even though I explained that receiving the order so late in the season in our desert climate would end in disaster, the people I spoke to assured me that there would be no problem. I have no desire for any further contact with the service department, so I will just write this off to experience.

I have bought from them in the past without any problems. But, I just recently bought 8 Pardon Me daylilies and received them today. They were each in a separate plastic bag, with no soil. Each one had mold and mildew on them. Most of them do have some sign of life but a few do not. I will plant them and see what happens, and report back with an update.

I had a very bad experience with this company recently. After 3 weeks of not seeing my order, I called on 5 different occasions speaking to a different representative who told me that my order had processed but had not shipped yet, and they could not tell me why!!! One rep. even said that the items in my order were all in stock, so she couldn't understand why it had not shipped. When I asked about cancelling the order, I was told that I could not cancel because it had already processed; yet, my order was just out there in limbo somewhere!
I was told I had to mail a letter requesting a refund, and if it reached their office before the order shipped, it would be cancelled. When I asked if there was another method of sending it I was told "no". When I spoke to the 4th customer rep. however, I was told I could email my request. So I did, and when I called to verify that the email had been received to cancel the order, I was told that the department that handled that only communicated by email, so I couldn't speak with them, and the rep. said that she had no knowledge as to whether or not they received it, but I should hear from someone by email within 24 hrs. Ridiculous!!!
I received the email telling me that my request was being forwarded to the department that handles those requests. This was the same department that I was told over the phone by the rep. that would be processing my request!
After receiving other ridiculous vague correspondences basically saying nothing, I told them I was no longer going to deal with this, but report them to my bank, and I did.
I hope that people will do their research on this company, apparently under many names, before they order from them. I'm surprised they have not been shut down by now. They really shouldn't be allowed to stay in operation. I don't usually like to do this, but I had to let others know. People work too hard, and times are too difficult to be taken by these frauds.

One year I ordered 3 grapes from this company, and found them to be nice plants that grew and continue to grow in my yard. The next four years tell the tale: DO NOT BUY HERE UNLESS YOU ARE DONATING TO THEIR CAUSE. I have purchased 300 dollars worth of plants from them (100 was on a gift certificate I got for a birthday) and have been getting replacements now for 3 years on that same order. Year after year I send in the green plastic bag with the label, and year after year I have gotten what everyone else has said they have gotten: dead, moldy, rotten slimy excuses of garbage. I HAVE HAD ENOUGH. In the other business that I am in we are paid to be "nice people" when it comes to dealing with folks, but there is something terribly wrong with a company that is this ignorant and/or deceptive when they offer plants such as they offer at the prices they do, and then send what amounts to stuff for the compost heap. I called yesterday to see where my order for this year was and they said it was sent out on April 30--it arrived today, two weeks later. How does this happen? Because they use the cheapest method possible to mail your items and keep the remainder of the shipping and handling money instead of shipping it Priority Mail or otherwise. This year I received what amounted to rotten plants that looked and smelled even toxic/caustic. What a joke--I am not even going to bother asking for replacements again, nor am I going to ever accept a gift certificate from such a company.

The prices were really low, so I gave them a try before reading their reviews. My merchandise arrived promptly but was not in great shape. A couple asparagus roots were rotten, but the others were fine. The douglas fir trees were brown and dry, but, after a week, it appears they will recover. The strawberry plants were small, but seem to be doing ok. I've received better quality plants from other companies, so I'm not planning on being a return customer to Direct Gardening.

I bought almost $50 worth of various trees; Sarvistree, River Birch, Red Maple, White Birch, Pink Dogwood, which I planted in October. Not a single one budded this spring (2009; Williamsburg, VA). All I received were dormant sticks, and they just stayed that way. I live in an area with plenty of sun and good soil (all my other transplanted trees are doing fine, unlike the plain, dormant sticks from Direct Gardening). Now if I can just find that orginal shipping label ...

I was really surprised to see so many negative comments on here, so I thought I would add my experiences with this company. I placed two orders with Direct Gardening last spring and received them within two weeks. All the plants (Hydrangeas, Rhododendron, and Hibiscus) lived and have come back beautifully this year. The Rhododendron was broken when I received it and so I requested a replacement using my shipping label and got a new one within a week. I placed another large order this spring (Roses, Delphinium, Hollyhock and another dark colored Rhododendron). The order took about a month this time but the plants arrived in plenty of time for the season. This key to ordering from this company is to carefully read the instructions about how and when to order, saving the shipping label, not letting the plants sit in your mailbox upon delivery, ect. It is possible that I just got lucky with my three orders, but as long as I keep getting good plants I will keep buying from them.

I ordered over 100 items from this company...not thinking it was a scam.

After reading all of the negative comments I thought I would never get my order.... I thought I'd get real crappy rotton bulbs and dead starts..... I thought I'd get the wrong items or not enough or too much of one item.

