Comments regarding Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens

Like others in this forum, I ordered some plants from this company that were dead and never came back and, like others, had much difficulty trying to contact their customer service. I tried their Contact Us Form, email and phone. They have an answering service during business hours (?!). The fact that they were not responding makes me feel this company has nefarious business practices so I filed with the BBB.

I wish I had thought to look them up before I ordered from this company. I had no idea they went under so many names either! That makes it very difficult to look at ratings as they will be all over the place with the various vendor names.

We ordered two hydrangeas and 10 hybrid willow. They were shipped in an opaque plastic bag on May 6, 2019 and they did not arrive until May 15. The gifts promised with an order over $40 were not included. The plants arrived very much dead. In order to get a refund, we would have to ship the dead plants back at our own expense and they will not refund the original shipping costs. We have made a complaint to the Illinois Attorney General and will ask our credit card company to challenge the payment.

It is also very, very difficult to get through to them on the phone.

I was burned earlier this year by another mail-order gardening company, and was reluctant to order from anyone but a select few. But we had our heart set on jack-in-the-pulpits, and the only place we found them was at Exciting Gardens. The fact that I received them, they appeared to be healthy, and that the company was responsive to my inquiries, was more than I expected. I will report back next year when they start sprouting.

WARNING: If you close the account you paid with,
EVEN AFTER RETURNING ALL MERCHANDISE,
you will not get a refund.

THIS COMPANY IS HEARTLESS! Flowers are a symbol of love and life, and this company has taken the death of my mother in law as an opportunity to benefit their bottom line.

My mother in law placed a $600+ dollar order the week before her death. When the first box arrived a few days after she passed away I returned the box and contacted the company to let them know it was being returned and why. I asked them to please cancel any remaining shipments and was informed that 5 other boxes had just shipped. I told the representative that those boxes would be returned as well once they arrived.

This company uses MANY names. Dutch Gardens (the name I ordered from) refunded the contents of the first box, but when I called to find out why the other 5 boxes hadn't been refunded, the representative confirmed that all the merchandise had been returned, but told me that the company would only refund to the debit card that paid and since the debit card was no longer valid (checking account had been closed due to death) they had no way to refund the orders. I requested they issue a check to the estate, or simply give store credit for the remaining amount. I was told that the request would be forwarded on the the appropriate person.

It has now been 9 months, I have called several times, and each time I am told the request for refund has been made, but the company stands by their policy of not refunding returned orders if they are unable to refund to the card that placed the order.

Basically, this company does not dispute the fact that they received this entire order back. They simply refuse to issue a refund in any form other than to credit a debit card that is not valid, and won't accept a charge or credit.

I wish I had kept the plants and spread them around to her many gardener friends and planted some of them with my girls in our own garden to remember their grandma by. I was just so overwhelmed by the unexpected death that anything other than returning the boxes seemed more than I could manage.

The death of a loved one is a very emotional and exhausting time, and this company has made what should have been very easy, a difficult and enduring challenge.

Like the previous rater/commenter, they require the original packaging which is of no relation to the actual plant if it dies (as did several soon to reveal) because the little white label on each is printed with a dot matrix printer that washes off with the first rain and all plants are packed in clear plastic. Several of the trees I ordered were either dead or dying, could not tell at receipt as they were shipped bare root and none of the trees I ordered should have leafed out yet due to the season. They offered to replace the items but none were in stock at the time I was haggling and they could not assure I'd be sent replacements in the following calendar year. There were other sites with those trees currently available and I had had enough of this outfit. DO NOT PURCHASE FROM EXCITING GARDENS. The only thing exciting you get from them is your heart rate from dealing with this sham.

"On Nov 4, 2016 12:59 PM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

We are sorry to hear of this customers experience. We do have a refund and replacement guarantee available. We have contacted this customer via D-mail to see how we may be of assistance."

I bought rose bushes from Richard Owen Nursery. They died. I requested a replacement or a refund. They want the original packing material which I threw away because I assumed the plants would live. They will not refund my money or reship the order. The only way I can get satisfaction is to reorder the rose bushes, save the packaging material, tell them that the rose bushes died, send the packaging material back and ask for a reshipment or my money back.

