Jo - I tend to get my order shipped to me from Naylor Creek in the middle of March and I have been successful potting them up when they arrive, keeping inside and hardening them off outside when the weather gets warmer. I have also done mail order within Ontario...most recently at the beginning of July from Budd Gardens. The plants arrived within 2 business days using regular Canada Post mail. The plants always arrive in great condition if packaged properly. Michelle - yes, if you place an order you would have to pay for the phytosanitary certificate unless you have friends that would join in on your order...in which case you can split the phyto and shipping costs with them. It's cost effective for larger orders and collector's looking for rare plants. If you are only getting a few plants then it's not financially worthwhile unless you are getting rare hostas on your wish list that you can't get anywhere else. Vanessa

Actually, the warranty doesn't carry over specifically to be a disincentive to have you country hopping for your purchases. Aliris's example is the unfortunate consequence of when people move across borders and lose their warranty coverage, but a warranty isn't a right, either. It's an incentive for the shopper to buy. The company says, look, you're not taking such a big risk with us. We'll warrant the product for a year (or however much) so that you'll be sure that we'll take care of any faults. A warranty is just a little piece of paper. Much easier than manufacturing and testing in a way that people have that much confidence to buy your product that they know there won't be a problem. Warranties are also used as pricing tools. When Gaggenau had the big sucky price increase they also increased their warranty to five years. Gaggenau products aren't without fault, but pert near. People have never had a lack of confidence in the brand. Still, when you raise the prices 38% (part for the rise in price of steel, part for the stress of the difference between the dollar and euro at the time, part to cement their position as a luxury brand), you have to do something to keep the people coming. Saying, "Remember us? The uberreliability people?" is pointless. Quintupling the warranty says, you're giving us more money, but we have your back. Similarly, on the low end, companies use warranties to salve their reputations. When new Korean makers of low price little cars entered the U.S. market, they slapped really long warranties on them as an incentive to buy. You don't know us and you think we're junk but we'll keep that junk going for a long time. When foreign cars were beating American cars for reliability, the American companies slapped bigger, better, longer warranties on them to say, the press may have you believe you'll be spending more on repairs, but we'll cover it, so really we have a better price. So. What's the deal with portability? Pricing is set by how many units they think they can sell to optimize their profits. If selling more units means that the cost per unit rises and eats into the total profits, they won't expand their production. If selling fewer units means they're under utilizing their resources and undercutting their profits, they'll make more. They use these optimal production ideas, and pricing information from the various places they sell their goods, to figure out how many to sell in each place at each price. Again, to optimize profits. Canada has about a tenth of the population as the U.S.A. Most of the population is fairly near the border, however, as opposed to up in the arctic region. We're not talking about the pricing in Yellowknife. It seems logical that Vancouver or Toronto should be the same as Seattle or Detroit. But much as it sometimes seems like there isn't a difference, Canada does have different laws and regulations, different distribution systems, tax structures, etc. The manufacturers set up their systems for each country. They might even have the same rep serving the entire NW, including both Seattle and Vancouver, but they have different structures and goals for each. Neither Canada nor the U.S.A. object to you taking appliances across the border, so the manufacturers have to do whatever they can to support their optimal pricing structure in the two different places. They do this to support the dealers, who don't want you flocking across the borders instead of buying from the local guys like them. One disincentive that costs the makers absolutely nothing, and, in fact, actually gains them a bit in missed warranty calls, is denying coverage if you go outside of your local market to buy their stuff. But really...how many of you have warranty work done? I did have a service call on my gas cooktop in the first few months, but it was an installation issue. Wolf wanted to have it checked out anyway, but they could have told me the likely culprit over the phone, and I would have had the electrician fix it without having the service call, if there was no warranty. I know we hear a lot about warranty work about this and that appliance here, but that's because of the nature of a forum. When things don't work, people talk about them. The very least regard I put into whether to import my induction cooktop from Europe was the lack of warranty. I talked to Gaggenau service, here, to make sure they could fix it, since I didn't want an orphan, like some of the folks who bought Fagor or DeDietrich from out of the country had before induction was plentiful here. As long as there was someone who could fix what might go wrong, I wasn't hung up on who would pay for it, figuring it would be out of the warranty period by then anyway.

I actually considered this. So I think it's an interesting idea. Intellectually. I don't know where you live, but maybe Eurostoves, outside Boston, can offer some advice. They would know about differences in current, getting service, maybe insurance, maybe other lines. They might even be able to special order something, or tell you where to find it. Or tell you their thoughts on how to go about what you're going to do. Also, have you considered what's available in Canada? I could never get my head around how a device made for another electrical current could really be safe here. But that's me. Some people are terrified of canaries ... Or spoons. When I looked into having literally anything brought over, no matter what it was, a sink, an appliance, whatever, the cost of the object locally, plus shipping, added up to approximately the cost of an equivalent "eurostyle" object in the US - translation -- we're already paying for the shipping, we might as well get what we REALLY want. Plus -- and here is where I get truly evil -- the biggest hit in shipping is the first hundred pounds or so. After that it gets much cheaper. So while you're getting that shipped, if there's anything else you've been dreaming of getting shipped, like some nice tile, or a schranke or something cool, you might as well. In fact, (and I am honestly a fairly cheap person) you might be wise to get a cheap winter plane ticket, do the deal in person, see to the shipping on that end and make sure you get the appliance you need and you get your questions answered. And a little winter holiday! Good luck!

Thanks... Yes, I think Modernaire is USA made. I live nearby to Eurostoves and am a frequent visitor to their store (they sell homemade granola that is amazing along with lots of cool gadgets). Trevor has recently become a distributor for Modernaire and I like to support local businesses so I will likely go this route (rather than Rangecraft - yes, I had one of those in the last house and it was spendy and nice). Another reason I am thinking Modernaire, is that right after I put the Rangecraft in I saw Marthavila's "ladies in red" and sort of flipped for that look. (at least I think it was marthavila... this goes back a ways in time). Breezy, also at eurostoves, Trevor cooked me up a nice steak lunch on the CC and that was sort of what sold me on it although I am still unsure about the open burners. I know they are meant to be higher performance but in the brief research I did, I was reading about all sorts of care you have to take when cleaning and I got a little scared off. Would probably be difficult for me to not go for the CC at this point given the amazing things I have heard about it and seeing it in action myself, BUT I do admit to being unsure of the open burners.