But guess what????
I got everything right at the beginning of May just like the order said! I got every bulb right down to the exact count. And everything was alive and well.

I am glad to say I received everything. Especially after reading all the terrible reviews..... So there is hope for this company after all .... =)

Happy planting!

Marie from Hoosier Land.

I was overjoyed to find a company that was affiliated with so many different nurseries. Boy was I in for a shock.
I placed three seperate orders . one order totaling $150.73 on 3/13/09 from Exciting Gardens, One order totaling $53.69 3/22/09 from Four Seasons Nursery, and one order totaling $48.65 3/22/09 From Honeycreek Nurseries.

My orders were accepted and my credit card charged emmediately. I recieved my first of two packages from Exciting Gardens in a timly manner and all of the items arrived in good condition, 15 blackerry bushes, 18 raspberry bushes, twenty Rhubarb roots, fourty asparagus roots sixteen mixed oriental lilies and three red painted daisies. So I figured this company was reputable. The second half of my order arrived today. three weeks after the first part of the order arrived.. I have six Angel Trumpets here that are nothing but mush. I cannot plant mush and expect it to grow. very dissapointing.
Honeycreek Nurseries order arrived last week. three weeks in the mail and I have six broken trees from their overstock selection (trees that are not legal to import to my state) and a yucca plant that is muchy on top and dry dead on bottom. Not plantable....not to mention that the rest of the order was all yellow and of the smallest most inferior stock I have seen to be sold by a mail order company..
Four Seasons order was supposedly mailed on April 3rd of 2009 and today is the 28th and still nothing in the mail.
I have called the company several times and have gotten absolutely nothing in the way of assurance. I know when the order arrives that it will be a box or bag full of dead plants.
I have tried to cancel the order and can do nothing until 30 days has passed from the supposed shipping date.
I asked 3 different customer sevice personel people about shipping and why they only have one shipping option? I would be more than happy to pay extra shipping to recieve strong healthy plants via mail. I was told that they dont have any other options. Finally I was able to speak to a supervisor . Not that it was of any help. but I did finally get an answer to the shipping question. You have to request upgraded shipping at a cost of $12.00 extra. Why on earth do they not give you the option when you are placing an order via the internet or when ordering from the magazines. Boy what a no brainer that would be.
Needless to say this company and its affiliates has lost my business. Now I am an avid gardener that would make Martha Stuart proud and have many other gardning friends. I belong to the local Master Gardeners association and my displeasure will not be lost on the many many friends and other people that I deal with.
I am astounded that from reading this forum that there is not a class action lawsuit against this company yet. All that I can say is Buyer Beware.
I wish you all Happy Gardening.

I placed my order in Dec. and received the first of 2 shipments in March. I ordered 3 dwarf trees ( Apple, Plum, Peach ) , 25 Strawberry plants and 2 Butterfly bushes. The strawberry plants were a somewhat rotten, the butterfly bushes were completely dried out and the trees, err sticks looked pretty dead too. Did the scratch test and they were still green. Bagged them in 50% compost 50% topsoil and set them out in the sun. After about 2 weeks the apple tree started leaving. I decided to plant them and now the apple tree has plenty of leaves. It is only about 2 feet, nothing more than a stick with leaves but it is alive and a dwarf so hopefully it will become a tree one day. The plum is a little bigger with a few branches ( all dried out ) but is showing new buds, here's hoping. The peach stick is just that , a dried stick with no sign of life.
Of the 25 strawberry plants 15 have survived and started growing.
I will try to return the peach and butterfly and see what happens.
I guess for the price I can't complain too much.
Second package contained 1 Lemon and 1 Orange dwarf tree. Came about 10" tall with bright green leaves. The soil had spilled out of the little container but the roots were undamaged. Pot planted them the next day ( about 2 weeks ago) and they are doing good. The orange tree has several new leaves and the Lemon is starting a few.

OTOH my neighbor ordered several plants just about a month ago and received them last week. Much better looking stuff than what I got. Perhaps the time of year when you place your order has something to do with it?

Since I only need a few items I would again order from them knowing that it is a 50/50 thing and for the price I'm willing to take that chance. However the customer service is not very good and can be frustrating.

This company is the world's worst. Placed my original order in January. They took payment immediately, but did not ship until April. I had underestimated my project and needed a few more plants. (if I could find the species elsewhere I would never have ordered from them again). Again they took my money immediatly; that was almost 3 weeks ago. I called again this morning...still hasn't shipped. Got a runaround with the girl on the other end about refunding my money. If my plants aren't here Friday I contact the attorney general. People like this should be put out of business!

I hadn't heard about this company before I placed my order, but the price on the red maples, blueberries and aspargus inticed me to give them a try.

My first discomfort with them was when I sent an e-mail asking when the order would ship. They responded that they needed the address and my name along with the order number I had already provided. I also asked if there was a better way to check shipping.

