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I received my order today from Welp on March 30, 2012...I live in Iowa and one of the reasons I ordered from them is there are also in Iowa. This was my first order from Welp, I am a 'vetran' chicken producer having received thousands of chicks over many years. I called to check on the status of the order on March 27th and was told the chickens were being shipped from New Mexico. I was none too pleased with this being discussed now, not when I ordered the chickens in early Feb. I received the chicks today, 75 ordered and received 66 alive and 9 dead....not 1 extra was shipped. Does not look like they were vaccinated for Mareks either. I am waiting to call them to discuss when they open at 8 AM.
I don't like the 'bait and switch' ( ship from a hatchery other than Welp in NM not IA) and the fact they shipped from another time zone and not 1 extra chick....well thats just cheap.
I will not ever order from the company again and recommend othyers choose another hatchery.
I've spoken directly with the customer above regarding his order, but will add some comments here as well.
First, we do use several supply points (other producers), to supply birds for our orders. We hatch cornish rock broilers and red rangers here at our hatchery, but use other supply points for different breeds. This is mentioned in the middle of our home page right on our website, and is in regular sized type, not fine print. We have never tried to hide this fact from our customers. Most of the other supply points have been doing business with us for 20 years or longer and we would not continue that relationship if we thought it was reflecting on us negatively.
The customer mentioned that he did receive exactly 75 chicks (which is what he was charged for) but 9 did not survive the trip through the mail. Unfortunately, this sort of thing can happen on occassion, despite all the precautions we put in place to help avoid loss of birds in the mail. It is our policy to send a few extras chicks in the box, but in this case, I can only assume the person counting made a mistake. For this I apologize. I have issued a refund back to this customer for these birds. He also mentioned that the birds did not have the marek's vaccination noted on the packing slip. It was noted correctly in the system, and I believe probably was done to the order, but I did issue a refund for this as well since it was not noted on the packing slip. (Sometimes a "V" on the line for the chicks is used to abbreviate marek's vaccination.) I do understand the customer's concern regarding this. Again, a mistake on our part that is not acceptable. This is definately not the norm for how we do business, and we will work to do better next time. Our goal is always to get quality birds to our customers efficiently, and in the best health possible.
Thanks for reading my reply.
On Apr 2, 2012 2:29 PM, Welp Hatchery added:
I've spoken directly with the customer above regarding his order, but will add some comments here as well.
First, we do use several supply points (other producers), to supply birds for our orders. We hatch cornish rock broilers and red rangers here at our hatchery, but use other supply points for different breeds. This is mentioned in the middle of our home page right on our website, and is in regular sized type, not fine print. We have never tried to hide this fact from our customers. Most of the other supply points have been doing business with us for 20 years or longer and we would not continue that relationship if we thought it was reflecting on us negatively.
The customer mentioned that he did receive exactly 75 chicks (which is what he was charged for) but 9 did not survive the trip through the mail. Unfortunately, this sort of thing can happen on occassion, despite all the precautions we put in place to help avoid loss of birds in the mail. It is our policy to send a few extras chicks in the box, but in this case, I can only assume the person counting made a mistake. For this I apologize. I have issued a refund back to this customer for these birds. He also mentioned that the birds did not have the marek's vaccination noted on the packing slip. It was noted correctly in the system, and I believe probably was done to the order, but I did issue a refund for this as well since it was not noted on the packing slip. (Sometimes a "V" on the line for the chicks is used to abbreviate marek's vaccination.) I do understand the customer's concern regarding this. Again, a mistake on our part that is not acceptable. This is definately not the norm for how we do business, and we will work to do better next time. Our goal is always to get quality birds to our customers efficiently, and in the best health possible.
Posted on June 12, 2011, updated January 7, 2012
Posted on June 9, 2011, updated June 12, 2011
I ordered 35 birds from them in or around mid april to they gave me a shipping confirmation for 6/8/2011. It also said they would contact me if this changed. I recieved a phone message on 6/7/11 saying they would only be sending 20 and then a message on 6/8/11 saying 16 I called and left a message saying don't bother cancel the order I later called and spoke to a person about the order and said
I don't want an order that small and she said too late they have already shipped. The order size was determined by availability and they didn't get a good hatch. This doesn't meet what I needed in an order. Their attitude about the shortage and the fact they shipped a short order without confirmation that this would be ok or any offer to finish filling the order in short term tells me that they don't care about service and if they new on the 7th the order was to be short they didn't ship same day as hatch as advertised. When the chicks arrive I'll add to this as to quality of birds but as for now I recommend using a differrent hatchery if you need what you order!!!