"On Sep 28, 2016 2:46 PM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

A customer care representative has contacted this customer for further information. We do hope to hear back from the customer as we would like to help resolve this problem."

Placed an order on March 10th 2016 and ordered several different plants. Today April 20th 2016 I finally received my order. My paw paw came in as a persimmons tree, All of my cherry trees were dead, so dead in fact they looked like dried up twigs with slight mush on the bottoms of them. I called to see why they had sent me a persimmons. The woman on the phone Mary was extremely short with me and told me they were not in stock and if i wanted a refund i needed to send back the plant and the shipping receipt. Now i have to pay to ship a plant back that i dont want just so i can get my money back. So i will just be losing more money and might as well just keep this half dead tree. Terrible place to order from! Please I advise you to order from someone else!!!!

I had placed my spring order and we had a hard dry summer. I lost half my order. I requested replacements and they said it was to late to ship for the fall. The next spring got here and still no replacements.
I was told it was over looked, they would ship in the fall. Fall and still no replacements. Farmer Seed & Nursery is also Richard Owen Nursery and Burgess Seed and Plant Co. My total order with the three companies that are one in the same, totaled over $600 dollars.
I will never do business with these companies again. I am now turning to our State Attorney General Office for help.

Placed rather large order in 2014. Most plants never came up. I did have the original package so wrote the company for credit. I ordered a special daylily which cost $12.99 for one plant, to replace some of the plants which did not survive. It grew, but did not flower. In 2015 the daylily finally flowered, but it was a very common variety which I could get anywhere for $2. I called the company and asked for a refund or new plant. They refused because I no longer had the original shipping label. Since it did grow the previous year, I no longer had the shipping label. I sent them pictures of the lily that did bloom, actual flower, all documentation, etc, but they still refused to do anything about it since I did not have the original shipping label.
This company has mostly junk plants, customer service is terrible.
I have ordered plants from many different companies, and Exciting Gardens is the very worst. Do not buy from this company, which also operates under other names, including Owens Nursery!!!

Also read the fine print on their guarantee. For a refund, you need to send in the original packaging within 14 days of receipt!! That is hardly enough time to know if the plants will survivie or not.

Rec'd wrong plants. One plant bag had 2 different labels. What plant was inside? Called RONursery. Was told there would be note of explanation w order. Wasn't. Was told to put plants "in an envelope w a stamp" and mail back. Rude, employee, w exasperated sigh, insisted "one stamp" would be enough. Wasn't. Cost over 3 dollars to send back w my request for money back. (Ordered/charged in June 2015; plants rec'd fall 2015.) Postcard from RONursery said they would send plants during 2016 season. I sent letters of complaint to various consumer agencies. After that, RONursery said charge card account would be credited, but for plant cost only. Will not refund/credit any shipping or return shipping costs. As a Master Gardener, have never dealt w so reprehensible a nursery.

I ordered 6 raspberries, 2 manchurian apricots, 2 juneberries, 2 honey berries from Farmer Seed, aka: Burgess, Richard Owen Nursery on January 22, 2015. I received 2 buffaloberry plants instead of the june berry the middle of May. So I sent in the shipping label right away per their request after I called them to notify them. They said they received it and had it on file numerous times. I planted all the trees immediately. June 1, 2015 I notified them that all there trees except the apricots showed no life and were presumed dead when they arrived. I have written and emailed and each time I get a different story, they are being shipped, no they are not. We don't have your shipping label, yes we do, no we don't. I still have not received any tree replacements or any juneberries. Complete waste of money. Total cost was over $100. Plus I lost out on plants, I could of reordered but had hoped they would honor there guarantee.

Who knows who is managing these companies. "Richard B. Owen, 73, of Bloomington expired from his earthly body Friday (Nov. 4, 2011) at his residence. Richard was president and CEO of Owen Enterprises which includes seven mail-order nursery companies, four nursery retail stores, a flower shop, mail-order jewelry company, ad agency and retail linen and bath store."

