In praise of Ideal World shopping channel

Every time I take my wife to Bents garden centre off the East Lancs Road it can cost me the best part of a hundred quid. (So I try to restrict it to a couple of times a year). Mind you twenty-five of that will be for lunch in their excellent restaurant. The quality of their plants is first class. I think they've been voted best garden centre in Europe, but they are very expensive.
We have however bought several items from Ideal World shopping channel over the years.
Two years ago we bought a six-foot almond tree for £20. It produced seven or eight almonds in its first year and about eighty this year. It's now about 12ft tall. I think that was a bargain.
This year we bought small orange lemon trees for £40 the pair (I've seen them advertised at twice the price elsewhere for the same size) and an olive tree for £35.
I've just ordered five orleanders for £20 and a pair of Pair of Loropetalum chinensis Black Pearl for the same amount. Here's a picture, from the site.





We've never been disappointed with any purchase from them.
We get a catalogue from "Garden Bargains" occasionally, but if anything in it catches our eye, we check with Ideal World first as they seem never to be beaten on price and the value for money is much better too.

 

We've bought a variety of goods from these people and the service and after-sales is excellent.:gnthb: They have aso got uk based call centres:wink: We don't even bother, now, with companies that have overseas call centres:wink:

 

I got talked into these today.


But we did a "trade off" the potatoes in tubs won't be happening next year.
Changing and disposing of the compost was always a pain and although we enjoyed the potatoes they were far from cost effective.

The tubs can be positioned on the rear patio in front of the side fence. They'll get the sun for most of the day.


http://www.idealworld.tv/4_Tree_Min...?fh_location=//idealworld/en_GB/categories@lt;

 

Bents is round the corner from me.

They are very expensive, and of late their quality has been a little less than it has been in the past, although their Christmas display is a day out in itself. They do sell David Austen Roses but the choice is limited, and all their roses seem to have blackspot.


I bought an apple tree from them last year and it cost me £70, then I went to Lidl and bought the exact same one bare root for £5.99.


All in all though a nice place if you are loaded.

 

I'll agree about the black spot.
We looked in there a couple of months ago, OK not the best time for roses but the selection of David Austin roses was poor and many had black spot as you say. But I always keep the receipts and take advantage of their five year guarantee. We took a David Austin rose back with us on that occasion as it wasn't as was described, we'd had it two years and got our money refunded. I'm not even sure if the receipt was for that particular rose. They've no way of telling have they?

We did buy some dwarf rhodos while we were there and they were excellent. But then we had the pick as they were a new delivery.

As for prices, according to theirs, this red acer of ours is worth the best part of £1000.