The scoop on 'Gourmet Seed International'

I've placed several orders from GSI.
Each time, something is slightly amiss such as wrong size packet/ wrong variety/ forgotten item. In each case the company has corrected the mistake in a fair way, but it's a hassle to have to deal with.
My most recent order was for one 100g packet of seeds and several hand tools (they sell nice quality no-frills tools from Italy that are a much better value that the Chinese garbage peddled by the box stores). The tools all arrived in a timely fashion, but no seeds were enclosed, and no indication of the status was provided (out of stock, back-ordered, or just plain forgotten). An e-mail to customer service was not acknowledged within 1 week, so today I made phone call to CS (again). Helpful as usual, and maybe I'll get the seeds I need for fall planting, but I'm just not sure that it's worth the hassle to have to follow through and get every order corrected...This would be a great company if they were just a little more detail oriented.

We thank this customer for his business and apologize for the error in filling his order. Here are the details of this transaction:
He placed the order on 11 July, and it was delivered to him on Thursday afternoon, 17 July. He sent us an email 9:26pm that evening. We responded to his email on Friday morning (apparently he did not receive it) telling him that we would send the missing item right away. It was shipped out that afternoon (Friday 18 July).
The customer called us this morning (Monday 21 July), and as the person answering the phone was not aware of the details, they offered to call back with any information, which they did. However, before they made the call, the customer filed this report.
We erred in filling the customer's order, and for that we are truly sorry. Not only do errors of this type not please the customer, but they cost us greatly in correcting the problem. However, as is true for any merchant, we appreciate it when any customer will give us a reasonable amount of time to respond and fix the problem.
Phil
Gourmet Seed International, LLC

Online order #05014326
The ordering was easy and the seeds arrived in about 8 days. The counts of mature seeds were good, even though there are a lot of small immature seeds in the packs.

Only one isssue here with my order. The packages were all marked "Untreated". However, the "Moon's Super Bush Beefsteak" seed had a pinkish red coating on them. I'm not real savvy on a lot of this stuff, but I have 93 other tomato seed varieties and none of them are red. So, I have to believe the package was incorrectly marked as "Untreated". Treated or untreated is not a major problem to me, because all I want are enough tomatoes to properly save the seeds from my harvest. The rest are for trading to increase the number of varieties I have to grow from and save seeds.

I'm not really into all that organic stuff, but there are others out there who DO care a great deal. So this comment is for them, plus, I don't like ANY mistakes on correctlly identifying what's inside the package. Surprises are for birthdays. Anyhow, I've already repackaged the seeds to physically fit into my inventory and storage system, and I have thrown the original packaging.

Yes, I will probably order again in the future.

We thank this customer for their business and their feedback, although we wish they had told us directly of the error so that we could have swiftly corrected it.
Although we make every effort to double check our work and offer quality products and services, we do depend on our customers to notify us immediately of any error on our part or any quality issues they may discover.
We do stand behind the quality of our products and services, and offer a guarantee. As such, we would like to extend an invitation to this customer to contact us for a refund or replacement, since the seed was not to their satisfaction.
Regards,
Phil Winteregg
Gourmet Seed International, LLC

Last year a friend ordered seed from this company and complained that it "wasn't dated for this year" but had a "use by" date. I bought the seed from her, and nearly every seed germinated. I got good crops and was very satisfied, and ordered from them directly this year. Their selection is excellent and I like the airproof packaging, since I think it's very wasteful to throw away seed that is still in perfect condition.

I just received my first order and was I ever pleased ! I love the foil packaging . This allows for the seeds to be viable much longer then the paper envelopes most companies use. I will be buying my LONG TERM STORAGE seeds from them for sure. I got prompt replies to my questions and fast delivery of my order. TWO THUMBS UP !