Richard Owen, Directgardening.com, House of Wesley, Four Season's Nursery, Burgess Seed, or by any other name.... maybe not so sweet. I placed my order on Directgardening.com but all these companies end up in the same call center and they have the same mailing address. Website notes that it takes one to two weeks to process an order, it has been more than 30 days and although my credit card was charged promptly upon placing this order no one in their call center, and that is all you have as a point of contact, can tell me when the plants will be shipped. As our summer heats up it will soon be too hot to plant the rose that I ordered or enough time to enjoy the annual vine I had hoped to receive. The prices are low, but not that low to be worth this highly inadequate customer service. How can they not know when an order would be shipped? Why is there no way to contact anyone for more information? I'm with most of the other posts I see for this group of companies, I'll pay a few dollars more next time and order from someone else.

The 6th of April I mailed an order, total of 39.00 (dollars) check # 4011, the check has been processed, however I have not received any of the plants that i ORDERED, NOR A CONFIRMATION THAT YOU RECEIVED MY ORDER, THE 6TH OF JUNE IT WILL BE TWO MONTHS, CAN i PLEASE RECEIVE NOTIFICATION OF AT LEAST WHEN i CAN EXPECT MY MONEY RETURNED OR THE PLANTS

I would highly advise anyone to never use this company or its affiliates to ever order anything from. Ever. I ordered two Edelweiss flowers and once of them arrived dead. I had been ordering from this company for years and was accustomed to some arriving and some arriving dead, but for what I thought was a good deal on plants turned into a nightmare. I have since realized I am better off spending more and being assured quality buy buying local and advise anyone to do the same.

I will never do business with this company of its affiliates for the rest of my life.

The companies services are so poor its miserable even talking to them. Their phone number hangs up after 2 minutes of being busy. They won't replace my dead plant without games or headaches, so on the 8th on May 2015 I cancelled what was a 143.00 order.

I just found out today, that they were shipped on the 9th. I think they do this on purpose to scam people out of money, but that is just my theory. Now I will have to wait to a return label that will never arrive - I suspect on purpose, and likely not get a refund even though I fully intend to return everything.

BUYER BEWARE!!!!!!!!!!! This is not the place to order anything.

I placed a small order with this company for the first time in January 2015. My credit card was billed immediately and I was told the order would be processed and shipped in one to two weeks. When the order didn't arrive, I assumed they were waiting for milder weather. On April 9 when the order still had not arrived, I called and spoke to Garria (sp?) who assured me that the order would be shipping within a few days. On April 22, I tried calling again since the order had still not arrived. I received, and have continued to receive a busy signal, no one ever answers. I sent an email on April 23 and was assured - again wrongly - that the order would be shipped within a few days. I still haven't seen any plants arrive from Richard Owen. I have cancelled my order with them via email, now I'm wondering how many months I'll have to wait for the refund. In my opinion, this is NOT a reliable, honest company to do business with.

Ordered 24 blue spruce trees in July believing they would be shipped at the appropriate time. My credit card was charged immediately. To my surprise I received them July 24th. It was 104 the day I received them. The package was immediately opened and trees removed. Each tree was wrapped individually in plastic and sealed and then placed in a large green bag. Needless to say the trees were literally cooked by the time I received them. Eighteen of the 24 trees were totally brown with needles falling off. I called Richard Owens Nursery to get a refund or at least replacement of trees and was told to plant the trees and call back in 6 weeks. Do not order from this company! Major rip off. I wish I had checked the company out before ordering. I will be calling them back in 6 weeks, but am not going to hold my breathe.

When I received the Richard Own Spring 2014 Exciting Gardens catalog early in the spring, I almost hyperventilated over the low prices!

I'm a new gardener but already addicted to garden catalogs and have started purchasing some pretty expensive items from several of the big name growers.

My first thought was "these prices are too good to be true." Then I checked the online reviews. Wow! So negative! Obviously it WAS too good to be true! What the heck...I'll place a small order and find out for myself.

All the places I order from always charge my credit card up front. The items from Richard Owen came a few weeks later, about par for other suppliers. Since I'd read the reviews the small plastic bags with dormant plants weren't a surprise. After reading the instructions on how to plant, I plopped 'em in the ground, watered them...and waited. The 12 candytuft plants I ordered are all greening up and starting to leaf out. It's a total bargain!

And they included some bonus strawberry and balloon flower plants, all of which are also leafing out.

