Before buying from ANY online company, check this website out.

Here is a link that might be useful: Garden Watchdog Website

Lynne, if you call them they will reship via UPS instead of USPS, and there will be a tracking #. If the reshipped plants fail, they will issue a credit. Their policy is reship twice, then credit. hope this helps :)

A friend and I both ordered from Michigan Bulb many years ago, but learned our lesson and would never do so again. My worst gripe against MB is that they never give you the botanical name of anything, and the names they use are often totally unfamiliar. I think they make them up! We both placed good-sized orders and received "free" bulbs of something they called "Starry Twinkles." Turns out it's a horrid weedy little bulb that multiplies way too freely. I'm not saying it's the only reason I moved, but it didn't hurt....

I bought bulbs from them years ago. They bloomed the first year, but never again. Some of them just never even came up. I never ordered from them again.

Brecks.com worked for me. Very good catalog. Get on their list and next yr they will give you a $25 off $50 coupon. Maybe now if you ask them. They extended mine until mon. Last year it was $25 off any order. No minimum. That was quite a deal. I don't blame them for not offering it again.

I have ordered from Michigan Bulb for about 15 years. I am very pleased with them and there products. I have had plants die and there were alwayes replaced or I received a credit. I highly recommend them. Make sure you e-mail (service@michiganbulb.com)and you receive a e-mail within a couple of days.
Thank You

I, too, have ordered from Michigan Bulb for many years and have had good luck most of the time. A few things died or didn't do very well but, they have always been quick to replace things. Several times, they replaced the whole order, not just what I had a problem with. At the time I lived in Phx and may have ordered things that just didn't do well there. I will be sending in another order in the spring next year.

I have ordered from MB for a couple of years.I spent about $500 with them.My plants bloomed for 2 years and never came up again.My black elephant ears only bloomed 1 time,died they replaced them and they died last year.I just don't want anybody eles to lose money with this company!

In looking over your magazine, I would like to know if the 3 in 1 angel trumpet will grow in Iowa? Please get back to me.

They have some good buys--if they lived or even arrived alive. Hope springs eternal and I have orders to be replaced right now & that's entire orders. (from last year)

It's not always what you think it is, either. After 4 attempts at pampas grass (3 white, 3 pink)--that's 24 plants--I have 3 survivors, 2 of which are supposed to be pink & are not. Plus, it is dwarf pampas which is not what the catalogue says or what I want. That's just one example.

Aside from plant replacement, that's it.

we had a bad experience w/ them too. i was a newbie to gardening and thought it was my lack of knowledge that almost everything died. i guess not from the majority of the stories.

I recently placed an order with Michigan Bulb. It's my first time using mail order. I want a trumpet vine and all I could find locally are tropical versions. The standard trumpet vine I want is native to Michigan. The one on MB site looked like the right one, but there was no latin name. I ordered a few iris and some daises because they had a special deal. This was before Memorial Day. I found out today that the order will not ship until fall.

If I had known that when looking at the site I would not have placed the order at all. I will not be ordering my fall bulbs from them.

I finally joined Garden Web because I really liked the the information I've come across while googling and I like the link to Garden Watchdog posted by breezy. I'm not a gardening newbie, but I'm not an expert either. I know mostly how to grow roses. I'm trying to revitalize an old garden that has been let go for at least 6 years.

I just received yet another "delay email" for my order.I think this is ridiculous - we cannot plant bulbs in Northern Colorado in November! I won't be ordering from you again. Your system treats it's customers as if they are idiots who do not know when to plant. I suspect it is more about you holding on to our money longer before you ship. When I order and pay for something I want it sent to me. The last time I ordered from you, you collected my money, waited a few months, then said "oops, can't send that after all" and refunded the money. really....

Michigan Bulb company is a joke they sent me ridiculously small seedlings of everything, A complete rip off. lucky if they will even survive.

Horrible.....Everything is dead or if it is barely alive they dont survive. I ordered several times just in case. Very poor quality stock.

I usually hate the companies that send you stuff and then make you pay for re-shipment of an item. Some are even worse and won't replace unless you notify them within 48 hours.