In January 2008 I ordered 11 packets of vegetable and herb seeds from Gourmet Seed International. When the order arrived, it contained 5 seed packets dated 5/2006, and one seed packet with no date at all. I emailed the company, expressed my opinion that fresh seed was my expectation and asked if they could replace the seed with fresh 2008 seed. They replied with an email talking about how seed remains viable for years after it is packed, etc. I again told them I had never been sent 2 year old seed by any other company, and asked to either have fresh seed sent, or my money refunded. They have said to return the seed and they will refund the money. This is disappointing, as it now means I must take the time to go back to the post office to send it, and must place another order and pay another shipping and handling fee for another order with another company. I think they also should refund their shipping and handling fee ( $6.29 US, the highest of the 5 companies I ordered seed from this year), as I certainly would not have even ordered from them to start with if they had posted on their web site that they send seed packed 2 years ago. And, of course, my time and energy to handle this return as well as time off work during the business day to get to the post office is not something they will reimburse.

We are sorry that this customer is unhappy with the seed that we offer, and did offer to refund their purchase price, which is normal for any company.
We did explain that although most domestic seed companies use simple paper packages which only allow for a 1 year expiration dating, much of our seed comes from some of Europe's finest seed houses packaged in long-life, hermetically-sealed packages, which allow for a 3 year expiration date. In fact, we have followed this example as it provides the customer with much fresher seed. Also, much of what is being sold as '2008' seed here in the US was packaged in 2007 from 2006 harvests. In other words, still 2006 seed.
After we offered our explanation, we did extend our offer for a refund, as it was obvious that the customer was still not happy with the seed. We did not hear anything further from the customer until they filed this complaint, and were never aware that the customer took exception to returning the seed. If the customer will contact us, we will be happy to arrange for a pickup of the seed at their convenience.

My sister living in New York has ordered on my behalf various seeds from Gourmet Seeds in December 2007(over 30 varieties) which she brought to me when she came to Turkey for Christmas.

To my suprise most of the seeds were with expiration date 2007.

My intention is to use these seeds in 2008 (some of them end of 2008).

In my view sending seeds with less than one month validity is neither fair nor correct and I think the customer is entitled to freshly packed seeds when ordering in December 2007 and not receive seeds from old stocks.

Even if Gourmetseed tells me that I will not have germination problem because their product has longer germination validity from the one indicated on the package, I still think that it is a really negative points on their behalf.

FYI, I have also ordered in the same manner from Baker Seeds. the grains I have received were with the sticker "packaged for 2008".

Taking into account past experience, their customer service, variety of seeds they have, I will still keep ordering from them.
(Because of past good experience I graded them neutral and not negative)

I strongly suggest their management to take necessary steps to prevent such situation in the future.

We want to thank this customer for their business and their comments. They bring up a valid concern that we are trying to resolve that will genuinely benefit the customer.
We strive to provide 'current' season seed whenever possible to our customers, meaning that seed we are packing now was harvested in 2007. This means, however, that we are a bit later in getting this on hand, tested, and packed than many seed companies, especially since so much of our seed is sourced from overseas. In fact, some of our overseas seed is still in transit to us. To resolve this problem and to get a jump on packing seed for the upcoming season, many seed companies almost exclusively use previous season seed, which for this example would be seed harvested in 2006. This means the seed is already one year old, so although the germination dating may make the seed appear to be fresher, it simply means it was packed later. For most seed, this is not a huge problem, as most varieties, if stored properly, will handle this extra year and still pass germination testing easily. We've avoided doing this as we feel it isn't being quite upfront with the customer as to how fresh the seed really is. As to Baker Seed, we can't say what their practice is, and trust that as a quality company, they are ensuring their customers are getting quality seed.
We've struggled to balance getting the freshest seed possible to our customers, and still have it available for those early shoppers. For next year, we're working with our growers and seed sources to expedite the arrival of fresh seed, and are working to streamline our processing here to get the current season's seed on the shelf as quickly as possible. Our plan is to have a larger percentage of current year seed available for those who order early for the next go around in the winter of 2008/2009.
We welcome any comments or thoughts from our customers on this subject at: [e-mail:customerservice@gourmetseed.com].
Regards,
Phil Winteregg
General Manager

The range of varieties is quite interesting, the seeds arrived
in a timely fashion and have been germinating reasonably.
But many of them are treated seed; which I don't use, so it
ended up being rather a big waste for me. Even one of the
packets that was clearly marked "untreated seed" is
treated - seeds aren't that color naturally. I was also not
thrilled to see the carrot seed packet marked "packed 05
expires 07" - this was in 07- I'd like to think I'll get seed that
will be good for a couple of years after I get it.