The folks at Richard Owen should re-think their marketing. Instead of that nonsense in the catalog about "three years of labor", and is "it worth the price of $7.99?" they should explain in the catalog that their plants are a wonderful bargain...and especially let purchasers know what to expect when they open the shipment.

Turns out, my first order WAS a bargain, and now I'm going to place a much larger one!

Received plants last year, several were BLACK (dead) and the others died soon thereafter. I received a credit voucher for most of the order. Growing season was over so this year (2014) I sent in a new order with the voucher and an additional $7.00 for the extra costs. Weeks later, hearing nothing, I contacted Owens. They had NO IDEA what the status of my order was. The next day I received my order back telling me it was an additional $10.17. I re-sent the order with both checks on 17 May. Today 9 June I see NO activity on this order, neither of the checks cashed (a good indicator for a company that couldn't process the order and bill me for the $10.17.) Richard Owens / Exciting Gardens is an exceptionally poor company to deal with. Check on-line and you will see MANY websites show dozens and dozens of complaints about this company. I also notice their catalog is not current with the USDA's Agricultural Zones as of 2009, FIVE years ago. It is a wonder how they stay in business They are VERY hard to contact also. I am now wondering if they plan to ignore my order and pocket the (almost) $90.00 voucher.

Richard Owen Nursery is a complete rip off!!!
You don't get plants! you get seedlings in a plastic sandwich bag!
A $50 tree is literally a a stick with a couple roots on it!
DO NOT EVER USE THIS SCAM COMPANY!!
I ordered two gardens and an additional 96 creeping phlox and a tree, it all came in one small bag! Over 150 plants and a tree in one bag?
Does anybody know if this company can be reported to anyone who matters?

I ordered last year from Richard Owen Nursery and I had a couple plants that did not survive. Those that did are healthy beautiful plants. I sent them a letter with a list of the plants that did not make it through the winter with the shipping labels and they promptly replaced every single plant with no questions asked. I think their customer service is wonderful and would highly recommend this company. I will be placing all my future orders with them.

"On Aug 3, 2013 11:35 AM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

We wanted to thank you for your kind posting on Garden Watchdog. Your experience is more typical of our normal customers as we do ship hundreds of thousands of packages to satisfied customers each year. We just wanted to thank you for taking the time to post your comments!"

I ordered 24 thyme plants to use as steppers between the stepping stones in my porch. It took over a month for them to arrive. They were in plastic bags, dried up and dead. I always throw away the packing and keep the packing slip. They would only process a return if I would send them a copy of my credit card bill to prove that I paid, and a printed letter (not an email) with "I no longer have the original shipping label." as the first sentence. I gave them the info via email, telling them I wouldn't send anyone a credit card statement, that their records showed that I paid.

These people sent me dead plants, with a return/refund policy so cumbersome I couldn't get my money back. After reading this column, I'm glad it was only $23.98.

"On Aug 3, 2013 11:33 AM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

A customer care representative has contact this customer for further information. We do have a 1 year replacement guarantee on all of our plants which is clearly stated on our website, catalog, even the label itself. We stand behind this guarantee and do hope that the customer takes advantage of the exception we have offered.
"

Posted on April 26, 2013, updated June 9, 2013
I ordered the perennial bargain bag from Exciting Gardens which arrived today, 4/26/13. I thought I would share the contents for anyone who might be considering ordering it for themselves. I received 4 each of Hens & Chicks, Balloon Flower, Liatris, Baptisia and Hollyhock. I ordered other items as well and will rate the quality once they are in the ground for a little while.

In May I ordered $150 dollars worth of plants.
Ordering tips:
-order one month before you need to plant. The site specifically says it takes 1-2 weeks just to process the order and then they try and ship based on weather. (Ordering plants that bloom in summer, in September, would be a mistake.)
-Research the plants you see in the Catalogues. Order before appropriate planting times. Make sure they are correct for your zone.
-these are bare root dormant plants, don't expect what you get at The Home Depot. Follow the care instructions.
- if you live in a very hot climate order in April or before. store spring flower bulbs in a cool DARK ventilated space until fall planting. (Research what bulbs are planted when)
- prepare planting areas while you wait for your order. The order comes in multiple shipments when you order a lot, but keep in mind how much work each plant will require and try to get as much done before they arrive as you can, that way you can get non-woody plants in the ground immediately.

