Whatever Happened to my Rose Garden? Pt. 1
This is the transcript from the recent podcast. I will be uploading it in three parts.
The KoKo Loco Rose
This one is peachy, pink, mauve, and tan. It’s also a surprisingly neutral flower in a bouquet.
Hello, everyone. This is Brooke and you're listening to the Vintage Gardener podcast, which is where gardening and science meet. So today's episode, I'm going to be doing a review of my rose garden. Now, I know some of you guys are probably going to be wondering, why on earth are you doing a review of Rose Garden? Um, By way of podcast. Instead of doing something more typical, which is a video. And so the reason I'm doing it is because I had a failure in my rose garden. And so, there really isn't anything for me to show. But the thing is, this kind of involves a story and I don't want to do a long talking head video. So I'm just like redoing, you know, I've revamped my logo. I'm revamping a lot of things. And so I'm going to be trying to keep the videos on the YouTube channel shorter, and if I have things that involve, like, for example, a story, um, I'm going to do it here. Um, on a podcast. And so, um, you guys will see why I chose to do it this way because there's also, I feel some, there could have be potential blowback on YouTube. Um, And I'm really not interested in trying to become part of the controversy. So, um, I think sometimes it's a different type of person who enjoys podcasts and I think that, Basically, people will be more likely to, um, They're looking to learn. So, which this will be perfect for. So, Uh, here, here we go.
So, a florist's rose is, it's a work course rose. So basically, if you're a flower farmer, you know, you're gonna want to have roses, well, you need the type of roses that are going to, that don't have as much time between, you know, blooming and setting up for the next blooms. And so, that's what florist roses are like. The one thing about florist roses that's different though. Is that typically they're not grown out in the landscape. They're typically grown under some sort of protection. Um, like a cold frame or something to protect everything.
Um, you know, there weren't, because people weren't putting them in the garden, there wasn't really a whole lot of information. Uh, about like how well they did in landscape. Um, and so one of the things that Grace had mentioned, Some are on her website, was that basically, uh, she had, basically had exclusive rights to sell these, sell, sell some of the varieties, especially the ones that were, were called Grace, um, Rose Farm exclusives, um, to consumers to put in their, in their gardens. And so, you know, I did, some of the ones I saw, I did look, you know, I did Google them to see, because they are expensive. They're, they're, you know, florist roses are more expensive than, um, than the traditional landscape type. But, you know, the varieties that she had, it was correct. Other people didn't have them. And so there were, you know, I had to, if I wanted that rose, I had to get it from her. Okay?
So I was very excited because I was looking forward to having some unusual varieties with unusual coloring. And I was, you know, excited because I, you know, this would have been, this was, would have been an experiment, and I don't mind, I don't care about experimenting in my garden, but that's, that's how you know. Um, and I was just looking forward to see if I could find some, um, additional roses that would work for growing in New Jersey, which is gonna be tricky, but that'll be for different video.
So, I started, I followed the Grace Rose Farm. There's a group on Facebook. I joined that. There's also this one called Rose Vendor Feedback Group on Facebook that I joined. They can be kind of very, actually, more than kind. They can be very, very negative sometimes. And I do recall doing like a Google review search on Grace Rose Farm, and I did notice that there were complaints about shipping and getting either things that were wrong roses or maybe there was damage to the rose or a disease issue and them not being responding. Um, but, you know, and I think I even looked on the better Business Bureau and I saw some complaints, but I did see on the Better Business Bureau because they do notify people, if you make a complaint, that they were reaching out to people to get them to get, um, to get resolutions and that sort of thing. And so there was a lot of, there was a lot of things I, cases I saw closed out as the person was being satisfied. So, I was like, okay, I don't know, maybe. It definitely seemed that they were having some growing pains because the impression I got was that they kind of blew up. Um, which, and can happen. I don't know if it was a matter of COVID or because of, you know, like, get putting ads in places like Victoria Bliss, because I've been getting Victoria Bliss for a while, and I don't recall really seeing, um, Grace Rose Farm in there until more recently. So, anyway, yeah, that is me, it seemed like they were trying to, you know, stay on top of the issue. And so, you know, I was like, okay, well, it seems like they're trying to fix things. So I'm still gonna give people the benefit of the doubt.
