Comments regarding Breck's Bulbs

I started receiving Breck's catalogs about the same time as Michigan Bulb catalogs. Then I realized they were all under the Garden's Alive umbrella. Typically, their prices are much higher than M Bulb, if it's something M Bulb carries. Breck's has a MUCH better selection though. Like MB, Breck's offers sales and all sorts of discounts. I typically only buy during those sales. The sale on daylilies at the end of last season was not to be missed. Plants they were trying to offer for $15-25 were being let go for a tiny fraction of that. In short, I LOADED UP on daylilies. And, to be perfectly honest, their daylilies are the best I've ever received from an online source. I ordered a lot of big beautiful tetraploids and got them in the ground ASAP. They TOOK OFF! In no time (and I hate to say it), they were really embarassing the daylilies I'd bought from Gilbert Wild and Son much earlier in the year. So, buy full price from Breck's? No. Take advantage of their sales? Absolutely.

Posted on October 19, 2017, updated November 16, 2017
Posted on October 13, 2017, updated October 19, 2017
Posted on May 14, 2017, updated October 13, 2017
Posted on June 13, 2015, updated May 14, 2017
I was apprehensive about ordering from a Gardens Alive! affiliate. But the combination of clearance price and additional discount was too much to resist. I ordered a lot of plants.

They were shipped in a reasonable time, not quickly but respectably soon after I placed my order.

The plants I received were a respectable size, healthy, well-packed, well-marked. A very good value, if the actual blooms are true to the cultivars described and pictured online.

No complaints. Everything appears as it should be.

Their products are very undependable in condition. I have received many great items but also dried up items and a root that was completely rotten. The last shipment irritated me. It was a rather large order of fall bulbs that I pre-ordered in May. They had a "sale" of fall planting bulbs and being May I was able to plan to fill spaces with specific colors in specific areas of my gardens.
The shipment came at a good planting fall time but when I opened the boxes I was surprised that three of five of my orders were substituted because they were out of stock. Now how could that be when I ordered in May! Nowhere do they ask you ahead of time May They Substitute. I was furious!

Beware of "free plants" as an enticement. I ordered three types of bulbs on Sept. 11, and 3 weeks later received a shriveled tiny iris as my 'free plant.' Six weeks later I received a box with 2 flashlights (which I didn't order) and no bulbs. When I called Customer Service in India, I was treated politely, but informed that they would refund my money and unfortunately there were no bulbs available for reshipment. Breck's, you have seriously slipped in the customer service area and I will be ordering from American-based companies in the future.

Bought 3 Hibiscus, showed up after first snow fall, not 1 grew.
Complained, had to beg for replacement order, was to be recv'd this month. There's 1 week left & still hasn't ship'd.
Definate waste of time, energy & $$$,
They advertise nice plants,, but haven't seen them yet, wouldn't waste my time again

For now I'm giving Breck a neutral rating, but I'm not happy. I placed an order and received an email telling me the order had shipped approximately a month ago. I have contacted them twice to find out what happened with my order and still have no idea really when to expect the bulbs. I told them I hoped the order wasn't held up in a hot warehouse rotting away somewhere and that I just wanted to know whether it has shipped or not. If not, I would like to know when I might expect it. Purchase at your own risk, but after two companies have not delivered what I paid for I've decided not to order from any company that is not within the top rated companies in the Garden Watchdog or unless I can see the bulbs, hold them in my hand, and physically leave with them from a store.

We moved to Talent three years ago, and the neglected garden needs a LOT of work, and a lot of new plants. I was lured in by one of Breck's frequent "sales." I ordered columbines, daylilies, hardy geraniums, a bottle bush, a canna lily, and some phlox.
I see that others have had the same experience: My order was correctly filled... with dried up, shriveled roots in bags of wood shavings. I soaked everything for 24 hours, and planted all in a newly prepared [critter-proofed!] bed. I want to emphasize that growing conditions are identical for all these plants:
The phlox sent up a few tendrils and promptly expired. Three of the five columbines look like they'll make it. One never sprouted, and one other looks iffy.
Four out of six geraniums sprouted, of which two died within a week. Of the two that are left, one looks healthy, the other not so much.
The daylilies are scrawny, but living, and the bottle bush seems to be happy, as is the canna. It works out that 1/2 of my order died.
I have not taken this up with so-called customer service because I got a huge run-around on another order [ironically not mine!] and won't deal with them again.
This time I wrote snail mail, and asked them to remove my name from their mailing list because I do not wish to do business with them again.
This is especially in regard to their pricing, which seems to me an extroadinarily moving target. I do lots of comparison shopping because we are vets on SS. Using iris as an example, I directly compared their last "as much as 75% off!!" sale with an Oregon-based company which sent me beautiful fans. In every single case, Oregon's REGULAR cost was LESS than the "sale" at Breck's. I prefer to deal with companies who are no so volatile in the $ale front. I would suggest to those whose bulb experience is positive-- shop around a little. You may be surprised at what you find...