I got the Pre-planned Rose Garden...all are alive and doing well. They seem to be growing fast. One was a little moldy but I pruned those parts off and it's still alive. Not growing like the others but 9 out of 10 isnt bad! For $5 dollars each I consider it a fantastic deal. I have to admit that it didn't come with the planting guide. I just went by the picture, it looks great. (Tip:plant high watch them die, plant low, watch them grow!)
I also really like the hybrid lilly bulbs! They come up fast! The hostas I got seem to be growing fast as well.
I got the Robin Hood Rose bushes, they are growing well. I also got the Mock Orange bushes and they looked like little dead twigs...they weren't! I soaked them for longer than a day...like 4... tiny green buds appeared!
I got the perennial bargain... I got 4 mediterranean pinks (didn't know they were on the list!) 4 carnations (carnations are edible I found out) 4 creeping phlox, and 4 hybrid lilies, and 4 ballon flowers. The balloon flowers grow fast as well. The phlox doesn't creep fast!
I also got the flame and pampas and fescue grasses. They come as tiny bits of grass on soil wrapped in a bag...the flame grasses are dry roots. The flame grasses are growing. The Pampas grass will take awhile to get to be the full size. Maybe a year or two I assume.
I went ahead and ordered a couple more things. Some freesia bulbs and gladiola bulbs. I think the bulbs and roses are the best deal. If you don't mind waiting a couple years for shrubs and bushes to be established they're a great deal too. I also got some butterfly bushes and some rose of Sharon trees.
For the price I'm fine with having to do a little extra work and with waiting for my garden to establish. Plus it's really rewarding getting this tiny "vulnerable" plant and watching it grow!

In April of 2012 I ordered $109 worth of plants from Richard Owen catalog, What I received was plants that were almost dead, brown leaves, dry sticks, About 9o% of them died after planting, I am an experienced Gardener, and have ordered from several other catalogs over the years.
When I tried to return the dead plants and ask for my money back, they did not refuse, but they just kept asking for more information, and asking for labels that I had already sent them.
As a result they never sent my money back. YOU SHOULD NEVER ORDER FROM THIS COMPANY! I wish I had looked up this website, so I see all the Negative comments, left by their other customers, I would never have ordered from them in the first place.
Learning from my experience, I saw something in a Burgess Catalog that I wanted to order, But I looked up Burgess and found out that they are affiliated with Richard Owens so I will not order from them this year. I lost $79 because of this company.
I hope everyone with a bad experience with this company reports them. They need to be stopped from sending Catalogs with money back guarantees.

"On Apr 11, 2013 2:43 PM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

A customer care representative has contacted this customer for further information. We do hope to hear back from the customer as we would like to help resolve this problem.

"

About 4 years ago, I ordered 8 trees or so, 50 strawberry plants, some shoo mosquito plants, and other things. The shoo mosquito plants were black, wilted, and dead on arrival. A few couple trees didn't make it. I contacted them and sent them the original packing slip. They replaced everything that died.

I have an almond tree that is blooming. A few days ago, I received 6 more trees, 3 seedless grapes, and a goji berry from them. All seem in good shape. Some have buds or tiny leaves.

Maybe my situation was a fluke, but after looking at other people's similar reports, I don't think it is. Here's what happened: I ordered $134 worth of plants and seeds in early September, 2012 and my credit card was immediately charged on the 11th of September. Two weeks later, I emailed asking for a status as I had heard nothing. They emailed back stating that the orders were about to go out and I should have mine soon.

I still had nothing by 10/18/12 and so emailed again to cancel the order. (these are garden plants and it was starting to frost, so I didn’t want to try and get them in the ground) They told me on 10/23/12 that I couldn’t cancel as the order had gone to the shipping department and was irreversibly scheduled to ship. I said that was fine and would return the package.

When I received the package on 11/7/12, I immediately returned it that day, unopened to the Post Office and refused the package. I emailed the company that very day and told them it was refused and would be coming back. They acknowledged that and said to please allow 2-4 weeks for a refund.