Um, so, I ordered roses that fall. There was a lot of sales going on. Um, at the time, the impression I was under was that, She was, she was getting a new grower for the roses. I was under the impression that was a much bigger company. I thought based upon, for example, the growing pains, it seemed that they were having, that maybe they were trying to like upscale or up, yeah, like upscale their business. And so didn't really think anything much of it because I was like, okay, well, you know, I know they're transitioning, big, big whoop. Um, that's what happens when businesses grow. And I, you know, I just was like, okay, it didn't seem like it was going to affect me. Um, she did a live, um, at some point, I didn't see it for a while, but I know that there was a live where she showed what the roses looks like, and she was doing estate sized roses, which were in 2 gallons that were, um, from what I could see, very big in the field. And then they were doing some own root roses, which were one year, and they were putting 2 in the same pot to kind of give the same. Like, so that you would have a good sized bush, like this of the same size as the estate roses. So, I was like, I don't know that that's necessarily necessary. I mean, if you give a smaller rose plant, just charge less. I think most people would have been fine with it, especially if it's an unusual variety. But once again, I was just something I noted and I just kind of moved on with my day.
So, uh, the in the 2024 season, you know, they start shipping, not just roses, but pretty much everything. They start shipping to the warmer zones 1st. And so, What I'm seeing was that people were complaining that their boxes were arriving, very damaged, and it was causing damage to the plant. And, you know, part of that's not her. I mean, you know, she's using FedEx and my experience with FedEx is that they, I feel like sometimes they like drop kick stuff to my front door. Because those boxes are so beat up. So anyway, I was like, oh, that's unfortunate, and she said she was going to see what she could do in terms of how they package the roses. Um, and so once again, it was just one of those things, okay, things like this happen.
And then, then I started seeing complaints about, The roses not being the size that was shown in the video, and I was like, huh, what's that about? So anyway, my roses started coming in. And so 1st thing I noticed is that number one, to deal with the, you know, box being crushed issue, she was using bamboo steak. Um, which I think definitely worked because even though the, the plant was like very battered. I think if the stake hadn't been in there, I think it would have been crushed. Um, but that definitely helped. But then I noticed that the rose bush was smaller. Um, and I was like, okay, so, I want, I, I wasn't like, I wasn't upset about it. I, you know, because of the damage to the that people were reporting. My feeling was that she, they had cut it back to make sure that it didn't get damaged in transit because, you know, with cane's getting damaged, especially if it's on a grafted route. If it breaks down too far, it's going to be below the growth point. You may not get a plant. And so once again, I wasn't upset. I was just like, just the realities of shipping. And so, um, I did get the own root, and I noticed that they were really, really tiny, like 4 inches, and I was just like, okay, you know, I hope there's no transplant shock because there is not much here to die back. So, um, I put them with the rest of the plants in my nursery and I had some other roses, and so I was just watering them because, you know, at that point I was starting my business, and so I was very busy, and so, I was like, okay, I'm just going to keep them watered, and hopefully they'll, you know, they'll be okay. I mean, they should be okay. I was like, you know, I noticed they had fertilizer in the containers, and I know that as it gets warmed up, those nutrients would be released, and I was like, they'll probably flush out, you know, won't be a big deal. You know roses are pretty resilient. So, Um, but once again, I did see people a lot. I started seeing more and more people talking about the size of the roses. But once again, I was busy, so I really didn't have time to kind of delve into what people were, what was going on. Though I did notice words kind of like, you know, bait and switch being thrown out there. And I was like, okay, this is definitely not good.
Um, so when we got a really hot day, it was like in that June. We had a spiking temperature. Uh, you know, because in New Jersey, sometimes we don't have a gradual warm up. It's like it goes from like cold to like 95 and there's no in between. And so the, I noticed those roses were scorch. Now, the rest of the roses I had, like I had gotten bare roots from like Lowe's that were doing amazing. Everything else was doing amazing, but these scorched. And I was like, oh my gosh! I was not expecting that because they did have time to like settle in. Um and I was like, what is going on here? Um, and so it, there was all kinds of leaf drop. And so, you know, I mean, I know they were florist roses, so my feeling was, oh, maybe florist roses are just a lot more picky. Um, than other type of roses. So I was like, okay, well, let me make sure I'm giving them plenty of water because if a rose defoliates like that, you definitely need to make sure you water it. And I was like, and hopefully it'll re, you know, re flush out. And so, um, the bigger ones did. All the ones that were own root just died completely. They just never came back. And then, You know, as time went on, it was like, we kind of did this thing where like the temperatures went cool and then it spiked again. And then, even the other ones died. And so when it came to the roses, there were, I did order a couple of roses from, um, Grace Rose Farm that weren't Grace Rose exclusives. These were roses that had been out in the the rose universe for quite some time— Um, Neptune and Poseidon. They are landscaping roses that are used for cutting. Um, but they, they did recover. And so I was able to plant them out.
