Email I got:
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Vintage Gardens Closing
ORDER NOW THROUGH JUNE 30TH
for the last time...
Dear Friends, Customers and Supporters of Vintage Gardens,
A rosy outlook is what I wish for you all during these hard times---and it is what I hope you will try to maintain as I share with you that Vintage Gardens will close its doors to new orders on June 30th, 2013. We have tried to prepare our customers for this announcement over the past two years. I know that with the demise of so many rose nurseries recently, our closing will mean a very significant loss of resources to lovers of old roses, but we cannot continue operating the nursery at a loss.
This is it, then, the final months of Vintage Gardens. Our time table is focused on selling off the large number of roses we propagated in 2012, on shipping spring orders, and on propagating remaining custom orders to ship in the fall of this year.
We will:
Continue accepting orders through June, and shipping them.
Ship our spring season orders through June.
Close our office on June 30th.
Prepare all outstanding custom orders propagated in May and June for shipping starting in September.
Ship our delayed French Import roses beginning in September.
Ship a small number of orders to cold climates in the Spring of 2014.
Close our website on December 31st, 2013.
As I face the end of an effort that has engaged me for 30 years, I look ahead now to all that must still be done in the name of the rose. Central to my rosy outlook has been the efforts of a group of old rose lovers who have created a non-profit organization to preserve the collection of roses that I developed with Phillip Robinson beginning in the late 1970s. The Friends of Vintage Roses, assisted by the Heritage Rose Foundation, have begun the work of stabilizing and restoring a collection of old and rare roses that once numbered over 5000 varieties.
This organization will complete its application to the IRS for tax-exempt status this month. Donations raised by the Heritage Rose Foundation have already benefited the rose collection, including the restoration of more than a thousand lost and nearly varieties.
The years ahead will keep me busy helping the efforts of The Friends of Vintage Roses to preserve and provide public access to the roses. And my commitment to the Heritage Rose Foundation will continue to demand much from me as well.
Our Road to Closing Down
We have set for ourselves the challenging goal of meeting all of our promises to supply roses to our customers, and to retire our business in good standing with our customers and suppliers. We will need your good will, your good words, and your assistance in order to do this.
I thank you all for your understanding, your support of Vintage Gardens' efforts to keep so many rare old roses in commerce, and for being rose gardeners---the best sort of people I know!
Thank you for your understanding, your patience and for your support!
-Gregg Lowery
[email protected]
Here is how you could help:
Please resist the urge to call or email us about confirmed orders of roses that have not yet shipped. There are only 2 of us at Vintage Gardens, and we face a mountain of work to get everyone's orders right. All import rose orders will be confirmed individually in March.
Please, PLEASE, place an order for some of the glorious roses we have currently available---NEARLY 1200 VARIETIES AWAIT YOU! Nearly 9000 rose plants have yet to be sold before we close, and if we fail to sell a good many of them, we cannot meet our commitments to customers. Many, if not most of these varieties of rare and old roses MAY NEVER AGAIN BE OFFERED COMMERCIALLY. Think of this as your last rose-buying binge; let it serve you for years to come.
Please, SUPPORT The Friends of Vintage Roses! This non-profit organization now OWNS the collection of roses that I developed over a 30 year period of my life. The Friends mission and purpose is to preserve this collection of heritage roses for everyone---holding onto the possibility that everyone will continue to be able to learn from and enjoy the roses.
The Friends of Vintage Roses
Preserving a Legacy of Old Roses
DONATE to preserve them. Dozens of supporters have already done so, and their generosity is providing the means to stabilize and restore the collection. It is because of their timely support on behalf of The Friends of Vintage Roses that this rose collection has not already vanished! Aging plants are being revitalized and more than a thousand lost and nearly lost varieties have been restored to the collection.
To DONATE, you may make tax-exempt donations to the HERITAGE ROSE FOUNDATION to support the efforts of The Friends of Vintage Roses, on the HRF website: Donate to The Friends of Vintage Roses.
VOLUNTEER to help to maintain the collection, along with the many other souls who come to Sebastopol, on scheduled monthly work days, called DIRT DAYS, throughout the year. Contact Carolyn Sanders for information on upcoming Dirt Days.
LEARN MORE about this non-profit organization. The Friends of Vintage Roses will be launching their website very soon, and we'll send out an email from Vintage Gardens with The Friends of Vintage Roses' web address when that happens. For now, visit the Vintage Gardens' Resources page and click onto The Friends of Vintage Roses to read more about this organization, how it started and what it has done to preserve these old roses.
About Vintage Gardens
In 1985 a small backyard nursery was born specializing in old roses.
In 1989 the newly planted collection of roses was first opened to visitors in May.
In 1992 our first rose catalogue was published.
In 1994 our first retail store opened in Sebastopol, California.
In 1996 we moved to larger accommodations where our offerings expanded to other historic plants.
In 2006 Vintage Gardens closed its retail outlet and became, once again, a mail order old-rose nursery.
In 2013 Vintage Gardens will cease growing and selling old roses and will close.
What will the future bring for the Old Roses? Will they survive? YOU have a say in that!