As of 12/30/12, I still had no refund, 8 weeks later. So I emailed again. They told me that they had received the return but there was “no correspondence” in the package (which of course was unopened as it had been refused) to tell them what to do with the return. I replied that there was indeed email correspondence with customer service and that I wanted my refund. On 1/4/13, they replied that they would issue a refund in 1-2 weeks. That never happened.

So, I finally filed a dispute with my credit card company (go Capital One!!) and they got my money back for me. Richard Owens tried to issue only a partial credit of $120 and Capital One had to get the rest of it from them. At least they issued a credit and this is resolved, but what a hassle.

I feel I was more than patient with Richard Owens Nursery, worked with them as much as I could and finally had to solve it by disputing it. I'm filing this report after searching the internet and seeing dozens of other people have had the same problems as me with this company. I don't like seeing this sort of thing going on and feel that by reporting it to the public, the company will perhaps improve whatever problems with their internal systems have created this situation.

Posted on September 4, 2012, updated November 28, 2012
This company needs to be put out of business. Took forever to receive my $80.00 order. Plants were sticks or dried out. Should have sent right back but didn't know if they were dead or just "ill" from the mailing. Nothing happend with the plants, assumed they were dead and mailed back. Rec'd plants in almost the same condition! Even the blueberry plants that had green on them this time are dying. I have complained to the Better Business Bureau. Everyone who has complained should do the same.

"On Sep 7, 2012 2:32 PM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

We are sorry to hear of the problems with the plants. A customer care representative has contacted this customer for further information."

I am not happy with this company. My plants where steamed / cooked from being in those plastic bags. Plus I wonder about the quality of the plants / how they are handled or stored. I was a sucker and thought it was the stress from shipping. Some plants did recover with time and others never did. I sent back my shipping label and a letter that stated my plants had been cooked. Maybe they should rethink their packaging. My peony was half rotten looked old and had no eyes on it. ( This is not shipping stress ) I thought hey they set me back with my growing season way not get a replacement order for my troubles. WRONG, every replacement item was dead. Fleshy plants where cooked again to the point of no return. Bushes where dead and broken and even my one bulb exploded in my hand ( poof dust, mold and bugs ). Shipping stress? I think not. I wasn't about to waste more money, time on shipping the replacement order back. Something is wrong here. Mistakes are made yes but twice? Never again will I do business with them.

"On Oct 19, 2012 11:48 AM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

A customer care representative has contact this customer for further information. We do have a 1 year replacement guarantee on all of our plants and do hope that the customer takes advantage of this guarantee."

This company absolutely SUCKS! DO NOT BUY PLANTS FROM THEM OR ANY OF THEIR SUBSIDIARIES!

So, I purchased 12 candytuft plants and 24 walk on me plants. The order arrived in timely fashion but what I received shocked me. I've been doing business with Springhill and Michigan Bulb for 3 years now and was not expecting the crap I got. I received a garbage bag basically with 3 candytuft roots in 4 bags, which was fine. They looked rather healthy but dormant. What was disturbing is the walk on me were all just roots bundled 6 in a baggie. There was no separation just a bundle of roots!!! I called the company and I was told to soak them for 24 hours and they should easily separate. They did not. Out of 24 plants I ordered I got 17 viable plants. They were planted in between my flagstones and watered as expected. As of today, only 3 are alive!! I contacted the company and was told that I had to send back my shipping label. That's bull****. I did as was told and requested a reship of candytuft (4 had died) and 17 walk on mes. This time I had to wait almost a month to receive the plants and what did I get? A garbage bag with dead, moldy, rotted plants. I called again and was told to return the order and I could get a credit voucher. I will NEVER pay for another order from this company. I will use the credit voucher for bulbs only and be done with this scam!!

"On Jul 16, 2012 11:40 AM, Richard Owen Nursery / Exciting Gardens responded with:

A customer care representative has contact this customer for further information. We do have a 1 year replacement guarantee on all of our plants and do hope that the customer takes advantage of this guarantee."