And so when I planted them out, I pulled it out of the container. I was floored because the root, given the size of the container and given, especially when I got it, like the size of the actual plant, I was very surprised to see how small the root ball was. And there are typically 2 things that cause that. One is, if you're using a fertilizer that's too high in nitrogen, it can prompt a lot of green growth, but it won't encourage the roots to develop. So you have a root system, That's too small to support the plant. The other thing is that if you're doing shallowing, shallow watering, um, unfortunately, the roots will tend to stay where the water is. And so, you know, when you're watering something in a pot, you gotta make sure you get that liquid all the way down to the very bottom. And so I was just going, wow, what in the world? And so I went to the roses that had died and pulled them out of their containers and saw that they didn't have much root system either. And so at least in my mind, I was like, okay, well, that would kind of explain why they weren't able to withstand the heat because they just didn't have enough root system to support them. And I was kind of scratching my head because, you know, more people started getting their roses. Some people were in climax like mine. And their roses seemed to be doing extraordinarily well. And so I was like, okay, did I get that? did I get the lame patch? What happened here? Um.
So I would say it was, it was, at some point in summer, I would say mid-summer. Um, I don't know what happened that day. I just had, you know, wasn't busy that day, and, you know, I took lunch at a reasonable time, and I noticed that Grace was having a live, and in the live, um, she came on to address some issues because there were a lot more complaints about the size of the roses, and she was just like, she needed to address it because the reputation of her business was at stake, and she mentioned that she didn't want people thinking she had done a bait and switch because there was the video that showed them. And why am I showing videos of them so being so big and why they're so small now? And so, uh, what she revealed was that there, um, there had been an issue with the old grower. Um, it resulted in a lawsuit. And unbeknownst to her, that old grower cut all of the roses down to the ground. Um, they had settled the case, and the grower had to turn the roses over to her. Um, but she said basically once she got the, like she didn't realize how damaged the roses were until she got them. And she goes in because of how things were going, she said, I didn't have. I did not have the choice in not accepting them. And so she had called all kinds of rose, like Rosarians, um, to her property to figure out how to take care of these roses, how to, how to, um, you know, fix this issue. Um, but it's one of those things that it was going to take a while and, you know, I think she did struggle with, should I send them out? Should I not send them out? Um, but, I mean, realistically, I think she, I mean, knowing what I, I've grown roses, so I know at that size, it would have taken a couple years, so I think she was looking at it as, okay. If I hold on to them. It's gonna be at least 2 years. Um, and I think she felt like maybe the better thing was to try to get them to start growing and then ship them out as quickly as possible so people could get them in the ground. And because let's face it, plant any plant does much better in the ground than out. Um, than in a container. So I think that's what she was thinking. That's just, that was just listening to her, that was my impression. That's just my opinion. And so, I was like, oh, okay. Um, and she acknowledged that, you know, this, this, this problem was going to, She was going to be cleaning up this problem for probably 3 to 4 years, and I thought that was a fair assessment because, you know, rose production, like that, you know, it's going to take a couple years just to get, you know, get things to the size, you can sell it, let alone when, now you got backlogs created by having to replace a lot of roses.
And so, um, You know, at that point, I didn't know what to think. You know, I'm, I, although I am an attorney, I'm not her attorney. I know that, um, you know, I've certainly dealt with my fair share of, legal quagmires and I know a lot of people think, oh, well, you can just, it's a simple fix. It's not, they're not simple fixes. And so, you know, How could she have handled it better? At that point, I didn't know because quite frankly, I didn't know all the facts and, you know, I knew I didn't know all the facts. So I can't say, I would have to have had a lot more information, um, to, to say that this could have been done differently.
