Well gang, just received my order from So Succulents. I can honestly say in 25 years of ordering plants through the mail this is the biggest mess I've ever seen. The box was in perfect condition. All the plants ship planted in "cells" that supposedly can just be put in the ground. The plants were just thrown in a big box with crumpled newspaper put on top. Five of the semps had ripped right out of the cells, the sedums had lost almost all leaves and stems - it was a disaster. Hardly any potting mix left in any cells. Only one plant was in a bag - baby tears sedum - but it didn't help. I e-mailed to return them and get my money back. We'll see what happens.

Also, I found this place on E-Bay, but when I e-mailed her she said I could order from their website where there is a bigger selection. So that's what I did. Well stupid me. If I'd have ordered from E-Bay I could get my money back. From her website???? That remains to be seen.

Needless to say, I will never order from them again.

Let me get this straight Chris. You found out about So Succulents from a person on Ebay and that person is connected to So Succulents?
Do you have a link, I notice if I google that name there are a number of different links for it.

That really is a mess Chris. And I wouldn't transplant without removing the cell material first. Wonder if the varieties/cultivars are correct? We will wait to see what they do about your order.

How sad. : (

Wow, I was just about to place an order.
Guess I will look elsewhere.
Sorry about your mess, hope she makes good.

So Succulents has a store on E-Bay and another website store not affiliated with E-Bay. I wrote her on E-Bay to ask a question and she referred me to her other website with a bigger selection. I ordered from that store: http://sosucculent.com/semperv... This is the E-Bay store: http://shop.ebay.com/so_succul...

I will remove from the cells before planting. I've seen those "net" cells before and don't like them.

Update: I did receive an e-mail response from her. She said she will refund half my money and I will keep the plants. She said she is just trying out these new "pots". But I don't feel the pots had anything to do with the awful packaging job.

I hope the cultivars/varieties are correct too. I will definitely mark them and keep an eye on them.

At least they responded. Did they say anything about the way they packaged them?

No they didn't comment about their packaging, but I did mention to them that the least they could have done is wrapped each one in newspaper.

Got my sosucculent order today. One benefit of having your town locked down because of destruction is that the mailman actually bring your packages to the door.

All that being said, the order was a wreck. I really would not recommend them I'm sad to say. The plants were poorly packed. They were etiolated weak specimens with poor root systems. As a result every sedum was a broken shattered mess. I planted several pots of the mix of pitiful pieces. The semps only fared better if it was on of those "stiffer" plant types. The more tender ones were also a broken mess.

I ordered the 2" pots. I expected small. But not weak etiolated barely rooted plants. I took some picks with my phone but can't figure how to load them. Lynn if you will cmail your email I can email a couple to you if you don't mind.

I really was hoping for great things for this order as it's nice to have a new prospective vender.

Well Chris you and I are in the same boat. At least we know that it cannot be dismissed as an isolated incident. I too would have emailed a nice scathing email, if I had email. And as you said the box was pristine.

Oooooo I bet I can send a message through eBay. Let me try.

Nope can't seem to do that from my phone either.

Well that looks just like Chris's order. Very sad. : (

Thanks for posting those for me Lynn! :hearts:

Yes, poor packing. But also poor plant quality.

I don't think they grow well in those cell things. Well now we all know that is not a place to buy from. We will definitely leave this as an information thread for this supplier.

Thank you Terri, just sorry this happened. Once might be an accident, twice, not so much.

Yes Terri, that sure looks familiar. What a shame. And although she told me she would refund half my money, I haven't seen that happen yet.

I have happy to report that she has now refunded half my money as promised.

At least it shows some honesty. Now they just need to learn how to ship things and make sure the sedum are well rooted if they are going to send them potted or celled.

When I send sedum out in trade, I try to send a small rooted bunch with roots wrapped in damp paper towel over wrapped with plastic wrap and extra cuttings. This seems to work well for sedum as most will root so easily. But we expect more than that when ordering from a commercial business.
I find semps to do very well shipped bare root. Less chance of rot, less postage cost.

I was really surprised she shipped in those cells. As far as I'm concerned, that was just asking for problems.

This is a useful post for me as I'm going to be shipping some plants myself, and this is a huge first order, so I'm really anxious to do it right.

You will do fine Jacki. You are used to receiving shipped plants so already have a very good idea of what works and what doesn't work.
You are also a thinker.

At least that part's working okay today - I went to my very first acupuncture treatment yesterday - wow, is all I can say...

Jackie I'm sure you pack just fine. This order had multiple problems.

#1 the plants were very weak (and not just the normally tender dasyphyllum)
#2 I have never had anything do well in those expandable peat pots, ie no roots
#3 they were packed as if you were going to carry the box across town (with a little crumpled up paper on top. Things were not snug in the box. So I'm sure it was a surf tumble the whole way.

You will easily be able to double pack that stuff on the flat. All you will need to do is have a stiff cardboard the length of the box + 2x the height of the flat (including plants). Bend the ends, slip the cardboard over the flat like a lid. You will want a support across the middle of the flat, and some tissue paper across the rows and in the airspace. Then you can easily pack the top layer.

The worst issues here were the loose nonpacking. And the fact that the plants were badly etiolated.

I just found her phone number so I'm going to call now.