Been ordering from Brecks for a while now, and lately have had nothing but problems.

First, ordered a lily collection, planted the bulbs in a new garden, and when they sprouted, one of them was a gladiolus. Of the 5 colors in the collection, I only got two.

Next, ordered a toad lily. Received a bag of dirt with a one inch long root not much thicker than a hair. It never grew.

Finally (one last chance), ordered 5 Odessa Calla (supposed to be black). What I got was mid-range purple (think Prince purple) on all of them.

I'm done ordering from Brecks. Quality control has all but vanished. I'll now only buy plants from my local nurseries.

Worse customer service ever. Placed 2 orders with them in the last 2 months. First order they substituted items. Second order they just sent an e-mail stating item not available and they altered the order and refunded the $ amount for the item. Sent an e-mail back telling them to cancel the total order and refund my money and confirm receipt of the request. No response. Called and talked to someone not in the United States. They hung up on me. Called back and finally got someone who could do something. Cancelled the order - waiting on my refund. DO NOT ORDER FROM THIS COMPANY - you will be totally disappointed.

I ordered the warm Clematis Collection in early spring. After waiting 7 weeks, I called the cs department. I was told the collection was on backorder and would be shipped within 7-10 business days. 3 weeks later, I again contacted customer service, only to be told this time that the order had been sent to shipping and should arrive within 7-10 business days. I waited a full 14 days, contacted customer service yet again, this time by email, and received a response that the order was still backordered but they would refund my shipping charges. I waited another 14 days, and contacted cs again. This time I was told the order had been cancelled. No refund was issued. Don't order from them. Take your business to your local nursery.

Just a quick hello from Calgary to all you wonderful people at Brecks Bulbs.

Just wanted to say Thank you for your great service and awesome plants.

I have ordered irises from you last year, and they are all coming up nicely

The plants I ordered from you just recently were shipped so fast , I hardly finished putting in my order and 3 days later I received them!

I had to spread the word on how wonderful your plants are, as I get so many compliments on my yard, everyone asks where do I buy my unique plants, as they can't find them in the garden centres here in Calgary!

You guys and gals are all Rock Stars!!!

I was searching the web for bearded Iris and an ad showed up for Breakers (a bearded Iris) for $3.74 which is a good price. It also showed a $25.00 coupon for an order over $50.00. I clicked on the ad for $3.74 and added 14 Breakers to my cart. The total for Breakers was 52.36. So far so good. I added the coupon for $25.00 off and the total for Breakers changed to 69.86 or 4.99 for each of the 14 Breakers. It did show the $25.00 off of $69.86.

I started a chat with them and after 15 min. of chat they offered me a $5.00 coupon which I declined as I was being overcharged $17.50 for the product. They told me that they do not allow more than one coupon per order even though I did not use a coupon when I ordered the Iris. I told the person on the chat that I considered this a Scam and would not order from them.

A few years ago, I did order from them and what I received was very small and did not have the increases that US growers send. Half of the plant did grow, but took an extra year to be large enough to flower.

In this case, I thought that the price was low enough to make it possibly worthwhile to live with the small plants.

I have order from Breck a few times and have always been satisfied. I had one occasion when an iris was missed. I called and spoke with customer service and had a new one shipped no problem. I had a few fall planting that didn't come up in the spring, and they either sent me more or refunded the purchase price. That is pretty amazing to have kind of service. Also they have some sneaky great deals.

Posted on January 28, 2007, updated February 9, 2017
Breck's advertises "Direct to You From Holland Since 1818." That is a lie. The current "Breck's" has only been in business for 4 years. I placed a $170 order with Breck's 5 years ago. That Breck's went belly up and I got nothing. Just be aware that this company has no long term history.