On June 12th, 2011, freddie_fixit added the following:
The chicks came on Friday 6-10-11 with one DOA and several not looking so good. By Sunday morning still inside the 48 hour guarantee I was down 3 more for a total off 4 dead and email was sent to welp about this. I was able to find out from the papers that came with my order that they DID NOT ship from Iowa at all so since welp offered the Chanteclers straight run only the other supplier probably used me as a way to dump the left over roosters. Since I was out to try and end up with 15 or so hens and normally you can expect about 50 50 out of straight run things are not looking good for me. After welp answers for the loss and the chicks are old enough for me to be sure of sex I'll be adding to this thread also if I receive any correspondences from Welp I'll include them as well. They should warn customers if they are drop shipping because that opens up a lot of chances for bad results.On January 7th, 2012, freddie_fixit added the following:
Sorry it took so long to get back with the final results but before they got big enough to tell for sure what sex they were we had a cold snap and the last 10 dropped dead. I know the folks at welp are going to say it was my fault but they were receiving the same care as 20 new delawares and 10 new marans that were all about the same age give or take a week and I did not lose any of them and these were supposed to be very cold hardy birds. My evaluation of this whole situation was that the birds were week, they never grew and developed like they should they were supposed to be quick growing heavy bodied birds with large breasts depicting the breeding which included cornish and for cold heartyness they had neither they were small slow growing very delicate and not hardy at all surviving count 0On Jan 7, 2012, Welp Hatchery responded with:
"On Jun 14, 2011 2:47 PM, Welp Hatchery responded with:
I've responded to this customer directly through email, but feel it should be answered here as well.
Unfortunately, all hatcheries have to deal with short hatches on occassion. Our supply point noticed that the week before this customer's order was to ship, the chanteclers hatched under previous projections. Since we had this information, we tried to be proactive by contacting customers to let them know we were most likely going to be short on their orders for the next week. Since this breed is a rare, hatch percentages were down, and we weren't sure if/when we'd have this breed available again, we decided to get all customer's who ordered atleast some of this breed, rather than cancel several orders all together. In most cases, customers will want to do this, rather than risk getting nothing at all. On Friday, June 3rd, I called and left a message on this customer's voice mail. I left a message that we were projecting to be short on this breed, but would still do our best to get 20 of this breed for him. On June 8th, after the hatch was complete, we hatched short from the projection, so we were able to send him 16 birds. I called him again, and left a message telling him about this. We did not receive a call telling us to do anything different until June 9th, which was after the birds had shipped.
This customer contacted us via email to let us know that some of the birds did not survive, so we issued a refund back to his credit card. With regard to shipping straight run from our supply point, we've shipped from our New Mexico shipping point for over 20 years, and we would not continue that partnership if they sent all males to customers. This insinuation really has no basis. On the homepage of our website and also in our brochure we mention that we have supply points in New Mexico, Minnesota, and Iowa. Thanks for the oppurtunity to respond."
On Jul 30, 2011, cowcreekgeeks Huntington, WV wrote:
Posted on May 18, 2011, updated July 30, 2011
Posted on February 15, 2011, updated May 18, 2011
On February 6 2011 I ordered 25 Wyandotte chickens from this hatchery.
I had been warned against using this hatchery by my Father-in-law and by a co-worker. I couldn't pass up the free shipping that Welp offers so I decided to give them a shot.
I received an email confirming my order later that night. Two days later, I received another email confirming a shipping date of February 14 2011. I took Wednesday off from work to be available to take care of my newly arrived birds.
I was impressed by how swiftly my order was being processed so I ordered an additional 25 broilers to be shipped with my Wyandottes. I received a confirmation from the company for that as well.
At 1 pm on February 14, I received a phone call from the customer service representative telling me that my Wyandottes were to be shipped in APRIL which would put my breeding program at least 2 months behind. I asked her about the broilers and she said they'd be sent out on Wednesday...not Monday the 14th. I took a day off for nothing.
After demanding an explanation, the lady said "sorry, it's not OUR fault...the chickens just aren't laying!" I don't buy this as a reasonable excuse for poor service. At first I was very angry and cancelled my entire order. I changed my mind, called them back and asked them to make amends by sending the broilers free of charge as an action of good faith on their part. She said she had to clear that with her manager. I said that's fine, find out and call me back as soon as possible. I waited all day yesterday for a return call that didn't come. This morning I called them. I gave them my name and inquired about my birds. I was informed that they shipped on the 14th!!! I asked her if she was sure and she said yes but then transferred me to the lady I talked to yesterday. She told my they DID NOT ship and I was told she hadn't attempted to contact the manager yet... she'd get back to me tomorrow.
I'm frustrated that a company such as this can have such lousy organizational skills and LAZY customer service representatives.
On May 18th, 2011, cowcreekgeeks added the following:
It is now May 18th and I still don't have my birds. I don't know how this company can even stay in business with service like this. They haven't emailed or called me to inform me of my status. I am quite sure they have written me off. There's NO WAY that breeding birds for a hatchery have not started laying eggs.
