Comments regarding Raintree Nursery

Posted on April 16, 2016, updated April 18, 2016
I was out at the nursery yesterday looking to pick up some blueberry plants that would produce this year. Everything was fine and the weather was fairly nice a little bit of sun peaking through the clouds, when all of a sudden I hear a lady yelling as she walked toward a U-Haul parked next to the larger trees they have on display. She was shouting "I'm just doing what I was told" and "Don't yell at me" even though she was the only person I could hear. She must have been talking to someone but I'm not sure who or where they were. I moved closer to where she was standing because I'm a bit nosey and was curious as to what was going on when I heard her apologize to some people that were standing by the U-Haul, she proceeds to say "I'm sorry about that, but that guy is an a**hole." she then says "I need you guys to help me put the trees in your truck." The guys tell her it's okay and not to worry and they start loading their truck with some trees. I then hear her say something like "No one likes him, he's such an a**hole and this time I'm going to get him into trouble." One of the guys insisted it was fine, and that they didn't mind loading their plants. They finished up and everything seemed fine, I had my eye on a few blueberry plants, gorgeous looking Nordlands. So I proceeded to walk down into the building where you pay and all I could hear was another lady yelling but it was pretty incoherent so I couldn't make out what was being said. I waited a few minutes for someone to check me out but there wasn't anyone behind the counter, I decided then to leave after 5 minutes of standing around due to how bizarre the situation was and the lack of any help. I'm not sure what was going on but it seemed like the nursery was having a bad day and maybe some managers were not around to fix the situation. I've seen some other reviews on here about the poor customer service at this place and I guess I'm just the latest victim.

Posted on March 10, 2016, updated March 22, 2016
I was there yesterday and I was treated like I was wasting the employees time by trying to order some plants. I have ordered online before and have had them shipped to seattle, I think that's what I'll do from now on, I would advise anyone who thinks about going there to think twice.

Posted on May 29, 2015, updated June 3, 2015
I've recently planted 48 fruit and nut trees in my yard. Purchased at various places, all are doing fine, EXCEPT FOR THE FIVE ALMOND TREES PURCHASED FROM RAINTREE.
NO BUD SWELLING, NO LEAFING OUT. I BELIEVE THEY WERE DEAD WHEN SHIPPED.
DO YOURSELF A FAVOR AND BUY LOCAL!

We ordered $200.00 worth of trees and blueberry bushes in May, 2014. Three of the trees did not break dormancy. We notified Raintree of this, but instead of replacements they issued credit minus shipping charges. We wanted replacements. Why should we have to pay shipping charges again for ordering the same plants that were dead?

Spent 80 dollars on four 3 inch pots from them. I thought the price was rather steep but I was hoping it was because they were good products. Got a confirmation saying that it would ship sometime mid-March. It arrived today and I was super disappointed. I ordered 2 wasabi and nearly all the leaves were snapped off or broken and the 2 hops I ordered have barely even sprouted. I wouldn't mind if they were four or five dollar plants but for what I paid and what I received, I feel like I've been duped. I doubt I will buy anything from them again.

I ordered 6 strawberry plants. When the package arrived, the plants were well packed with cardboard pieces to hold the pots in place. Maybe the delivery people dropped the package or threw it, but one of the very thin plastic pots got pretty smushed, and the rest were compressed some. That, plus the fact that there was a slug happily crawling along one plant when I opened the package, made me decide to give a neutral rating. The plants are still semi-dormant, but they look like they will be fine.

Posted on June 19, 2011, updated August 23, 2011
Posted on May 17, 2011, updated June 19, 2011
I ordered plants for about 180 USD with them around New Years, got an email that they ran out of one grape, which they replace with another variety I liked for free ! 6 days before shipment I got another email preparing the arrival - very nice and plenty of time to do soil prep steps. Day of delivery the stuff came well packaged and still wet around the roots. All the potted plants looked really good, they are in the earth already and the shoots come out - great. The freebies I got were surprisingly high quality, lots of roots (bare), good height already and actually one more than announced. The only concern I have were the two additional grapes I ordered (again the freeby looks great). I saw mold on the bare roots of the two purchased and they are tini-tiny, maybe 2 inch above ground and 3 beneath - only few roots (looks more like rootstock to me). Obviously I can not say yet if they will survive and grow, but I have not much hope for these two. That would be 20/160 USD or 2/14 plants - not bad. I made pictures of the mold around the roots and have not complained yet and will wait if the grapes actually do survive, so can not comment on their refund policy yet.

If they do survive, I would say I am blown away from the overall quality that I got. If they die, I am still OK since the rest exceeded my expectation by far.

I would recommend buying the higher priced items and potted plants (enjoy the freebies !), but skip the cheap mass production stuff (aka grapes).

Will certainly buy again here.

Posted on August 5, 2011, updated August 8, 2011
Posted on July 25, 2011, updated August 5, 2011
Posted on July 25, 2011, updated July 25, 2011
When I first called Raintree to place an order, I was quite happy. They answered the phone quickly and were really nice about placing my first order. I didn't expect what came next.

I ordered 5 Caroline raspberries by phone back in May. Once they arrived I was surprised by their small size. Clumping ALL five together gave me about the same rootball size as one Stark raspberry plant. Seriously....I have a picture. Their website stated that their raspberry plants were stocky and well-rooted. Maybe this is why they were on sale. If so, they should have stated that. Out of the 5 plants, ONLY TWO exhibited any new growth. Less than 50% were alive.