My grandmother has used Breck's bulbs in her garden for many years and recommends them, so when a friend wanted garden gifts for her birthday, I ordered her a gift certificate from the website. I ordered many weeks in advance and had it shipped to my house so that I could include it in a package with other gifts and a card. Breck's turned out to be incapable of providing a simple gift certificate, or answering any inquiry about it.

The website promises that certificates will ship immediately, and my confirmation email promised that it would arrive in 10-14 days, which was still plenty of time to include in the gift. At 13 days I checked the order status on the website and the gift certificate had still not shipped. I emailed customer service requesting immediate shipment with expedited mail or an email copy, and 4 days later, I received a form letter indicating that the shipment would happen in another 3-5 business days and take 5-7 business days to ship. With the holidays coming up, this would put the order well past the birthday and perhaps not before Christmas.

I emailed again, asking more urgently for expedited service or at least an email copy I could include in the gift. Receiving no reply, I called customer service two days later. After keeping me on hold for 10 minutes, the rep promised to have the certificate information emailed to me the next day so that I could include it in the gift.

The next day came and went, and the only email I received from Breck's was a marketing promotion advertising that there was still time to order for the holidays. Insulting irony!

I received another form email the following morning, offering me no help or real information and saying that the certificate should ship in time for Christmas. I spent my lunch break calling customer service again, and spent 20 minutes on the phone with a nice man who tried to help me. After putting me on hold numerous times to call various other departments and managers, he managed to find out the status of my order, and admitted that there was nothing he or any person in sales and service could do to help me.

He indicated that they could only generate gift certificates from one paper printing machine that had been broken down for weeks and they were helpless to generate even email copies without it. He said that he would try to get me the certificate before Christmas, but that they were trying to cram in the several weeks of backlog in the next few days as the machine was expected to be fixed. There was nothing else he could do for me.

For a company that advertises so heavily regarding gifts, it is inconceivable to me that they would handicap their ability to generate gift certificates through such an insane process, allowing it to be delayed for weeks just before the holidays. The total inability of four different customer service reps to do anything about it, and the huge delays in getting an honest answer, were awful. Why even bother to have customer service when they can't actually achieve anything, and they don't even answer promptly or honestly?

Please take your money to a better catalog company. I'll go back to buying my family dahlias and gift certificates from a company we can trust.

Beware! It's worth noting that Breck's is listed on BBB under a few company names. I feel like this is probably a company that concentrates more on volume and turnover than customer service or quality, so just keep that in mind when you order and have a back up plan.

This was my first time ordering from an online plant website and I probably won't do it again. I ordered the daylily collection 3 months ago and got a confirmation it shipped, but then never got it. The fedex tracking never left the warehouse. I waited because I thought maybe they were coming from Holland (obviously I don't know much about plants) and their website said they were in the middle of moving and to be patient. Advice: Don't be patient. :) Finally, I emailed...twice. Nothing. I called...the rep had an accent and I couldn't understand her. I'm usually pretty good at listening. I asked to be transferred to a supervisor 3 times. She kept avoiding it, then finally told me the supervisor was not there.

She kept trying to give me the money back (which at least was offered), but I explained I didn't want the money...I wanted the flowers I ordered and was promised. I asked if they could just send any daylilies. I didn't care which ones at that point. Just something to put in the ground for my mother. Nope. Everything was out of stock. "Why?" I asked. "The website still shows they are there." More putting me on hold and this time came back and said supervisor (who mysteriously appeared) said he gave his apologies and they would just issue a refund. I did an online chat just to see if it was someone who could understand and send SOMETHING. But, nope. Same thing. I'm done. Very disappointing experience. Why sell something you don't have? Why not try to substitute SOMETHING...ANYTHING for customers? I may have never received anything if I hadn't kept track and check in.

My mom and I order dahlias from this company nearly every year. Mom also orders many daffodils and other bulbs which have consistently been excellent performers. Dahlia tubers this year from every supplier were of poor quality. The growing season was also stressful to the plants. However, when I sent photos of the dahlias that didn't grow or did not produce the expected plant, we received prompt credit to our account. We did not request a refund since we order regularly for many different varieties. Breck's does a pretty good job overall.