Don't waste your money and time with this company. On July 30th, 2011, cowcreekgeeks added the following:
It's uh...JULY 30th and the company STILL has not contacted me. On Jul 30, 2011, Welp Hatchery responded with:
"On Feb 21, 2011 10:49 AM, Welp Hatchery responded with:
I wanted to post here to confirm that I have contacted this customer regarding his order. I was out of town and called him when I returned to the office. After talking with him, I believe we have resolved his issues and are shipping him his cornish rock broilers. I just wanted to post a few more details as well. Thanks!
When a customer places an order on the website, they select the preferred week that they'd like to receive the birds. There are occasions where specific breeds aren't available, so we send an automatic reply to the customer when the order is placed that lets them know to look for a second email confirming the actual ship date. Since we use the postal system to ship chicks, we can never guarantee the exact arrival date, but it is generally 2-3 day. We mention this as well in the email the customer receives.
We've just recently found out that there are several breeds that are not laying and hatching well, so we've contacted those customers to let them know about this. We are putting them on lists so that when the birds are available, we can call them.
We ordered bantam light brown dutch chicks this spring. The chicks arrived, and the did not look anything like the light brown dutch chicks that we have received from other hatcheries in the past. As they grew it became more and more obvious that they were NOT what we ordered! We complained to the company and they assured us that they were light brown dutch. We have looked at the Standards of Perfection book, and they do not meet any of the standards for this breed. In fact, they appear to be "mutts". Not pure-breed chickens. We intended to show these for our kids 4H project this year. As it stands we wasted a whole bunch of money on birds that cannot be shown as pure breeds. WE WILL NEVER BUY FROM THIS HATCHERY AGAIN!
Hello. I've sent you a private email, but have not yet heard back. I thought I should reply to your posting. In a case like this, we normally would just ask that you send us a photo of the birds. Once we have the photo, and confirm that we made a mistake and sent the wrong breed, we are very willing to either replace the birds with the correct breed, or refund your money. We do have photos of most of our breeds on the website, so you can see exactly what our birds look like. If you can send us photos, I'll be happy to have them looked at and we will respond once this is done. Thanks for letting me reply to your post."
I ordered 25 straight run Dark Cornish chickens, they arrived at the post office on June 24th, the post office called me and told me the birds were in, but there was no sound from the box and they thought they were probably dead. I called the hatchery on my way to the post office to find out what I needed to do, the lady told me that I should call back when I knew for sure if they were dead or not and they would either issue a credit or replace the birds. When I picked up the birds they were indeed all dead, so I called the hatchery again and the lady said they would go ahead and issue the credit. I never received the credit, so a few weeks later I called again. This lady told me there was no record of my previous calls, but that she would go ahead and issue the credit. I am still waiting for the credit 7 weeks after the fact! Talk about customer no-service.
On Aug 11, 2009, Welp Hatchery responded with:
"On Oct 9, 2009 3:44 PM, Welp Hatchery responded with:
Hello. I just wanted to reply to your posting so I can clarify what happened to this order. Since I can only assume your name, I believe this is the correct information regarding your order. It looks like the order was shipped 6/22/09 and as you mentioned, the birds came in bad shape.
(I wish we had more control over how we ship baby chick, however, FedEx and UPS don't allow us to use them for shipping, so for now we are stuck with only on option, the US Postal System. They generally do a good job for us, but on ocassion this can happen. I'm not sure how we can avoid it completely, but we do our best to give the birds the best chance for survival and good health. )
Our policy is a guarantee of live delivery and up to 48 hours after delivery as long as proper care is given. We just ask that you call us within 48 hours (or Monday if over the weekend). You did do this, so we did initial the process to issue a credit. Our policy is to issue the credit right back to the credit card the following Friday. However, is looks like one of the clerks made a mistake and issued a credit to the wrong customer (some has a name very similar, and the clerk did goof this up). I apologize for this mistake. It looks like after some time, you contacted us again, and after we checked out your account, found that it had been issued to the incorrect customer, so as soon as this mistake was found, we issued you a credit back to your card. I believe the transaction date for this was 8/11/09. I guess I just wanted to let you know that we did not intentionally withhold your refund, it turns out the clerk made a mistake that caused this delay. Thanks for letting me explain."
I had initially ordered 25 day old chicks from Welp Hatchery in late June, (15) Welsummer pullets; (2) Welsummer roosters, (6) Dominique Pullets and (2) Dominique roosters.All alive and well.As the chicks began to develop I realized the Alleged Dominique Roosters were actually Barred plymoth rocks due to their STRAIGHT combs and yellow shanks.The pullets having ROSE combs and dark shanks. I called customer service with the complaint and they concurred with their SEPARATE distributor and assured me that I would receive the proper breed of roosters.This morning I received the same incorrect Barred Plymoth Rocks as I initially received incorrectly,plus (20) assorted roosters used to keep them warm in transport(that I havent got a use for in this world).I WILL NOT ORDER FROM THIS HATCHERY AGAIN.They either dont know the difference between a ROSE and STRAIGHT combs or they tried me twice and lost.