We want to thank this customer for their business and the feedback. With thousands of products on the shelf, it is nearly inevitable that a mistake will occur on occasion.
We would like to hear directly from this customer so that we can trace down the labeling error on the treated seed to be sure that there are no more of this variety on the shelf mislabeled. Also, since we have no idea when a customer plans on using the seed they purchase, and we have many greenhouse customers, we can only assure that the germination dating has not expired at the time of shipment. When placing an order towards the end of the year, many of our customers will let us know they need seed dated through the following year, and we will try to fulfill their needs as best as possible, depending on current availability and where we are in rotating our stock. Since we use long-life, hermetically-sealed packaging, store our seed in a climate controlled warehouse, and periodically test it as it is stored on the shelf, our germination test dates are for longer periods than the single season dating allowed by paper packaging. We were pleased to hear that in this case the germination was fine.
The bottom line is that we do stand behind the quality of the seed, and we look forward to any direct feedback we can receive from a customer, positive or negative, as this is what helps us to improve our products and service. If any customer has any issues with our products or service, we request they contact us immediately so that we can have every opportunity to make it right.
Phil Winteregg
General Manager

This is the second year I have placed a small order with Gourmet Seeds for unusual and hard-to-find vegetables, and I am very pleased with their products and their customer service. Seeds arrived within a week of ordering, and my written request for one variety was filled even though the on-line ordering system said it was out of stock. It doesn't appear that I was charged for the extra item either, though I am quite willing to pay for it. The seed packages are often in German or Italian but I don't care, as the quality, and quantity, of the seeds surpass many American companies. It's nice to have a company that cares for small orders - and I will definitely be making larger ones after this.

This is a great place to get unusual veggie seeds from Europe. For instance, they have a bunch of old-time British turnip varieties I have never seen anywhere. I really like the large and very beautiful seed packets from the Italian seed companies they carry too. The art of the seed packet has obviously not been forgotten in Italy. They also include a very generous number of seeds.

Rarely am I contacted by a company when they are out of something, but this company did. They were out of a yellow bush bean I ordered and emailed to ask me if I wanted a substitute. I said yes, and they sent me a double amount of another yellow bush bean. They also shipped priority mail, which is unusual in the seed biz.

I really like this company for European veggie varieties.

I love this company to get unusual seeds. The European seed packets in general are much larger than the usual American ones. The prices are very good if you factor in the European seed counts.(I hope the company keeps it this way!) I have no problem not being able to read the packet info. I would rather receive them in their original packets than pay more for repackaging into packets written in English. Cultural info can easily be found here and on other places on the internet.
The shipping may seem high, but seeds are delivered quickly by Priority mail.

I have ordered several times from this company and have enjoyed the selection of European seed which is hard if not impossible to locate in other companies in the US. The European seed packages are lots more generous than American ones as well, it seems to me.
The only problem that I have had is that their web site would not my perfectly ordinary credit card that worked everywhere else. I even called them and had the person on the phone try to enter it and she couldn't either. So, I had to mail them a paper order and a check. Bummer.
But I got great seeds from them!

We want to thank pajaritomt for their kind words about our product line. We continually search to find new varieties to enhance the culinary experience you can get from your garden.
As to the credit card issue, we are sorry that the card would not process, but as any online merchant will tell you, we do not have control of this nor is this type of issue normally caused by the website itself. When paying for an order online, there are several players 'behind the scenes' involved with the secure processing of that payment, and for any number of reasons a payment can fail, even ones as simple as a key server being temporarily down or the security code being incorrectly entered.
If any of our customers have difficulty processing a payment, we invite them to contact us as this customer did, and we will attempt everything we can on our end to resolve the problem. However, as we do not actually process the payment (which is similar to a regular walk-in store), we are at the mercy of the various gateways and banks involved.
Again, thanks for the kind words, and as always we will continue to strive to provide an exceptional product at a fair price with exceptional service.
Phil Winteregg
Gourmet Seed International, LLC

They substituted an item without letting me know if I wanted it or not (they have my email address). I had to emailed them three times trying to ask them whether the item they sent me was the same one I ordered/paid for because the seed packet was in Italian.

