Comments regarding D. Landreth Seed Co.

I ordered two packages each of Aquadulce Fava Beans and Fordhook #242 Lima Beans from Landreth in February. According to the catalogue, the Lima packets were to contain "about" 20 seeds while the Fava packets were to contain "about" 25. The two packages of each type, however, only planted one single row of about 15' in length per variety, because there were no more than about 25 to 29 seeds total in both packages of each. Furthermore, although the Lima Beans germinated well the Favas didn't, and I only ended up with about ten viable plants. I sent them a message about this from the contact section of their website, and never got a response. I don't plan to order from them again.

I wanted to buy four packets of heirloom veggie seeds from this company. I was online and went to check out. A variety of shipping options was offered. The cheapest one was $6.50. Or I could pay as much as $74 to ship overnight (4 packs of seeds from PA to NY). I decided not to buy the seeds, because from what I could see, this company is centering its profit-making in shipping, which irks me no end. I sent them an email about it, adding that if they were wondering why so many potential customers did not go through with purchasing, they should look to their shipping prices. I went and bought the seeds from another company that charged me $3.00 for shipping them.

I got a phone call this morning from their customer service. It was explained to me that I did not understand how internet shopping works, that these prices are set by "modules." This right away ticked me off, because I DO understand how internet shopping works--I have had an online shop for eight years, I set up the cart myself, I have complete control over the shipping prices displayed, and no, my cart is not a fancy, custom job by any means. After some back and forth, I was told that if I had gone through with the purchase, I would have received a call the following day asking if I would like to get the seeds shipped by first-class mail for $2.00. Now, maybe this is true. But I went back and looked everywhere on their site and could not find anywhere that mentioned that if I paid $6.50 for shipping four packs of seeds, someone would call me the next day and knock it down to $2.00; in fact, I couldn't find anything on their site about shipping at all. Heck, even if I went with priority mail shipping, it should not cost $6.50 for 4 packs of seeds.

If this company's real problem with shipping prices is that they are hostage to the limitations of their cart (which is a very common, well-supported one, so there's no excuse for that), then they need to get themselves a new webmaster. Otherwise, it just sounds like a bunch of baloney.

Altho their prices are very good; I would not buy from Landreth Seed Company again. I would recommend that others stay away from them.

I sent a $25 order for seeds in by internet about 2 weeks ago. Postage was $9.50. Shipment of my order to me was very prompt.

However, when I received the order, things were not rite:

[1] I ordered 1 Lb. of STOWELL'S EVERGREEN CORN, open pollinated type, and they sent me instead HYBRID Stowell's corn. Which I do not need, or want.
[2] I ordered 1 Lb.open pollinated GOLDEN BANTAM CORN, which I did get in the order; but it had WEAVAL INSECTS inside of the sealed plastic bag it was in. I saw 12 to 15 little black weavels crawling insed the clear plastic bag, [hermetically sealed bag]
[3] I ordered 1 packet of open pollinated CHRISTMAS LIMA BEANS, and was expecting to see at least 25 to 30 bean count, but the package only had 12 beans in it. Besides the low count of seeds, the seeds looked very very small for Christmas Lima bean seeds. They must be someone's "culls", or "grade C" seeds.
[4] a packet of blue hubbard squash seeds had 21 seeds in it. Much better count than the bean seeds packet, but still too low.
[No seed counts for packets was stated on the website, .... and now I see why]

Now I am worried about the quality of the other seeds I ordered, whether they will come up, and whether they are actually what they were sold as.

I sent them 2 separate emails about the order, and got no response. Not even a acknowledgement that they got the emails. [ I did not call them on the phone; because I ordered the seed over the internet, and figure that if they got my money that way , they can respond to questions that way. ]