Um, so anyway, you know, after that video, it generated a firestorm of comments and discussions all over the internet. And It was, It was, you know, there was pro Grace, Rose Farm, anti-Grace Rose Farm. Um, people wanting to give her the benefit of that, the doubt, and those people who didn't want to give the benefit of the doubt. Quite frankly, being extraordinarily, nasty to people who felt like, you know, the benefit of the doubt to be given. The other thing is that people got copies of the complaint because when you file these civil lawsuits, it's a matter of public record. And so people who were not lawyers were going through these, you know, this complaint, and trying to, you know, trying to—They were trying to make sense of it because, you know how they say, like, nature abhors a vacuum, and that's very true. And it applies even to knowledge. And when something happens and there's just gaps in what we know, it's it's just part of human nature. We try to fill in. Those gaps with information that we have, um, and sometimes you may come to a good conclusion, sometimes you may come to a bad, uh, wrong or incorrect conclusion. And this is the situation. Um, I then I also started noticing and I could, I looked for it, but I couldn't find it and I don't know if I couldn't find it because I wasn't in those gardening groups or because, you know, moderators were deleting posts. I did see a couple screens shots here and there, so I know it, this had existed on Facebook somewhere. Um, but the defendant in the case, the old grower, appeared to be going into various groups, and basically, telling his side of the story. Now, I think it had been going for a while. It's just I hadn't seen it. Um, and so people were saying that basically Grace was unscrupulous, that she had done all these bad things. You know, she's telling people that she has exclusive licensing and she really doesn't because this guy over here, the grower is actually the one who actually has the license and and so there was just a lot of negative stuff. And of course, once again, you have people who are not lawyers who are reading this. Um, these complaints. And so they don't really understand what they're reading. And then with some of the people, you know, now looking, you know, having the benefit of reading, having read the complaint. Um, I know that people often, Um, engage in confirmation bias. So once they take a position, they look for stuff that support what they want to believe, and even if there's information that comes out that's contrary, to what they believe, they, they ignore it. Um, so, There was just, You know, the discussion, there was a lot of misinformation. There was incomplete information. There were people who were not knowledgeable about, uh, law and the business of breeding plants who were giving opinions, uh, that weren't accurate. And, you know, it was like, it's the typical court of public opinion, and that's what the defendant utilized.
And there's a danger to that. You know, when you're, you know, when you're in a court of law, like every, all evidence is filtered through the rules of evidence. And so, evidence, it's a really high standard. And so a lot of things don't come into court because they're not, they're not necessarily accurate. It's just not good evidence for any number of reasons. It could be hearsay. It could be, we don't know where this document came from. We don't know who made this document. We don't know that the document is what it claims to be. Um, we don't, for example, even with certain types of testimony, like, you know, people can say things, but it's like, but if the evidence shows otherwise, like, you can bar people from testifying to things, especially when, You can't, because you can't talk about false things, and so it's one of those things that, you know, by the time you get to trial, like the court and the attorneys have made sure that you're getting the best, the best evidence possible, all the evidence has passed muster. It's different when you're in court of public opinion. Um, anything comes and you can, you know, nobody's, nobody's gatekeeping , nobody's like shifting through the documents or what you're saying to make sure that it's actually accurate. And so, um, I was really, you know, on one hand, like, I, I certainly understand why the party settled because litigation is expensive. It takes a long time. And, you know, in a situation like this, um, It involves loss of revenue, you know, and this, and, you know, with things like this, especially when one person is talking and the other person is following their lawyer's advice not to talk, it does, it can involve a certain amount of reputational harm. So I certainly do understand why people would settle, but on the other hand, I would have liked to have seen an actual adjudication where there would have been a trial where there would have been. For example, transcript, because you can order court transcripts. You had to pay for them, but you can get them. But I would have liked to have something that was a finding a fact, so we could, so all the evidence would present it, and a fair, impartial tribunal would have, um, would be that a bench trial or a jury trial. Somebody would have ruled so that. Um, questions could have been answered because to me, there was just a lot of questions that were not answered. And, um, And so, It's a problem.