In June and July I tried contacting the company through their website contact form. I have yet to receive a response. I really want to get some berries going this season, so I could have a decent crop next year. Overall, I'm quite disappointed with my first purchase from Raintree. All I want are the three other healthy plants I paid for.

On April 15, I placed an order on-line on their website and got an email stating that confirmation email with order number would be sent soon. When I didn't get it on April 18, I followed up with request and got a reply that it can take a few days to get an email with order number. It sounds weired because for other nurseries it takes a few days to ship an order. I asked them time frame when I may expect my order to be shipped and got an answer that it takes 2-3 weeks before the order is shipped. I had to cancel my order because for California it is too late to plant bare-root trees in May. If you have something in stock why does it take you up to 3 weeks to ship it? Just wonder.

I bought two blackberry plants that were advertised as "1 year plants". I expected to receive plants with primocanes at least 1-2 ft long. However, what I got looks more like recently rooted tips: one has about 6 in green growth, and the other about half an inch (basically just now sprouting from the root). They look healthy, but definitely not the size they let you believe. I will try to avoid them in the future.

I recieved an email several days after placing my order giving me a shipping date and stating that my card wouldn't be charged until that date.

What actually happened was that my card was charged a full week ahead of the date I was given, and I have yet to recieve the promised shipping number.

Not such a big deal, except that I hadn't yet transferred funds over to that account, since I didn't anticipate that charge to be deducted until the date I was given, and I incurred fees as a result. My fault for not having the money there already, but still, I feel it was poor communication on behalf of the vendor. I have placed preorders with other companies many months in advance and not had this issue.

Note to Raintree:
It would behoove you to stick to the dates provided in regards to payment, especialIy if it is going to take several weeks to process your orders. I have heard really great things about your merchandise, and was pleased with your prices and selection. I would have loved to have left a positive review, but in light of the poor communication, I just can't.

Mixed results. Ordered raspberries, blueberries, fig, and a pear tree. The raspberries worked out well - not surprising since raspberries are easy to propagate. Blue berry bushes were very tiny. After two years, they are still less than 1 foot tall. The fig was also very small, but figs grow fast. The pear tree had no roots at all. Not just bare root, but no root. The ad says that their fruit trees are "well rooted". It grow about 2" the first year and almost died. The 2nd year it grew another 4", but looks like it will make it now. Raintree did refund my money on the pear.

I have had normal experiences (not exceptional, just normal) with Raintree and I've had frustrating ones. My guess is that they have good intentions but have made some bad business decisions as far as managing growth are concerned.

My negatives are that they often take a couple business days to even confirm an online order. Furthermore, I ordered some bareroot trees in winter for spring delivery. I never got an itemized receipt in email and there was a great deal of mystery as to when in spring the trees would finally arrive. This made it hard to arrange the physical help I need to plant trees.

Most recently, I noticed Raintree had a rarity that I wanted to try. I ordered it. A day or two later I was contacted by email because apparently I had entered my cc# wrong. Oh, by the way, the main thing I'd made the order for, the rarity, was out of stock for the season. I found it odd it was mentioned in an offhand way because when checking out of the online shopping cart, I ticked off the box that said to call or email me if something was out of stock. I wonder if my cc# hadn't been typo'd would I have been contacted? In any case, they need to come up with a better shopping cart and inventory system that will let them know that something is sold out and immediately remove it from being listed on their website as available. It's so disappointing to think you've ordered something and come up empty.

Raintree has a nice selection of plants, and I've been happy with some of the things I've ordered.

However, one year I ordered a Hardy Chicago fig tree. It was DOA. They sent me another one, and it didn't make it through the winter. That was the limit of their warranty. As you can tell, I'm still unhappy about it, and haven't ordered from them again.

(I have had success with many other trees, and it wasn't a particularly hard winter.)

I have ordered many items from this compny, incl. grapes, black berries, marrion berries, peach trees, plus ornamentals. I have to say that when they are good they are VERY good, but when I received my first blackberries, one was huge and strong and the two others were tiny and dead, the company replaced them, with MUCH better quality plants. The same exact thing happened with the grape plants I ordered. There customer service was great about sending new products, but I would prefer quality the first time around. This company is not a cheapie garden center, the items are full price, the merchandise should always reflect the price paid. I have stopped ordering from this company after the above purchases.

I've ordered from Raintree Nursery twice, I think, and had no troubles. The fruit trees are doing fine, so far. I did send two email questions to Raintree and was less than satisfied with the responses. In general both emails had to do with blooming dates (plums and quinces). I did not find out what I wanted to know re: plums. I have not gotten an answer to my question about quince blooming dates. I'll try again later, maybe they are busy with spring.

I ordered two blueberries and a book from Raintree. To my astonishment, I received one package (a tall shipping bag) with all three items inside! The smaller (wild lowbush) blueberry did okay, but the taller one (Rubel, northern highbush) was pretty badly bruised - obviously from the book knocking around in the bag. I called Raintree to complained, and told them that I expect it to survive. They said if it didn't I should call back for a replacement.The book was okay, although shipping a book with a bunch of damp plants could have been a problem, too.It's very sad, because the blueberries were large plants and were obviously healthy when packed. The highbush was at least a year older than a comparably priced plant (same cultivar) from Wayside. I think it will live, but it certainly won't do as well as it might have. One odd point is that they shipped a fully sprouted (not dormant) plant in the spring, but they don't grow these themselves (they told me this when I called) so I guess that's how they come in. Their catalog is great, lots of interesting stuff, as well as good selections of ordinary fruit. The information in the catalog, and the planting instructions sent with the plants are good, too. I will probably give them another try.