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My recent crape myrtle order was shipped on Mon. and received Friday a.m. The plants were still damp, no wilting, and no leaf loss. I have ordered from this company before, and have always been pleased with the prompt shipping and condition of the plants on arrival. Also, I have never lost a plant and all previously ordered are still growing well and blooming with a long bloom time.
Being that this website looked a little more "homemade" made me a little skeptical about the purchase. I decided to try three different nurseries from around the southeastern United States. This was one of them, and for the price, quality, and the quickness with which they shipped it was undoubtedly the best. I placed the order at the end of February 09 and received my trees promptly in the mail in less than two weeks, potted and all well worth the asking price. The owner also included a step by step guidline for the trees which was a nice touch, and all 6 trees are in the ground and have multiple growths. Do not be warry of doing buisness with this company, for they will not disappoint you, and will receive my buisness again in the future. Thank you for the good experience. BBuck
I ordered 6 tree crepes last Sunday, they were here on Thursday! All are well branched, approx. 4' high, lots of roots in their 4" pots, and were packed very carefully. They had to wait until this Sunday to be planted but didn't seem to mind a bit. All look very healthy and happy. I followed the directions to the letter for planting. I have high hopes for next summer.
On May 4th, 2009, ali59oc added the following:
FOLLOW UP: Here it is May and every one of my crepes survived a very tough Durham winter. They are all looking very healthy, all have leafed out into multiple branches, some have new healthy stems at the base, all have beautiful green/red glossy new growth and to date have grown 6" to 1' depending on variety. I am ecstatic! I have been following the grower's directions and feeding with MiracleGro every two weeks which I know is helping them quite a bit. I couldn't be happier with this company and would definitely order again.
I want everyone to know that I am very pleased by my crape myrtle experience and with David Chopin as well.
First, when I opened the long box I was disappointed by the size and condition of the plants. I am working on lining them up on a very long bank - and - my husband and I do not have many years left on this huge property - so I really want these things to be up and running with a beautiful display of color and quickly!!!
But I went ahead and followed David's verbal directions and planted them. David, by the way, was very patient with me and answered all of my questions. I know I took up a lot of his precious time! Anyway, these little plants only grew to about two-to-three feet tall last summer, no blossoms. Now, we live on property with two-to-three varying climate conditions with extremes all on various parts of the property(!) And - we needed gorgeous, inexpensive, hardy plants - a tall order!
It was scary because we had two weeks of no water (broken main!) during 100+ degree heat; then a winter of many frozen mornings for approximately four months. Also, during the winter we have an inordinate amount of rain. And, do you know what, almost all of those precious ones made it! I lost about five, which sat in a lake of water during the rains, and called David and bought another set to replace those and order some more. Why would I blame David for the loss of those???
When I received the next set, a paper with written instructions arrived. Before planting, I really wanted to make sure again that we were doing everything just right, so I followed the directions to the letter. They all died! (This new set.) What I did differently was to put a 2-3" layer of mulch over the top. He also told me not to water them very much the first year. The only thing I did differently was to put the mulch on it which retained the moisture and eventually killed them. After reading the comments one person said to be sure that there was no bark in the mulch as it slows down the growth - but in my case it also retained way too much moisture.
So David asked that I send them all back. The sad thing is that when they arrived they looked fairly healthy (droopy, but possible for resuscitation, as in last year's group). I understand the reason for asking that the plants to be sent back is that he wants to see the actual damage before just sending out "free" ones to anyone and everyone, and also, to look at them and to actually check what the damage was.
It took about three weeks after sending them back to receive the next batch, which he sent back at no charge. They were, again, nice, about three feet tall and slightly droopy. I called back to thank him and offered to at least pay for the postage, but he adamantly declined! So I wanted to do something nice to express my gratitude and thus, here we are.
Since we are on a tight budget we could not justify buying the 2-foot boxes found at the local nurseries for approximately $150 each. Yes, I was hoping for these glorious gorgeous trees to arrive at my door and was originally disappointed - but hey - you get what you pay for, and in my case, you should see my long bank today! They are ablaze with color and very happy, with the new ones settling in very nicely!
We had already ordered our crape myrtles when we came across the negative comments on this website. My husband called and spoke with the owner of crapemyrtles.com. My husband explained that we were very nervous about our purchase now. The owner of the company told us we could cancel if we were uncomfotable, but gave detailed instructions for raising healthy crape myrtles.
We crossed our fingers and kept the order.
The "sticks" arrived and we followed his instructions precisely.
This summer we have the most beautiful, brilliant, red crape myrtles! Just what we ordered. All of our plants have survived and thrived.
On Jul 12, 2008, barrelracer Central Islip, NY wrote:
I ordered the special 20 plants for $125. I received my order when the owner told me I would. I received big beautiful trees. Some had blooms on them when I received them. They were packed very good in big boxes and packed tightly with newspaper. The owner was very kind and polite to me and answered all of my questions for me. Thank you Mr. Chopin for making this a very memorable experience for me. I will be ordering from you again and recommending you to all of my family and friends.
I bought 6 Muskogee crape myrtles from crapemyrtles.com last year. They were rather small - 3-4 ft whips, basically - but then they were much cheaper than anywhere else. They grew quickly and bloomed a little last summer. All have done well, although a few branches did not leaf out this spring; however I am at the northern edge of their range, maybe I will mulch them down this winter. They are already forming a nice privacy hedge for my patio, the tallest one is over 10 ft and bushy. No complaints here!