I have to dis agree with you all. I have bought tree,s shrubs and flowers from Michigan bulb for over 5 years now and my mother in law did before me we have a 5 acre nothing but lawn and shrubs and trees flowers etc planted all through it. I did have a miss hap of them sending me a wrong plant and instead of fighting me on it they gave me the full credit and sent the correct ones, they are all still growing. We have a beautiful yard still every thing is growing.

Michigan Bulb usually ships dormant, bare root plants (and of course, bulbs). I have found that if I soak the plants for a couple of hours before planting, they do very well! I love knowing there is a gardening guarantee, if my plants don't survive, but I have had zero problems! P.S. I am a novice gardener, at best.

We have a new house and garden, and I placed a large order in January 2018. I got 1/2 delivered, and the other 1/2 was sent to me April 5th and returned by the shipping company. I apparently was given a refund for this part of my order but no one ever notified me. In late April and early May I kept calling them about the order, and was told 3 times that it had been shipped out. Finally I had a customer service representative take 1 hour to look this up and let me know about the cancelled order and the refund on April 5th. Now I have NO flowers, and will reach out to other flower websites. No one has called me to apologize, and I feel this is terrible customer service.

Absolutely horrible. Ordered my fall planting bulbs and plants months ahead. Kept getting emails pushing back shipping times. Received order with large part of it now 'unavailable' sold out!. Plants I did receive for $15.99 ea were tiny and not worth it. Never again. Terrible experience.

ATTENTION ALL WHO PURCHASE FROM GARDEN CATALOGS: After having a horrible experience with Michigan Bulb last season (which caused me to loose an entire season of gardening for my new home), I ordered from Spring Hill Nurseries. GUESS WHAT FOLKS? Spring Hill, Breck's, and Michigan Bulb are all part of a company called Garden's Alive. The supervisor was very proud that they have a low quality option (Michigan Bulb) in there umbrella of companies. Proceed with caution.

So where is the best place to order from I’m wanting to order clematis plants

Don't Proceed. Caution isn't enough. They cash in your money right away, take forever to send you the plants even when you keep calling in and most of what they send are either dead or with an expiration date that you better wait for them with shovel in hand.

I ordered 2 Musa Basjoo about 3 months ago; they don't ship until spring, this was fine. I ordered so early for a reason- these were a very important part of the design and harder to get this plant in the busy season. It is now April and I received the order of the wrong plants, still ok...emailed customer service and they sent me another confirmation with tracking # and will send the correct plants. I was happy that it was easily resolved, so I placed another order with them. 3 days later I receive an email that "I" cancelled my order. So now I have to call them to find out what's going on. This company outsources thier customer service that cancelled my order (after) they already gave me a confirmation that they would replace and correct -saying sorry, sorry and more blah blah blah sorries but thats now out of stock. Super annoying to repeat the order number 3 times and explain the issue with them, was transferred to a "supervisor" and again repeated the order number 3 more times, after explain now several times what the problem is; after that (hes filling out some check list) asks me the reason for my cancellation- ugggh, seriously? I dont order from companies that I cant rely on to make things right, its just not worth wasting so much of my time with thier incompetence and lack of commitment. My confirmation of my order and the payment given 3 months ago was a waste. Now its too late to get the most important and expected items that I waited 3 months for, and all I got was some careless response. I don't want to write emails, talk on the phone and make sure I got money back. I want them to do their job. There are plenty of companies that will do what they have to do to honor their commitments, this company is not one of them and I will never order from them again and have cancelled all my outstanding orders. So disappointed to be treated this carelessly

I have exact the same experiences. I just placed an order on 8/29. The first shipment took two weeks to receive, two of them are dead, one still has some green. They won't refund me to my card I used to purchase, instead they refund me a store credit that I still have to buy from them. It's very disappointing.

First order came dead so did the replacement. Just like Sarah no refund just a store credit, which you have to jump through hoops to use. Will never shop there again !!!

Ordered 3 Elephant ears bulbs, planted when suggested, 1 out of 3 bloomed, the other two are dead. Not quality at all. Never Never again will I ever order from this place. I would inform Michigan Bulbs, but they would just give me store credit, not interested in any of their products ever again

Date of experience: April 21, 2023

I've ordered from them for 20 years. Never had a problem. Occasionally, one or two in my order would not thrive, and I requested replacements with absolutely no pushback. Also, some plants come looking "dead". They are simply dormant, and need love and patience. They will grow despite looking like a stick when arriving.