I have ordered peony bulbs from Breck's, Very poor quality small bulbs with no eyes, Planted it and nothing ever came up. So disappointed!

I'm writing this review now since the dahlias I ordered have sprouted from the ground. This was my first experience with Breck's, I purchased the ultimate collection of 20 dahlias on May 7th and they shipped on May 23rd. I received follow-up messages in between those two dates to let me know that my order wasn't forgotten. It arrived three days later on May 26th. Each clump had at least two eyes and they were packaged in plastic bags with air holes.

Overall, I'm satisfied with the quality of my purchase, but if you want your orders to ship promptly then this might not be the place for you. The company doesn't following the shipping dates listed on their website.

just received the plants I ordered from brecks, first time ordering and found some columbine that were not available elsewhere, at the same time I ordered some other columbine from another mail order that I could not find locally. brecks came as bare root, I mean really bare root, a few roots which were moist, and a stem about 1/4" long, also ordered the yarrow on sale, 5 in one plastic bag w/ some peat, moist roots but no stem, no leaves, just roots. could barely find the top of them, all matted together so had to tear them apart. I did plant them so I hope they grow. the other plants I ordered from the other company came as pots and look very healthy. considering the state I received the bare root, it would have been better to have ordered elsewhere. also the daylily tubers are miniscule, smallest I've seen. I usually order daylillys from Oaks but these were on sale and gorgeous colors in the photo. sure hope they grow but w/ that size of tuber I'm not that pleased. i'll report later when they have a chance to grow.

Posted on June 1, 2016, updated June 1, 2016
Ordered 16 different items early in the year to get good deals. They were to ship at proper planting time.

They took payment from credit card in May.

Got a confirmation June 1 that on June 3 they are to ship 4 items (various quantities). The rest (12 different items, various quantities) they WERE going to ship 7/9 - 7/15 ?! I asked, "What the hell am I supposed to do with these in mid-summer!"

While they're cancelling and refunding the rest of my order, I have learned the hard way.

Beware of ordering from Breck's!

I happened onto one of their sale rose collections, came to about $3/rose with the coupon on the site added in, must be one of the best kept secrets around.
Huge healthy grafted bare roots. Planted and leafing out, can't wait to see the blooms. Will definitely order again. Note: their 'collection' sales of various plants have almost a cult following and sell out pretty fast. If all their plants are like the ones I got, it's no wonder.

I would not recommend this company to anyone. I ordered last fall. There were numerous mistakes in the order - shipped to the billing address. Mistakes within the order. They shipped a second order to the correct address. I returned that. They refunded the money for the order to the credit card - but then said I owed money for the order. Customer service was very poor. One person does not know what the next one is doing - they seem to have very poor internal communication. I think there are better places to order from - save yourself months of annoyance.

Great service and easy to work with! Website clearly laid out. Awesome, in fact, the best guarantee policy if anywhere. I will definitely buy more ftom them when I buy bulbs and other plants.

Thank you

I've been gardening for years and have ordered from these companies (Breck's in particular) and have not had the issues mentioned. My bulbs and plants come clearly marks and appropriately packaged. I have found that if you pay close attention to the fact that squirrels enjoy dining on your bulbs you'd understand why some of them don't make it to the next season. Buy more of the same kind to up your chances on them making it and mulch thickly to avoid it. Bait the squirrels with something else like seed during the winter season. I honestly have had no issues with my orders though and their variety and quality has always enhanced my garden.

I got the email for free shipping on all fall planting bulbs for the week of Cyber-Monday from Breck's Bulbs. I chose a few & went through the process through the last step... "$9.95 Shipping." I did that 3 times without submitting the order through. Once I realized it wasn't something I was doing wrong, I opened a chat with Breck's Bulbs representative Stephanie. She reminded me free shipping was only valid on the FALL bulbs & then I gave her the item codes for the items on the FALL bulbs page that I intended to order. She offered me $4.95 shipping & then she realized I was right, all of the items were on the FREE shipping listed page. She offered to process my order for me, but I will not give a credit card number over chat or the phone, I will only use Paypal for these online transactions. She said she wasn't able to do that. She then said she could process the order for me then refund the shipping later. I just said "nope."