You know, I last, uh, not last year, uh, 2024, which was when this happened, but later that year, actually ran into somebody who recognized me from Instagram, and they, you know, had 2 ordered roses, and they took a position, which they're entitled to take, and they didn't like the fact that I took a neutral position. And so when they were saying things, you know, me, I, at that point, I had reviewed the complaint. I had actually done my due diligence, and so I was pointing out, well, this is not accurate. This is accurate. This is actually how this works. They didn't have a response because they didn't know what I, they didn't know any of this information. And, but they just didn't want to hear it. And so, I wonder my, one of the reasons that I delayed putting this out here is because I wanted some of that to die down. Um, You know, I was hoping, okay, well, you know, a couple years later, most people probably wouldn't really care that much. I was hoping this would have blown over.
Uh, but, you know, not that long ago, a, um, big YouTuber bought some roses from Grace Rose Farm and people posted in the comments. You shouldn't have ordered from her. Um, this YouTuber, even though they, they're not the owner of the Facebook group. There's a groupie page and they are part of it. And so there was any kind, all kinds of talk about it. Um, I didn't see the original video. I saw the comments in the groupie. page, and then there was later a recap video, um, with the YouTuber kind of addressing this. And I, you know, listen, at the end of the day, they want to save their fans because, you know, if people start canceling them, well, there goes their money because that's how they make their money. They don't have jobs. They do YouTube videos. But on their other hand, I don't necessarily think that was a responsible thing on their part to do. Um, they should have known based upon the chatter they saw in their, uh, in the groupie section that it was complex issue. Once again, they could have pulled the complaint. I know that they're not attorneys, um, and they probably wouldn't have understood it, understood a lot of things, but the appropriate response, in my opinion, would have been to say, hey, we see all this chatter, you know, we looked into it. This was clearly a complex issue. I don't know anything about this. I don't have, I don't know enough to have an opinion. And so, all I can say is that I didn't have a problem with my shipment and, but aside from that, I'm not taking a position one way or another because I don't have that. I don't know enough to, to, um, have an intelligible response to this. And they should have left it at that. Um, but the problem is that when they did the highlights video, they highlighted the comment and they did have a little bit to chatter saying, well, you know, I didn't have this experience. other people could have. And so, you know, I don't want people to think X, Y, and D. So at the end of the day, they really, they highlighted and they kind of amplified some of the negative. And so then people were chat talking and discussing their response to it. So, um, it's a long story short, there's been a lot of amplification of, of negative, of, of, you know, misinformation and incomplete information, and there really hasn't been a, um, a well-informed, uh, a well-informed discussion of this matter. And so that's what, I'm gonna do.
I'm going to do something I don't typically don't do. I'm going to actually go through the complaint. I purchased— when you download off of public websites, they usually charge you per page. So I did get a copy of the complaint. I'm going to go through it. And as I go through this, um, I'm gonna be, I'm gonna make sure I distinguish between personal knowledge( which is what I saw and what I heard) and allegations and opinions because I want to, I want you guys to understand, because I have taken a certain position, um, and, I want you guys to understand why I arrived at that position. Now here's the thing. I'm not trying to change your mind about Grace Rose Farm. You can believe what you want to believe about them. I'm just making sure that you have all the facts that I do. Um, because I know that there's so much information and inaccurate information out there. And, um, I believe in fairness. And if you're going to judge somebody, I think you should be judging people. Um, on actual facts rather than what Joe Schmo in this group says or what he believes because that's not evidence. That's just a personal opinion, which, which, um, may or may not be accurate, may or may not be valid. And so that's what we're going to get into. So I'm going to. Um, do a little bit of A teeny, tiny primer on kind of how litigation works before I get into it. And so, I'm gonna, I'm gonna mention paragraphs, but I'm gonna kind of summarize what's in the paragraphs. There's some paragraphs I will read in full because I think it's very, It's the information in there is very important, and I'm, obviously, I'm an attorney and practicing for 20 years, so I have a better ability to look at a complaint and read something and understand what things truly matter. And so that's what I'm going to do. Um, and so, um, at the end of the day, you know, like I said, I'm just putting this out here. I just want people to have actual facts in, and have context for certain things. Um, and with certain things, I will tell you, I'll let you know whether or not. I found independent cooperation that, This probably, What's being alleged here is probably accurate. So let's get into it.
