Warranty Info

A common question we receive is "What warranty is provided with plant orders?"

Unlike other nurseries, we don't "hide" our warranty policy where it's nearly impossible to find.  We include it in our catalog, all advertising, and on every single email we send out.    The easiest place to find it would be on your .PDF confirmations we send - it will be on the 2nd page of every single one of those.

Legal Wording:

Yellow River Nurseries makes no warranty of merchantability or other warranties expressed or implied.  All material is sold as being true to form and species.  Claims, for any cause, must be made within 5 days of receipt of nursery stock or claim will not be considered.  Numerous conditions over which we have no control often govern results that customers may have with nursery stock.  Because of these conditions of which we can exercise no control, it is impossible to guarantee planting results and continued growth of nursery stock.

What we Cover

·         Incorrect or damaged stock

·         Incorrect quantities

·         Incorrect sizing

What we do not Cover

·         Failures from planting your trees more than 24 hours after pickup

·         Incorrect site selection

·         Improper supplemental watering

·         Plants that are potted and not planted into the ground

·         Winter Damage

·         Animal Damage

How to file a Claim

·         By email at scott@yellowrivernurseries.com

·         In the event a claim is approved, a credit for future use will be issued

·         In the event the claim is for incorrect size, quantity, or species the credit may be a refund in the amount of the claim, or a future credit for >= the amount of the claim.  Since any of these issues are on our end we will work with you to ensure you are happy with the outcome.

Our "more common sense / human" answer is this:

Our warranty is basically the same wording (or very close) wording used by almost all wholesale nurseries.   Some people who are new to the bare root tree world expect that a guarantee is provided with all trees - that is pretty much unheard of actually.    The DNR, County Conservation Clubs, and all wholesalers pretty much have the warranty listed above.   Warranties are a thing the catalog companies and online nurseries that sell 1 or 2 tree qtys provide.   When you compare their prices to ours you'll find that you pay dearly for that warranty.  A quick example:   24-36" Sugar Maple at Jungs (a large catalog company) is priced at $16.95.   The same or larger 24-48" Sugar Maple at Yellow River Nurseries is $4.15.   

There are a few online nurseries that let you purchase a warranty along with your plants.    It is usually around 50% of the cost of the order.    We consider this a borderline scam because they also require you to dig up the dead plant and ship it back to them at your cost.   Basically they are charging 50% and then making it super difficult to actually use the warranty you purchased.   We have zero desire to ever do something like that.

We do understand that some customers like the security of having a guarantee associated with trees.    You'll just need to decide what is right for you - but you'll see that you'll pay dearly for that warranty if you require it.

With that said we do understand that there is definitely nothing more irritating than spending your hard-earned money and time on something that never grows or dies right away.     We do work with people if there are large issues.   They are actually much less common than you would think.   In those cases we usually provide credits or something to that effect for future orders.  These are for instances where it appears everything was done correctly (trees were planted soon after pickup and cared for accordingly) and for instances where success rates are still low.     Low is defined as "a lot of such and such a variety never grew".  Not "a few didn't grow".