No, Nick, sadly not all people check what things are worth before bidding. I had lost a particular Encyclia species a few years ago and was looking for another to replace it. Not overly rare or anything, but not always easy to find. The dealer/seller put one up on eBay for $15, a very nice plant, which was what they sold it for at their orchid website. So I bid $15, it wasn't important where I bought it from them. Next thing you know, the bids are flying in. Once it went over $17, I went to the website and bought one that same day for the $15. The frenzy continued and the eBay plant ended up selling for -- I think it was about $60 or more. If my memory is correct, a second one they posted up afterward also sold for big bucks. A lesson I learned long ago: always check the price and availability at online websites before bidding on anything, even a toaster.

There are a lot of incorrect statements and claims about the Royalorchidclub made in this thread. A one sided story is never a good source of information to make good judgments on. Here are some facts: Royalorchidclub is an American corporation run by American people with farms located in South East Asia. The company had growing Facilities in Florida but suffered damages in Hurricane Katrina and could not recover. Now the company only maintains a packing house to transship its plants from place to place including retail consumers in the US market. The website has the story for those who are interested. I am not saying we are perfect, and I am sure we have upset customers from time to time. I find that some people have a different expectation than we are prepared to fulfill and there is nothing we can do about it. But if you are fair to us we will be fair to you. We have great Customer Service headed by Miriam, my wonderful wife. If you are not happy about something and if we are in the wrong you can bet it will be fixed. No, we cant control the USPS or how they handle packages, but we are probably the biggest complainers in Florida and have made great progress in working with the USPS to improve package deliveries. That being said, if you send us instructions to ship your plants into a winter storm and the package is delivered to a porch or mail box and/or is left outside over night, how can you expect us to be responsible for that and send you replacements for free? Make sure you have your plants always shipped to a safe location that is not exposed to extreme weather conditions. If we ship the wrong item to you we replace it easily. This does not happen very often. If your plant arrives damaged and you send us digital photos we replace it free of charge. If you can't figure out how to grow it properly and it dies we will not replace it or refund you. OK, on Spikes or Bids, 90% of them will survive and product flowers for you. These plants are normally flowering or blooming sized plants (aka BS or FS). Spikes and Buds are fragile and can easily blast or abort. That is not a reflection on plant quality and it is not something anyone can guarantee any more than the weather. Normally if a bud or spike aborts, the plant will spike or bud again within a few months time depending on the variety. Offspring Hybrid plants from the same parentage do not have the same flowers all the time. They can vary greatly between colors and sometimes shapes. Clone plants (meristem or mericlone) will be 99.7% alike. You can expect these plants to produce the same flowers. On plant sizes, we have several. Flowering, Blooming, Near Blooming, Medium, Small (Plant-S), Compots and Flasks. There is a detailed plant size chart available on all our websites and online sales channels available. No we do not sell blooming sized plants for $4.00, those are small sized plants and you should pay attention to the plant size details in the plant information provided prior to purchase. If you order a small plant we will ship a small plant. Yes, we do have several eBay id's. We have had them for many years and it is not secrete or conspiracy. One id is the account for RoyalOrchidClub on eBay and we sell bare root plants. the other we sell potted orchid plants from time to time which are shipped from a different location. No we do not have retail outlets in the US, but will be opening facilities in Florida and Hawaii in the summer of 2010. We hope to expand as the economy allows in the next few years to most of the major cities in the US. If you want to buy bare root plants you need to make sure you are prepared to care and manage them when they arrive. Beginners should take the time to read the information provided by the grower before you purchase to insure you can properly take care of the plants when they arrive. Most of the plants we sell are hearty and easy to take care of as long as you do it properly. Intermediate and advanced orchid lovers will know what and how to take care of the plants and have finely tuned growing space to handle plants and are rewarded with low cost plants and beautiful flowers. This is a business that I love and it is something I do because it brings pleasure to people. I hope that you enjoy your orchid experience both with our company and other great growers. Each grower is unique with different focus and inventory. Find what you like and enjoy!

I have bought from 4 ebay sellers including philinshelton, bamboobuddy , booo4U and they all promised to me they will be shipping my boo with the soil or at least some soil included. Philinshelton was the only one that came through as promised with no BS. He started shipping with 6x6" boxes to ship the entire one gallon of soil instead of the way it was done before where it was wrapped in a ball of wet newspaper. His plants are priced better than other sellers and very strong. what else is there.oh ya they came two days after I paid him.

I heard from the buyer this morning. He wrote a very nice note, sounding very much like an American. He told me he has bought several cargo covers like mine (for his club, he said), and gave me the name of the seller. He said this guy charges only $18 to ship to Japan. I checked it out, and the seller does this commercially, with a feedback rating of over 20,000. He participates in eBay's Global Shipping program, which I do not, and he sells the covers as Buy It Now for $129.99, with free shipping to the US. So clearly he expects to absorb some of the shipping, which I did not. Blame it on my back pain, but I have no desire to try to come up with a solution that will satisfy both the buyer and myself. In fact, I don't think such a solution exists. The difference between $18 and $318 is just too vast.