They finally emailed me back on my third email to them and said that they did not have my first two emails and did not know what happened to them????

Then I got another email . . . . .from their warehouse telling me that they have already sent my order??? DUH. . ...That was not my question.

The next day got another email and this time they finally told me that they had substituted the item. Well . . . . duh. . . . .

I would not buy from them again for the lack of customer service, gave me the run around and their S/H is extremely high.

We're sorry to see this posted, as we made every effort to respond to the customer and reply to the emails that were received.
We received only two emails to Customer Service, both of which were responded to (we keep all emails on file for at least 6 months for reference). We can only guess as to why the customer did not receive our first response, perhaps there was a problem with a spam blocker.
In any case, when we received the first email, we acknowledged that based on the information the customer had relayed to us at that time, it appeared there may have been a error in the warehouse in filling the order. We asked for more information to be sure we understood exactly what was wrong, and to ensure that we would be able to correctly solve the problem, we also asked the customer to let us know how they preferred to resolve this, whether by refund or replacement. We received no response until a later email arrived, where it seemed obvious that the customer had not received our first response.
We again responded to the customer, but since we were afraid they would again not receive our response, we went ahead and reshipped the seed in question to the customer. Meanwhile, the customer did respond to a shipment confirmation email, at which time the warehouse directly responded by confirming that a replacement was being sent.
As to our S/H rates, for domestic orders, we charge $4.95, plus 5% of the order. Our standard shipping is either USPS Priority Mail, or UPS Ground for larger and bulk orders. We normally ship within 2 business days of receipt of the order. Given that postage rates for Priority service start at $4.60, we feel we do a good job of providing exceptional service at a fair rate.
We again apologize for the inconvenience this customer experienced, and are reviewing our SOP to see what we might do in the future to minimize this type of problem.
Situations like this can be very frustrating, as emails can occasionally be unreliable. Spam blockers, while useful to reduce the junk emails we can potentially receive, can interfere with necessary business communication. Whether that was a factor here or not, we don't know, but it is important to add the names of the companies you do business with to ensure you receive all the information you need.
We stand behind the quality of the product we provide, and continually work to improve the level of service our customers receive. In spite of their perceived experience with us, we thank this customer for their business, and wish them well.
Philip Winteregg
General Manager

I have traded with this company for a few years now and find them to be one of the best. They don't waste time with flashy catalogs like Burpee's, and their selection is unique. The seed quality is excellent, as well.

Received my order via Priority Mail. Was very impressed with fast delivery of order. Ordered over the weekend and received here in Maine during the week. The seeds I ordered were types that I haven't seen available in the US. These are varieties from other countries so the package won't necessarily be in English. I did find an English translation on the web. Can't wait to try some new veggies. Package quantities are much larger than packets from US companies.

I have just completed creating an online order with the company. I have read the reviews and am giving this company the benefit of the doubt regarding shipping time, germination rates, and accurate processing of the order or 27 varieties of seed. I will be planting in a public demonstration garden that has had compost added to the soil for 10 years straight with consistent, timed watering. I will report back on service, packaging, seed quality, and germination rates as well as to the PlantFiles database on quality of the plants and produce. I hope to be able to post positive reviews.

ordered greasy pole bean seed from them and received quickly. i planted the seed and had 0% germination. i planted several other varieties at the same time and had excellent germination. i emailed them and they sent me an equal amount of seed but said the reason mine didn't germinate was that i planted them in cool soil. they also said that the greasy bean was an heirloom variety and they were harder to germate in cool soil. well, the soil was plenty warm as i germinated lima beans as well. the replacement seed were of the same lot and when i opened them the smelled rotten. i tried to germinate them on a propagation mat and they only rotted , stinking up the entire house. i ordered from a lady in kentucky the same type seed and planted last week and the seeds are now coming up. i can't get a response from harvest moon though i have emailed them several times. i would like a refund but don't think i'll get it. i would not reccommend them because the fancy packaging doesn't hide poor seed quality.
regards,
cary

Dear Mr. Dover
I apologize (again) for your germination problems resulting with this seed. For the record I think you should be more honest and evaluate the facts in your remarks to the general public of our handling of your order that
1) we responded to your email 3 times and our customer service manager spoke with you on the phone as well. You were not ignored but promptly taken care of.
2) After our first email we replaced your seed once with no complaints about it until now.
3) You were refunded the full purchase price and shipping costs per our guarantee even though we replaced the seed immediatley.