When she ended by asking if there was anything more she could do for me, I suggested she get that "FREE shipping on FALL bulbs" code fixed ASAP since it is supposed to be a Cyber-Monday thing & they just emailed it to a bunch of people that will be really annoyed that the "FREE SHIPPING" is really $9.95.

I've ordered from Breck`s many times. The bulbs arrive healthy and usually perform well. The pink snow crocus and Grecian windflowers were the only plants that didn't appear in spring. After losing hundreds of bulbs to ground squirrels I started ordering from Breck's Wholesale and got really nice bubs from them as well. The only downside is that Breck's sends way too many promotional emails (several times a day).

I ordered 25 galanthus bulbs from Breck's at the end of September 2015. The good news is they arrived about a week later. The bad news is that 7 of the 25 bulbs were covered in mold and mildew. I wrote to them and they promptly wrote back that they were sending a new shipment. Which they did. And this shipment was worse than the first one. Many moldy bulbs. I'm not writing them again. I don't want anymore moldy bulbs. the price on these bulbs was much cheaper than I could find in the local nurseries but then you get what you pay for. I will not buy from this company again.

Soooo disappointed! After spending hours online to find just the right bulbs, I placed my order with them in the wee morning hours of 8/30/15. Order was only about $75.00, but thought I was getting a good deal on the 140 bulbs and they were soooo gorgeous! Paid for via Paypal which they promptly took out of my account. Two days later, they finally acknowledged my order. Shipping date of 10/10/15. I'm leaving town for 2 weeks on 10/16/15, but I thought it was doable. The next day, I notice my order has been pushed back to 10/12/15. Okay, I can still fit this in before I leave. But then less than 8 hours later, my order had been pushed back to 10/13/15. Considering I only placed the order a few days ago, and my delivery date has already changed three times, I have no doubt there is NO WAY I would receive my order before I left. And living in Minnesota, we frequently get snow by Halloween, so didn't want to take my chances that would be the last time my delivery date got pushed back. It's only been a few days and they changed it three times. That said, still waiting for my refund. While they responded promptly to cancel my order, a refund to my Paypal account has yet to be issued. I feel so terrible that I won't be getting this beautiful mix of bulbs...especially after all that planning. :( I would never even think of ordering from this company again. Wasted time I did not have to waste.

I ordered about a dozen different tall bearded iris last fall from Breck's. Mistake. They arrived rattling around loose in a cardboard box with several of the varietal tags detached from the leaves, and one tag missing altogether. About half the plants bloomed this year, which is not unexpected. But two of them were NOT varieties I had ordered, and because they weren't tagged and half haven't yet bloomed, I still don't even know what I'm missing.

'Beverly Sills' was a tiny rhizome that produced a tiny (< 12" tall) plant--with, bizarrely, two full-sized blooms. It disappeared during the summer, but has now sent up a small, rather sad new shoot. 'Grand Canyon Sunset'--or, wait! might it have been it 'Wench?'--was also weak and has now rotted. The others produced healthy plants, but what the heck are they?

This year I ordered TBIs from Schreiner's, the iris specialty growers. When they arrived yesterday I learned how mail order irises SHOULD look. The rhizomes were twice the size of any I got from Breck's, plump, full of roots, and with labels securely attached to firm, healthy fans--labels that helpfully included a photo of the bloom and mature height of the plant.

I know who I'm ordering from in the future--and it won't be Breck's.

I am mad. So I am making a review. I ordered 30 sugar baby carpet lily bulbs . They grew beautiful. The second year was even better. Around my original plants were baby bulbs. Some of these babies did flower last year. My neighbor says my yard looks like better homes and gardens. My mother used brecks when she planted daffodils 20? Or more years ago. They grew and bloomed every year until she died. Thats the last time I visited the house.the only thing I ordered from brecks that did not grow was some babys breath. The roots were huge and healthy. I don't know why they didn't come up. But brecks promptly took my word for it and took the money off of my account. Because my mom trusted brecks for her buisness . I bought from brecks as an adult. And I am well pleased

I ordered from Breck's for my first and last time in the Summer of 2014. Not happy at all. The columbine, bleeding heart and other plants basically came as dry roots in a plastic bag with wood shavings. I planted them up in pot to keep an eye on them and get them going, and later into the garden. But they remained weak. I will be very surprised if they survive the winter. Very disappointed.