I ordered a number of plants including two dwarf dogwoods. Everything arrived except one dwarf dogwood. I emailed them about the problem and they said I should send the original shipping label to have this corrected. Seriously? They want me to go through all of that for one plant that they made a mistake on? Forget it. That is terrible customer service. Remove me from any mailing lists they have and also from any lists they may sell, trade, or otherwise share in any way. I will never deal with that company again. One plant and they want me to jump through hoops to help them correct THEIR problem. Why should I waste a stamp, envelope and my time to help those incompetent people.

ordered 3 Blue Roses and a gardenia, waited 6 weeks for shipment to arrive. Credit card was billed during phone order. Paid 10.99 for a gardenia which was about 5 inches, a local grocery store had a gardenia that was about 2 feet in height for 4.99. Order was shipped in a green plastic bag which was not labeled "fragile-live plants". Postman was trying to stuff package in mailbox, luckily intercepted him before any damage was done. One of the Blue Roses blossomed and gee, it was RED. Not surprised after reading the reviews here. Was instructed to send label from package and a letter stating my complaint and the matter will be taken care of. I can only Hope.

Beware of this company and all of it's affiliates, which there are many...Royal Dutch, Honey Creek Nurseries, the list goes on. I relandscaped my whole yard and made the mistake of placing a huge order with Richard Owens, Honey Creek, Royal Dutch, and Exciting Gardens. Out of the whole batch, only 2 flowers came up out of 50 plants. It's impossible to get any type of customer service and they make it impossible for you to get your money back. It's been more than half year and I haven't received any money back or plants. I think I will get the plants sent to me but who knows how they will preform.

I placed an order for 3 dwarf trees in late Oct 2012. They took my money on Nov 2. They did finally send 1 of the trees but it didn't grow.

About a month ago I send the packing label and written letterl as they said asking that tree be replaced and that they FINALLY send the other 2. They sent 2 trees, one had not one tiny root on it, it was just a stick and it was broken.

I planted the other tree and we had some wind last week that broke it.

I called today asking that since I still don't have 3 growing trees that my money be refunded. Misti says I would have had to ask for the money back with 14 days.

Sounds crooked to me. I hadn't even gotten a "Hello" from them within 14 days. She says they will ship the 3 trees again. Unless it's too cold. Believe me, it is not TOO COLD in Texas unless they are going to wait until Winter.

I AM FURIOUS.

hecaudl

I ordered from Exciting Gardens and they cleared my payment in 4 days time. However 2 weeks later I called them to check the status of my order and they told me that it was still processing and that I had another 2 weeks to wait to get my little Cherry Trees. I don't know how anyone can stay in business this way. They sure took my money fast. I have ordered from many garden companies without problems. I am very unhappy about there process and do hope that I actually receive my order. I would not recommend them to anyone and wish that I had seen the reviews on this company before ordering.

Never got the order. In fact I would stay away from any nursery in Bloomington, IL. My experiences with some of the other have been less than satisfactory

I am usually not one that likes to complain about companies. I like to give them the benefit of the doubt, however I am still waiting for my order to arrive. It has been 5 1/2 weeks. I ordered from burgess, and I received my order last week. It was a little late, but not like this nursery. They say that they process your order within 7-14 days. This is not true. They also say that they ship to the warmer climates first. I am in the warm climate. It is now almost 90 degrees, and things have bloomed over 3 - 4 weeks ago for an early spring here. I have called , emailed, etc. Last week, I was told that this order had been processed (finally after 4 weeks of waiting), and this week still no plants. I wish I had looked online here for the reviews before ordering from this company. I too get a busy signal when I call. Hmmm...must be due to the high call volume of complaints. Oh well, live and learn. Never again!

My order came in a plastic bag with little protection for the plants--all bare roots. My Manchurian Apricot was about 12" dried up bare root with no proction around it. It was broken in half. I contacted the company and after about a week they sent me an email that said I needed to send back the original packing slip. I sent it back with a message about the state of my "tree" and asking for a quick replacement. It has been 2 weeks now and I have heard nothing from Richard Owen Nursery.

I believe they fall short in both the packaging area, disclosure that they are sending only bareroots, and mostly, improvement in the customer service area.

I will not purchase from them again.

Posted on August 20, 2011, updated March 12, 2012
Posted on June 5, 2011, updated August 20, 2011
I ordered a lemon tree and they shipped to me as promised. The plant was in good shape and healthy. I have no complaints about this company. I will order from them again. They forgot to send my free gift, I emailed them and they said they would send it to me, and that were sorry for overlooking it.