Victoriana Nursery Gardens Reviews 

TrustPilot only allows you to rate from 1 to 5 out of 5. So here are my ratings & experience of each of these criteria below:

Plant health & condition: 0/5
I ordered two herb plants, described with photos as young, healthy plants, purpose-grown in small 7cm ø pots. They arrived half-dead, diseased, insect-attacked, leaves blackened, brown or cut, stems & branches woody or dead, roots growing out of the top of the pots, soil surfaces covered in moss, dead leaves, broken-off branches.

Packaging: 0/5
The plants were sent in a re-used, flimsy, battered, bashed-in on one side cardboard box. The filler material, meant to protect the plants and keep them from moving around, was a few handfuls of stiff printer paper documents shredded into rough strips. Unsurprisingly, the plants arrived upside down or on their sides, while leaves, branches & overgrown roots had broken off. The box was ‘sealed’ with just one piece of re-used, twisted, folded-in-on-itself narrow plastic packing tape, applied across the top only. The box bottom was unsealed, with the flaps gaping open, leaking upended soil, plant debris & shredded paper into the courier’s outer plastic envelope.

Delivery process: 0/5
The company’s website states they use 3 different courier companies. The nursery sends an email notification when the order has been collected from their premises for shipping, but this email will NOT state which courier was selected, it will NOT include a tracking link, it will NOT provide the tracking number, & it will NOT specify the delivery date or a time slot. You will have to chase this up with the nursery yourself. Then, despite the nursery having my email address & mobile number, & the latter listed in the delivery instructions, the courier (which I established was DHL) never used either one: I did not receive a single communication from DHL. Clearly the nursery used DHL’s cheapest no-frills, no-specified-time slot, no-shipping-updates delivery service option. I had to track the delivery progress myself on the DHL website, then wait at home all day on delivery day. It took 7 days from order confirmation to delivery.

Environmentally-friendly practices: 0/5
They grow their plants in peat, sell bags of peat compost, & pot up their plants in unrecyclable black plastic pots. Reputable nurseries & garden centres have stopped these environmentally-damaging practices, or are actively phasing them out.

Value for Money: 0/5
£8.50 P&P for two small herb plants, with the total order cost of £17. This was ridiculously overpriced, but after trying all spring and early summer to find those particular herb species I needed at any of the garden centres near me, without success, & seeing that no other online nursery retailer had them in stock, out of desperation I resorted to ordering from this nursery, despite the cost. If my local garden centres had ever actually got those two particular plant species in, I would have paid about £6 in total, & they would have been in excellent condition, newly cultivated, in peat-free compost, in 9cm ø recyclable pots.

Communication: 0/5
Emails to them are ignored for days until you chase them up. They sent 8 emails: the first 6, pre-delivery, were mostly status updates. The last 2, post-delivery, had no apology or shock re the plant problems, refused to refund me or communicate again. Emails curt & error-filled.

Returns & Refunds Policy & Procedure: 0/5
For live plants, their policy on returns and refunds is an outright ‘NO’, even if these are diseased/damaged/ half dead; in terms of UK law, ‘faulty goods’. Instead, their policy & procedure is:
1. to order you to take & submit photographs as proof of the plants’ poor quality & condition that they arrived in
2. then they declare this quality & condition to be normal/expected (despite looking nothing like the photographs on their website listings)
3. therefore order you to plant these half-dead, diseased plants into your garden
4. then wait 6 weeks to see whether they manage to overcome all their problems & survive, or whether they die
5. if they are dead, submit new photographs to seek permission to return them for a refund
6. if so, you must then dig up & return these dead plants, in their original pots & packaging, at your own expense & risk.
Per their website policy, they may DEDUCT from your paid order total the cost of the initial delivery charge (which you have already paid), plus the cost of any banking transaction fee they incurred, refunding ONLY what remains.
None of these policies is in compliance with UK retail law, which states that customers have the unconditional right to return FAULTY goods for a FULL refund (no arbitrary deductions allowed), & for online retailers, the return shipping cost must be at the RETAILER’S expense, not the customer’s.

The quality of the goods are excellent and have good Servicesalways will to help

Communication has been spot on and delivery arrived next day.

Very healthy wee slips and plugs, great root systems. Good communication and friendly approach. Great value for money and speedy delivery. Loved that I got an email saying they’re on their way and next morning postie brings them, living in north of Scotland I much prefer having postie deliver and supplying plugs and slips makes this possible

Order dispatched one day and received the next! Plants healthy and moist. Now over to me.

Good website. Great selection of plants, herbs etc
Good communication.
Plants arrive lovingly packed in good condition.
Thank you!

Plants arrive in good condition with recyclable packaging. They take to life very well and I order more each year. Has really transformed my garden. The fuchsia collection is amazing.

The plants I ordered look in really good health and arrived packaged with care. There was a bit of a glitch with paying on the website as I had a token but the staff were easy to get hold of and sorted it all out. They were extremely pleasant and helpful

Sadly the worst experience i’ve had with a supplier. They’re rude, don’t give you warning about dispatch in time to alter and their plants were terrible quality, all arriving waterlogged and without substantial roots. I’d avoid at all costs. They feel like genuine crooks to me.

I bought 60 grape plants from Victoriana Nursery.
5% of the plants were duds and never produced any grape plants from the graft.
I tried calling Victoriana Nursery many times to discuss the matter but I was unable to get hold of anybody and I eventually gave up.
The grape plants were properly planted, fertilised and watered and 95% flourished and are doing well.
However, the grape plants are expensive and a 5% failure rate represents a not insignificant amount of money.
I have bought replacement plants but not from Victoriana Nursery and I won't be returning there.

I ordered a single fuchsia. The tiny, baby plant was a great price. It arrived quickly, well packaged and in good condition. I'm very happy with my purchase.

Received the Catnip plants today. Look to be in excellent condition and have a very good root system. Planted out immediately so we'll see how they grow.

My plant was delivered within 24 hours of it being posted! It arrived healthy and in perfect condition. Will definitely be buying from again.

Enormous selection of hardy fuchsia to choose from, all with good descriptions. They arrived speedily, very securely packed and looking very healthy.

All plants arrived in extremely poor condition, and approximately 50% looked almost dead. I contacted the nursery, and they were not prepared to take any responsibility for the condition of the plants. I will be referring my complaint to trading standards.

Have bought over 30 vines from the company and over 4/5 years. Always arrive well packaged and in great condition. Only one plant died due to a failure of the graft.
Good plants and although the website needs an update they do get back to you if you have questions.

Shocking quality juvenile plants received , with 5 dead on arrival. Shocked they would post any rubbish instead of stating out of stock . No quality control , complete waste of money. A company with no pride !!

Cant fault anything with this company, from website to ordering, packaging and delivery, seed buying as it was years ago. customer service second to none.

I ordered 3 hardy fuchsia and 5 geranium plants and they have been delivered within 6 days. All plants are very healthy and look vigorous and because rain is forecast I've planted them out in the garden and gave them a good watering to help them settle in. Plants were well packaged and suffered no damage in transit and all were 'garden ready' to plant straight out. I'd thoroughly recommend using this company. Only negative is I couldn't find anywhere to track my order in transit and it was just lucky I was in when they were delivered.

I ordered a particular, unusual, hardy fuchsia earlier this year. The healthy plant arrived packed very well. Prompt planting meant it settled in and produced new, strong growth quickly. Once it began to flower I realised I had the wrong plant as the flower colour was incorrect, despite the labelling. I contacted the company and received a (correct) replacement within 48hours!