Guarantee

Orders to the USA are guaranteed to arrive in good condition.  International orders are not guaranteed to arrive, as is covered in more detail on our shipping restrictions page.  This page lays out the minimums that I guarantee, but if you are unhappy for a reason that falls outside these minimums, don’t hesitate to contact me.

Arrival

I guarantee that orders to destinations in the USA will arrive.  If your order has tracking, I will replace or refund any order where the tracking does not indicate delivery to your address within a month of the shipping date.  If the tracking indicates that the order was delivered and the address is correct, but you didn’t receive it, I will be sympathetic, but I won’t replace or refund.  If your order does not have tracking, which is normal for small seed orders, I will replace or refund any order that hasn’t arrived by one month from the shipping date.

Condition

Roots, Tubers, and Other Vegetative Material

Propagules in this category are guaranteed to sprout, so long as you store them appropriately after receiving them.  If you receive propagules in damaged/decayed condition, I will replace them.  If you store them according to our instructions and they die before you can start them, I will replace them.

Appearance

The roots/tubers that you receive may not look beautiful.  They have typically been stored through the winter and some species store better than others.  Also, our tubers are washed in a bleach solution, which tends to cause some browning on tubers that are more sensitive to it.  You may find the occasional tuber with wireworm holes or a bite taken out of them by a digging fork.  In some species, the stolon end of the tuber tends to rot in storage and so may have been cut off.  In general, as long as the propagule is firm and not moldy, it is fine for planting.  I touch literally every tuber that goes in a packet.  Some species that have less dormancy are likely to sprout in transit.  There is nothing I can do about that.  Be ready to pot your tubers if is too early to plant them out.  In most cases, even sprouted tubers can still be kept for a month or two in the refrigerator.

Seeds (Other than Those Designated as ‘Breeding Seeds’)

Seeds of phenotypically uniform varieties (typically plants that grow true from seed) are guaranteed to germinate at the percentage stated on the packet under our recommended conditions.  This includes any seeds that are not specifically noted to be breeding seeds.  Please note that most of the seeds that I offer are breeding seeds.

Breeding Seeds

The seeds that I designate as breeding stock are generally collected from plants that do not grow true from seed.  They may have low viability and may be difficult to start.  Some of the seeds that I offer in this category have such poor viability that buying a packet is much like buying a lottery ticket.  You may be gambling on getting a single seedling.  Some (like potatoes) normally have good germination, but require experience or close attention to detail to obtain good results.  All seeds in this category are marked with a yellow warning message and either the product description or the growing guide for the species will go into details about what you can expect when trying to start the seeds.

Breeding seeds are not guaranteed to germinate at any percentage and I won’t refund you even if you get nothing.  These seeds often require a lot of my time to produce or can only be collected in small amounts, so they are expensive.  In some cases, I am the only person in the world who produces these seeds for sale.  I recognize that expensive seeds that are not guaranteed may be a tough pill to swallow and that is why I provide as much information as I can about what you should expect.  I don’t make a lot of money on most of these species and I am ultimately faced with the decision to either guarantee them and raise the price to cover refunds or to keep the price lower, but put all of the risk on you.  The latter has proven to be the better policy, because it discourages people who are uncertain from buying.  I would rather that you place a small order and really focus on getting good germination than place a large order and get in over your head trying to start too many difficult seeds.

It is worth pointing out that, while I do not perform germination tests on breeding seeds, I grow everything that I sell, so I know if a seed lot is a dud.  I never sell seeds that don’t germinate for me.  They may not germinate at a high percentage, but they are always viable.

If I have failed to live up to any of these, contact email help@cultivariable.com for refund or replacement.