I haven't been here on GW forever ... saw this and thought that my perspective may be of interest, since I ran my own boutique rose/OGR nursery for five years. I started growing roses years ago, when introduced to OGRs by a friend. Quickly found that the ones I were most attracted to were ones that were not available on site anywhere in our area except at one small nursery, Sherando Roses, about 2 hours from here ... shopped there at least twice a year and my love of roses was fueled by my conversations with Randy, the owner. He was generous with his experience and I valued his opinions, which helped shape my gardens in those early years. When Randy retired and Sherando closed, friends and I were lamenting the loss of the one place where we could gather to enjoy, discuss, and buy our roses. (We were ordering online from the nurseries we all know, but nothing compared to the experience of getting our roses in person.) It was then that I decided to turn my garden and my love of OGRs into a nursery, to try to pass along and nurture the fire that Randy lit in me and in so many others. The reality of the rose business hit me pretty hard shortly after I opened. To put it bluntly, the average gardener does not want an old garden rose, especially one that gets big (and many people think that 'big' is anything over 4' tall), blooms only once per season (see ya, all those beautiful Gallicas, Ramblers, Albas, and so many others that are gorgeous in my hot, humid central Virginia garden) When the roses in the garden were in bloom, it was easier to introduce customers to ones that they were unfamiliar and convince them to try something that they had never heard of before. I fondly remember the year that I sold out of 'The Bishop', a wonderful Hybrid China, in one day because it was blooming and the color and fragrance and form are superb. All of the people who bought it that day left here with a new appreciation for a once-blooming rose. This is not what usually happens. For the most part, I had lots of people coming to look for New Dawn, Buff Beauty, various exhibition-style Hybrid Tea roses that I don't grow, anything by David Austin (because they knew that he produced the English roses), and anything orange, red, or yellow. When I opened my 'doors' that first year, I had what most of us here would consider a balanced assortment of a variety of good roses from most of the OGR classes. The popular ones that people had heard of sold quickly, the unfamiliar ones languished. (By popular, I mean roses with familiar names ... not necessarily roses that people knew in person.) During the years that followed, I propagated fewer roses that I knew would be challenging to sell that season, in favor of having more stock of the popular ones on hand. I convinced myself that I could do this (in conflict with my original mission to preserve and to distribute rare and worthy roses), because the meager $$ from the sale of the popular ones allowed me to buy more rare roses to add to my own gardens. This small positive aspect of the way my business was growing wasn't enough in the long run to keep me going. In 2012, I closed the retail portion of my nursery, and donated the remaining 80 roses in inventory to Stephen Scanniello's projects in NY. Stephen's Subaru that day was full of wonderful roses that most of us here know and love. I was happy to see them go to such a worthy project, but sad that I had failed to convince the public that old roses were something that they should get to know better. A general retail nursery, whether it is a brick-and-mortar store in your examples or a mail-order business, has to cater to its customers in order to survive. The average nursery customer does not go there to buy roses, and the average nursery owner/employee does not know how to choose or care for roses. (Speaking of care, there are many different levels of care that gardeners are willing to subscribe to in their rose gardens. Me? I have no problem spraying fungicide on my rare blackspot-prone roses that need it. That's what it takes to grow these here, and I know this and accept it. Other roses, like my ramblers, teas, most of the Chinas and Polyanthas, don't need fungicide and they don't get it. No type of Insecticide is used in my gardens.) This is a long-winded way to say that it is best to put ourselves in someone else's place before we criticize. Roses are a tough item to sell in the best of times at most nurseries ... even nurseries that specialize in them have a difficult time developing their customer base and logging enough sales to keep afloat. I hope I haven't offended anyone. Connie