We offer some of the finest quality seed on the market! With over 2,000 selections we admit there is always going to be a variety or two that "goes bad' though its fresh and germinated fine during testing once in a while and that is simply nature and any seed company will tell you this. This lot of White Greasy Bean was pulled, though we had no other complaints, we did notice that the germination rate for the lot was increasingly lower since the last 2 tests after your inquiry. Our return and replacement rate is less than 1%, exactly 0.06% of our total sales of seed. We receive only a handful of concerns regarding seed germination a year (6 to be exact for 2006) from the tens of thousands of customers we service.
If you are going to file a complaint Sir please be legitimate and offer all the facts to the public. Though you had a problem, we handled it properly and above and beyond what any other company would do. If you want to comment that all our seed is poor, though that is your right to opinion but this is contradictory to the facts you gave us on the phone and of your own comments in the last email to us from you stating our other seed we supplied you was extremely good and that this problem apparently was with only the variety White Greasy (Email address below in your comments have been wiped for your privacy) I do wish you well and hope that in the future we can offer your our service and "great germinating" seed, especially the okra again. Again any apologies for inconvenience you experienced and I do wish you the best this gardening season.

Kind Regards,
Michael Dean
President
Harvest Moon Farms & Seed Co.

----- Original Message -----
From: "large runner" <*************>
To: <*************>
Sent: Friday, May 05, 2006 7:45 PM
Subject: greasy beans 0% germination again

"i'm no rookie at gardening, especially heirlooms. i have grown greaseys for many years and the only reason i wanted new seed is because my seed had crossed with a neighbors several years ago and i couldn't seem to breed out multi-colored seeds.
the okra seed i received from you germinated great.
i would like to have a refund for the 2 packs of seed i bought from you."

I´ve ordered and payed on January 15th. Today is Februaray 14th and nothing has arrived yet. And I´ve payed U$11,75 for s&h!! for a total order of U$34,95.
I´ve asked by email for the shipment date and they not answered. Very bad experience indeed.

Dear Sir,
As we explained over the phone and by email to you. It takes 10 to 14 business days (not including weekends or holidays) for an International package to reach you as well as the time that customs handles it. We confirmed with tracking you received your package on Febuary 17th. The shipping charges were actually $12.03! Im sorry you felt the seed should have arrived sooner, but Express Service to your location in South America was $38 and you already complained of shipping cost, we always ship exactley what were charged from the carrier plus cost of envelope or box. I apologize for any inconvenience to you but these are unfortunatley issues with the carrier and not our service.

Kind Regards,
Michael Dean
President
Harvest Moon Farms & Seed Co.

See my comment under Mr. Fothergills--Harvest Moon is the U.S. agent for their seed.

Delivery is fast! Only 4 days from putting in the on-line order to having the seeds in my hands. Good variety of vegetable seeds, including a lot of cultivars I've not seen anywhere else.
One caveat, though: Harvest Moon reships a lot of seeds from European seed companies, and their catalog does not indicate where the seeds originally come from, and it can be a bit of a challenge trying to figure out just how what you have matches what you ordered. On the other hand, I now know the Italian for beet, cauliflower and lettuce!

Lovely selection and extremely fast shipping!

The only down side was $8.40 shipping on a $41.00 order. Still, assuming everything germinates well, i will be ordering from this company again.

WOW! First, their selection is incredible. Second, their service is lightening quick. I ordered online Sunday morning, received my order Wednesday morning...everything there and in excellent condition The seed packets are plump full and from all over the world. Can't wait to plant them...and order again. This company rocks!

An interesting company, They have lots of European vegetable cultivars that are hard to get in the USA. They apparently do not relabel. Only one packet was in English, and that one was from the UK. I rarely have germination problems so I am rateing them positive for prompt shipping and good selection of hard to find cultivars.