I am not a representative of this Company, though I will be franchised to propagate these plants in the Spring of 08. I did tour this facility, and so think I will offer this to all. This Company uses nothing but NEW Boxes to pack their Trees in. These Plants go Dormant, as they have started to do, even in Florida, and are the LAST Plants that will Leaf out in the Spring. They Flower best in POOR Soil, and Nitrogen will lessen the Blooms, and take away the Cold Hardiness of the Plants too. Make sure there is NO BARK in the potting soil, it will slow down the growth. Personally, I found touring this Facility a nice experience, with nothing but friendly People, willing to answer any questions I had, and cannot understand some of the problems others have had, unless they have a quick Mouth because they do not understand the Nature of the Plants, or what can happen during shipping, which is not the fault of the Nursery itself, no matter which Nursery ships Plants.
On Oct 18, 2007, juliehallowell Sarasota, FL wrote:
I am writing on be half of my mother --Lorraine--who does not have a computer or internet service, so this is a quote from her "excellent phone service, ordering took place on October 6, 2007, received plants on October 15, 2007. Plants were about 3-4 feet tall and in good condition, fully branched and leaved. Shipped in 4 inch pots. I would order from them again." Ordered 20 plants "as of October 17, 2007 all plants are still alive."
as a side note: my mom lives in Washington state and just moved from Michigan--she found a catalog from 5 years ago in a pile of papers/catalogs, etc. decided to call the number to see if the company was still in business--to her surprise they are! and the prices were still the same; she called to report this to me in Sarasota, Florida right away, b/c this is a Florida based company.
From Julie:
I read to her over the phone all of the negative comments from past experiences and we noticed that comments are cumulative from year to year--there are comments on here from 2001 through present day! Yes people and companies make mistakes, but seriously you have to look @ all the facts. I am a med student and if you read a study that says green onions have been shown to make 75-100% of people studied have heartburn then you may be inclined not to eat green onions. However if you look and see that only 4 people were surveyed and the study is being conducted by tums antacid, then you would know this study is not a conclusive study.
So I urge you to look at all of the information--I looked at other companies with poor reviews and many of them had complaints such as tulips ordered were pink and they came up yellow. Some said poor customer service, others all plants were black and moldy. I know this is just my opinion, but I urge all consumers to look @ more than just the numbers--consider the source and the reason behind the numbers to see if they are accurate.
Thank you
We ordered the landscaping special package and received our crepes in several long boxes. Each plant was nicely wrapped and moist and there were newspapers seperating each plant as well. The plants themselves were healthy looking with green leaves and a general healthy appearance. Unfortunately, seven of the crepe myrtles did not make it and we shipped them back in order to get the replacement trees as promised. We did not receive the replacements so we called and spoke to the owner of the company who told us that the dead plants had never been received. The owner of the company sent the replacement trees anyway, even though he had never received the ones we sent back. (I know that the company never received the dead crepes, because our package with the dead crepes was returned to me yesteray!) When I called to explain this situation, the owner of the company was very kind and generously insisted I keep the replacement crepes anyway! How refreshing to receive such a great customer experience! The replacement crepe myrtles look as good as the original ones and I would recommend this company for your crepe myrtle needs.
I placed an order at http://www.crapemyrtles.com on April 18th. AFTER I placed the order I discovered all the negative comments here and got pretty nervous. On Tuesday April 24th I called the company and asked the status of my order. The lady who answered was pleasant and told me my order would ship tomorrow and gave me the fedex tracking #. Today is Friday April 27th and I have 6 nice plants about 2.5 feet tall that came in 4" pots (no bare root, dead looking sticks). The box was wrapped well and I am very pleased with my plants. I will certainly order from them again!
On Sep 20, 2006, bobbi_s Richland, WA (Zone 7a) wrote:
HI!
I ordered 6 dwarf crape myrtles on September 5, 2006, and received the order on September 18, 2006. It arrived in a very long box, and packed very nicely with newspapers in between each potted plant. Each potted plant was covered with nice leaves, and approximately 3-5 feet in length. Each plant could be identified by the marker, and was packaged very nicely. They arrived in approximately one week, and cost $12.95 to ship it to Washington State from Florida. The amount for six dwarf crape myrtles was $59.00, which made the total purchase $71.95. All of these crape myrtles I ordered are hardy to Washington's climate, and where I live is between a zone 6-7. I am very comfortable that these will adapt and grow very hardy where I live. I am not sure why this nursery has received such poor ratings from everyone. They seemed quite helpful when I contacted them by phone, and sent me exactly the right crape myrtles for my zone and in excellent condition. I planted all of these the same day they arrived, and they kept all their leaves. I used miracle grow potting soil on them after taking out the original soil, and mulched them on top. I followed the directions that they gave me, and I am sure that I will have beautiful crape myrtles next spring. I don't know what more you can ask out of a mail order nursery than what they provide. I don't think that many of you know that plants cannot arrive in the same way you would go purchase them at a local nursery. If you want the plant to be grown, then you need to pay the price along with that. It takes time for any mail order plant to grow, and that is not any mail order nursery's fault. These plants were superior to any I have received by mail order, and they were not bare root like many I have received in the past from other mail order nurseries. I believe that if you want to order plants through mail order then you need to research what mail order means. You need to be prepared to take care of the plant, and give it the time it needs to adapt to it's environment. I think that you should also read very carefully the time frame that each plant needs to take for development. For example, if you are to order a hardy crape myrtle, then if you live in a very cold area, and border the zone for the plant, then you should order them in spring, and give the plant lots of time to develop their roots. I ordered my crape myrtles the beginning of September, and intend to follow instructions entirely. I am very happy with my purchase from Crape Myrtles, Inc.