I'm in agreement with much of the above. And will add that many responders on the forums state what works for them as universal truth for all gardeners. Micro-climates and soil conditions are just two of the many variables. To my mind, I've found buying plant material recommended for my zone 4 (and I'm finding more and more plants that have been bred and grown in my zone and not trucked in from California and Florida, etc. which also attests to their probability of surviving my gardens and all their micro-climates) has proven much more successful than trying to get a zone 5 plant to thrive even with much special attention. To be honest, trial and error in your own garden is a better guage then even asking other local gardeners. And it's simply because their conditions aren't exactly the same as yours. Having someone say "If I can grow it, anybody can" couldn't be farther from the truth... which is why I've totally given up on coreopsis, Monarda, Becky shasta daisies, Dutch Iris, and the new and improved heuchera varieties. I've had the old heucheras since they were simply called Coral Bells and they perform like troopers, but the new varieties just won't survive for me. I could zone push and put in a much lusted after Japanese Maple - but my gardening sense tells me not to set myself up for disappointment. Yes, the zone hardiness maps are only guidelines, and they don't tell you the whole story. I've been gardening for many years and trial and error (even for what is rated as zone appropriate) is still a real good teaching tool.

I don't have any advice, but just wanted to say, I feel your pain! I can totally relate to what you are saying. We have a very hard time throwing things out too. And not because we pat ourselves on the back either, it is because we just can't! Sometimes I am jealous of those that can. I don't mean something like hoarding...I mean changing something out because we are tired of the old. We have two behemoth tube-style televisions. We do not watch much tv so we will never wear these stupid things out. One of them my DH won in a raffle with a $3 ticket before we were married. They are so annoying, but I just can not, even with great sales and deals, go buy a new one just because I don't like the old ones. None of our furniture (which most of it is previously used) "matches" but apparently it is going to last forever, so I will forever have mismatching furniture. That is the kind of stuff I can't get rid of. I try not to bring too much other clutter into the house, knowing I have a hard time throwing things in the garbage. I even cringe when I have to throw broken toys away, not because I think they aren't garbage, I just think of the space in the landfill a worthless broken toy is going to take and it seems so wasteful. Over the years we have really become way more selective in what the kids can bring into the house too, because of my dislike for things that break easily and have to be thrown out. Dedtired, where do you get stuff that you can put in paint cans to dry them up? Now THOSE I would love to get rid of!

Madilee, I ordered from Chewy last week because we were running low on cat litter, and I also ordered enough to qualify for the 2 day shipping. Well, it's been almost a week and I still haven't gotten confirmation that it's being shipped. I tried to get it from Walmert-but they were out at my local store. Thought I'd try Amazon, but the only litter they had that my cats will use was not only more expensive than in the stores, but it also was about 10 days out. I had also ordered some canned cat food-they kind my cats prefer was out, so I had to get a 3rd choice. I ordered some baking soda for the cat boxes-since we can't empty them, just clean them out until we get more litter, and a case of strawberry jam, because I didn't feel like going to the grocery store. The canned food came within a day, the baking soda two days later-still no idea when the jam will arrive. Meanwhile hubby has PB & Honey sandwiches. I'd ordered a new desk chair since my old desk chair was not designed to be used for 8+ hours a day-oh my poor hind end! Amazon said it would arrive in 10 days (even though it was Prime) but it arrived 2 days later. I did order some outdoor toys for my grands through Walmart-a bounce house/ball pit, extra balls for the ball pit, and a covered sand table. They all said they'd deliver between 4/10 and 4/17. The balls showed up on Monday, and the sand table arrived yesterday. Still no idea when the ball pit will show up, I've not gotten a tracking # on that, but if I go back on the website it says if I order it to be delivered to the store it will be there in a week. I'm trying to be patient, I feel fortunate that I have the means to order things on line and I can pay a premium if necessary, but sometimes it does get frustrating. I'm unable to order normal groceries on line for either delivery or pick up. And Costco.com is sold out of almost everything I need. So I'm going to have to venture in to the store. But back to the OT, I have Prime and am ok with the delays. My Prime membership also includes free streaming, so that is worth it to us since DH is running out of shows on Netflix. Finally, GS-was it you who ran out of paper towels for pet messes? I purchased a couple dozen cheap bar towels for pet messes. We were going through a lot of paper towels when our cat with IBS was still alive, and it was my preference to do laundry rather than throw out so much paper. Costco often carries them, and in a pinch you can get them at Walmart as well. Check Amazon, too. I just ordered two dozen plain cloth reusable 'paper' towels off Etsy to use in my kitchen. I have a roll that are flannel & terry that are getting so worn out-we use them all the time.