I recieved a canned response stating they had received my order, but did not address my questions. So, I tried again. Within two weeks I had a date narrowed down to a six week time frame and some of my other questions answered, but not all.

I recieved the large green bag with my bare root stick trees, asparagus roots inside an additional bag and two potted blueberry bushes with no packing materials, two weeks before the begining of the shipping window.

Asparagus roots were starting to rot, but called customer service and agreed to plant them anyway. I ended up trimming the roots and planting. Believe it or not some are coming up. I doubt that more than half will make it.

I planted the Maple sticks - no current sign of life, but I do not think they are dead.

Blueberries - one is dead and the other was already sprouting a great deal of new growth when recieved. It is planted and I hope it will continue to tolerate the strange weather.

Not a terrible experience, but I do urge the company to work on their customer service skills, packaging practices and electronic systems for tracking. There are other much better internet companies, but few can meet the price. But again if the stock is consistently a problem, is it truly the cheaper alternative? . I doubt I will do business with this company again, but then again the price is a great inticer. I know that I can't trust the stock to be delivered in great shape so if I do get inticed to try them again it will be on a very limited basis.

I ordered items from this company last spring -they billed me immediately but arrived in November during a snowstorm. Nevertheless, I planted them. Most items were dead, rotten, and/or moldy. I called the company. They said "plant them and save your label." I did that. Nothing grew (because they were dead). I documented it all and obtained a lawyer. I sent back my original shipping label and a letter of explanation stating that I wanted a refund or replacement of the items and my letter was returned to me. I wish they would have at least made an attempt to make this right. I would highly advise against dealing with this company unless you plan on donating your money to them or care to retain counsel to seek retribution damages.

I ordered some purple angel trumpets and months went by without receiving them. Then they came in a box with no label, shipping form, or anything. The two plants were in terrible shape, barely alive. One had no pot or dirt around the roots, and one did. The packaging around the plants was different, like they got the plants from different sources. They say to get a refund you need to send them the shipping label. What shipping label? There wasn't anything in the box. Do they mean the outside address label? Where do I send it? There was nothing on the box or in the box to even say their company name. All of these sites listed in links shown in other reviews are crooks. Their websites and marketing brochures are so pretty, you think they are legit. They are not. Never buy from them.

I placed an order totaling 44.25 including shipping with Direct Gardening on 1-21-09. My credit card was immediately charged. As of March 3rd my order was not shipped. I called and was told that yes they had my order but they had already shipped to my area and they would not be shipping my order...so..I asked how they planned to return my money. I was told that I had to write a letter asking for my order to be canceled..like the lady couldn't do it then after finding "their" mistake. Isn't is amazing how they don't forget to charge the card? Anyway, I have sent a copy of my order and "asked" for a cancel for "lack of shipping". Will just have to wait til next month to see what happens or to see if I have to file a complaint with my card company. Needless to say I will never trust this company again.

Recently I received a promotional e-mail ad to buy a Direct Gardening gift card. The card was promoted as a bargain gift: $20 for a $25 card. The ad suggested buying a card for oneself, which is precisely what I intended to do. Not in the ad, and not disclosed until online checkout, is a $9.49 shipping/handling fee, bringing the cost of a $25 gift cost to $29.49. During this holiday season, I have purchased a number of gift cards. Most retailers are pleased to process online purchases of gift cards and waive shipping and handling fees. (Gift cards tend to be favorable to retailers, since they receive payment upfront, and a proportion of the cards are never redeemed.) Be aware that Direct Gardening has chosen not to waive these fees, and customers who purchase a small number of cards will not enjoy the bargain savings promoted in the ad.

I just had a bad experience with Direct Gardening. I originally ordered a bunch of zebra grass earlier in the year and they all arrived dead. I emailed photos of the dead grass and was told to mail my shipping label to them for a replacement. I sent back my shipping label and a long time later received a replacement certificate. So I ordered different plants this time--tulip trees, wintergreen and merrybells. Everything arrived months later in a green plastic sack. The bareroot trees were BARE. Not a bit of packaging was protecting the roots. Not surprisingly, they were completely dried out. I used my pruners to see if I could find any live wood. Nope, dead all the way to the roots. To add to my disappointment, the merrybells were a package of green slime. Completely rotten. The wintergreen plants were by no means healthy. I am not hopeful that they will be able to survive the winter. I emailed the company with photos of the dead plants and was told that if they do not leaf out in the spring I can contact them for a replacement. I wrote back and explained that I was NOT going to waste my time planting dead sticks, and that I wanted a refund, since the replacement for my original dead plants were dead as well. I got an email back stating that their return policy allows for replacements only, no refunds. So mail back the dead sticks with your shipping label and you can get another replacement. On one hand, I don't want to let them get away with this, but what a pain! I am tempted to just forget the whole thing. Buyer beware. This company takes no care in packaging and shipping and has a poor return policy. The savings in money is not worth the aggravation!