I have ordered 3 times from Breck's. The bulbs have always been good quality. Note that their pictures have inaccurate colors, i.e. the reds and pinks are exaggerated, they are not the only company to do this. I would order bulbs again.

I have ordered plants from here. The plants were dormant, and I had mixed success. I would not order plants again.

Just received my third order of plants from Breck's. Since Fall 2013 I have ordered the Reblooming Bearded Iris collection, Batik Bearded Iris Collection, Dwarf Aster collection, and Little Business dwarf daylily.
I must say that I was impressed with the quality of the plants so far, expecially the daylilly. The crowns had large, healthy roots and strong buds when they arrived today, October 2, 2014.
The asters (shipped in Spring 2014) were bags of tangled roots, but they were lableld with the cultivar names and colors (not listed in the orginal catalog description). But once planted up into pots to get them started, they all came on very strong.
The catalog descriptions and marketing materials are way too over enthusiastic. Try not to get suckered in by some of their claims but if you know plants, you can spot some great bargains.

This was my first and last order using Breck's as there was one problem after another . . . . and the bulbs haven't even arrived yet. There was a difference between catalog price and web site price - even using their "code" to get the catalog price. When I called customer service about this, the person insisted I make an entire new order, in order to get the catalog price; when I did not get a confirmation email, I called again= to learn there was no new order so my items hadn't been ordered. Since I had given my credit card authorization for the new "order", my bank account was compromised and I had to cancel/order a new card. . . and then contact all the other vendors with the new, correct payment information. Original delivery was scheduled for Oct 24-30, so I arranged to hire a planter-person for then (I'm disabled and can't plant my own plants). Breck's arbitrarily changed the delivery date for a month earlier, but after almost two weeks of emailing back and forth with customer service (even explaining why the change was unacceptable), they finally agreed to deliver a SECOND shipment of the same items Oct 20-27.
I wish I had found DG before I ordered from this company. After reading others' experiences with Breck's, I'm concerned about MORE problems and the viability of the bulbs I ordered.

Pricing is confusing... Catalog varies vs. website. Website offers a deal through an email, which somehow increases the price when the code is used? Deceptive pricing.

I'm very disappointed with my most recent Breck's orders (spanning a year and a half). Only 1 of the 3 Switzerland Begonia tubers I received showed signs of life on arrival. As expected, only that one grew into a lovely plant (despite being planted in identical conditions). However, it was clearly NOT a Switzerland Begonia. The Blue Hill Salvia also appeared lifeless upon arrival, and none of them produced even a hint of a plant. The Hosta "Mixture" Super Sak contained 10 plants of the identical shade of light green--nothing even close to resembling the catalog image of great variety in color and size. Despite receiving the wrong daffodils in my previous order, I ordered from them again. That was obviously a mistake. Complaint submissions to Breck's were ignored. I have been ordering from this company for a number of years, trying to beautify our homes in military housing as we moved from state-to-state. I refuse to continue to be loyal to a company that doesn't value or respect its customers.

This is a company to avoid. I ordered a Louis Cotton cannas
which are hard to find but they had them in their catalog pictured with dark bronze leaves, apricot flowers and a dwarf size. They arrived well into the spring after I called to see where they were..."direct from Holland,'' they said. I got 4 dead bulbs in the mix. But what grew was anything but advertised. Tall, lanky plants, leaves were more green than bronze, flowers are washed out yellow. NOTHING like the right thing which I have grown in the past. I have been growing all sorts of cannas for 35 years so when I called customer service, they told me that they obviously sent you the wrong variety. They offer three varieties, all completely different so this is bs. My guess is that they're getting their bulbs from a giant supplier and quality control is not at the top of their list. They were pleasant and gave me a refund but what will I get next year? Not going to devote much space to their bulbs until I see the results. Hey Breck's...alot of negative comments. You need to do something about that.

While the plants they ship may be of fair to good quality, the first shipment I ordered was satisfactory, but arrived six weeks later. I'm still waiting on the second shipment TWO MONTHS after I ordered them 4/27/14.

Be aware that your shipping date(s) will be questionable, and could be cancelled without notice, supposedly since they are shipped from Holland. If you can wait, or if you order well in advance of the planting season, you might be satisfied.

DO NOT order when planting season arrives if you want to plant them in time for the growing season. I will not order from them again.