Comments regarding Florida Colors Nursery

If you are in the market for a plumeria plant avoid this seller at all cost. They have a wonderful website with beautiful pictures of all types of plumerias for sale. They even brag about their excellent customer service which I have found to be horrible. Here is why I make that statement. I purchased a grafted Donna S plumeria from Florida Color Nursery (FCN) in 2015. It grew but never bloomed so in 2020 I purchased another Donna S plumeria from FCN (rooted but not grafted) and this plumeria bloomed in 2022 and again in 2023. The grafted Donna S also bloomed this year, however it is NOT Donna S. I always like to give people a chance to explain because mistakes do happen. I sent an email and received no response after waiting well over a week. I then tried calling and I get no answer. Do yourself a favor and avoid FCN. No sense in paying good money for a plumeria only to discover it’s not what you purchased and you have no recourse.

Please note: FCN has not responded to any of the negative feedback left on this site. However, on other sites that offer reviews FCN is the best thing since squeeze bottle ketchup! Sounds bogus to me!

Posted on June 17, 2010, updated June 28, 2010
Posted on June 17, 2010, updated June 17, 2010
I had my worst experience in over 30 years of gardening with these people recently. Everything started ok, I placed an order and paid. Then, a week later, I'm wondering where my order is. It finally arrived the next day and I start to go through it. The packing list shows (4) Plumeria, which is what I purchased, but only (3) are in the box. No note or mention is made of the missing cutting. Upon further inspection, it reveals one cutting has a tag with 2 different registered names on the same cutting. It says Leela AKA. Rainbow Starburst. I knew these two names referred to two different cuttings, but I even checked it with the National Plumeria Society Registry to be sure. Sure enough! So, I'm wondering what happened that cuttings are missing, one is mislabeled and no mention is given? Wouldn't they think someone would question this? So, I contact them in email and get no response for 48 hours so I call them. Carol answers and says she read the email and she offers to let me keep the cutting and she will refund it to my card. She will also immediately send the missing Duke cutting. Great! 7 days, 8 days, 9 days go by, no cutting and no refund. I contact them again by email to ask about this. I received a short and informative response. Then, the cutting arrives and it is grafted. I question this and asked why it was not rooted. I then realize it is a different Florida Plumeria company that I was dealing with that offers rooted cuttings and I immediately reply with an apology and ask them to forgive the mistake. Following this, I received the following response from Luc...

Sir

Please do me the favor to refuse the parcel coming your way. We cannot satisfy your total ignorance of horticultural principles. A full refund will be done upon receiving the returned parcel.

We rather loose as a customer and not receive any more of your ignoramus statements. Carol is pretty upset and she will not answer any of your phone calls in the future.

Luc Vannoorbeeck. Owner.
Florida Colors Nursery.

Needless to say, I am a bit flabbergasted at this bold and uncaring statement. So, I am sending the cuttings back and scratching my head as to what I did to initiate this type of childish response from someone? I think to myself, the entire world is like this now, maybe Luc is a young kid with a poor upbringing? But what's Carol's story? I upset her by asking about getting what I ordered? They are the ones that screwed this up since the beginning, not me.

Either way, I don't recommend doing business with these people. They seem to operate in a world of their own and are not organized enough to know what is going out. They don't keep things clearly labeled, as you can see from my experience and other negative complaints here about cuttings not blooming true to their label, things are missing from orders that they don't even have a clue about and they certainly don't know what the term "customer service" means. Then, they will blame YOU for their problems and verbally and personally attack you. Imagine that? Out of all this, I was the only one to apologize and I receive the above response? Go "F" yourself, Luc!

In 2004 I emailed and requested availability for over 30 cultivars of plumeria graftings that I wished to purchase for a garden design. They ignored this and two subsequent email requests for information and stock availability. I simply moseyed on down the road.

Cautiously take note that as of this writing, their order form requesting personal credit card information is not a secure site.

After reviewing the other comments about this nursery, (are you folks in some sort of club or something). I can only say that I had a very similar experience to Glenda. I do not know how the term "professionals" can be thrown around so easily. It is in all facets of life so I guess it would be here too.

My experience with grafted plumerias from this nursery has not been all that hot. A couple of of the grafts have broken, and a couple that bloomed were the incorrect flower. I was told the flower was to be a Moragne #23 and when it finally bloomed it was a White Shell. It had a metal tag saying Moragne 23 so that is what I thought I was getting. My supposed Duke turned out to be something I cannot even recognize. I was in South Florida summer before last and went in and I did not see anything I would use the word professsional to describe. I tried them once but I will not again. Sorry to disagree but I can only share my own experience. I do not mean to be impolite, but that was my experience which is what I think this site is for.

Carol

It just goes to show that you can't always believe what you read on these sites. This past summer and early fall some plants that I had ordered from this company finally bloomed after more than two years. Out of the six I ordered four bloomed, but they were not the flower they were supposed to be. I now have lost two years of time to find out they did not know the difference. They were not even close. I was very disappointed when I opened the package upon receiving the order. They all had puny looking tips which I guess were grafted on tips of other plumeria or possibly seedlings. I paid for what I thought were particular varieties only to get shrivelled up plants with ugly scars. If I pay for something I want the whole thing I paid for, not simply six inch slivers.I guess you get what you pay for. Needless to say I will never order from this company again.