Pense Nursery - Mountainburg, Arkansas

Brian Halverson

I have ordered several hundred plants from them three times and have had a good experience overall. Great pricing on some very good varieties. Good luck trying to find bulk pricing on mix and match varieties anywhere else. They worked with me splitting up shipping times for different plant types. My asparagus was very high quality and almost every crown made it. Raspberries and strawberries both turned out good. Unfortunately many folks don't realize the limitations of shipping plants. You are putting living plants in a cardboard box and leaving them at the mercy the shipper and the weather. They can get thrown around, left in the sun on your doorstep or even sit in the back of a truck or warehouse. If you have cool spring weather it usually turns out great, if not it's tough on things. I believe Pense Nursery does the best they can with in imperfect system.

Picture is of a first year Anne Everbearing raspberry crown planted spring of 2023.

Amy Lovering

Not very responsive. I placed almost a $200 order and received an automated email thanking me for my order and that it would ship soon. A MONTH later it shipped out. When it arrived, the 3 fig trees were dead - or appeared so - AND I was missing 2 items (that amounted to $65 worth of merchandise). I realize these places have lots of orders to fill and mistakes happen so I was pleasant about it. I immediately contacted them via phone (only voicemail is available) and email. I did receive an email back that responded to the question of my dead figs (basically, they told me to just give them time to bounce back) but they completely ignored my missing $65 of merchandise. They did tell me to pray for them because they were planting over 200,000 plants that summer. I called and emailed again....still no response. How about they take their "Christian attitude" and apply it towards taking care of their customers? I'll
wait another day and see what happens, as well as making a THIRD attempt at getting my plants or my money back. After that, I guess my next step is to either file with my credit card company for fraud or file a small claims lawsuit. Too bad, because they seem to have good prices (although the plants and trees I received through other sites were in better shape than theirs).

L Barnes

I'm sorry to have to do this but I emailed and a week went by so I emailed again. Still no reply.

I ordered $4,600 for a pre-sold fundraiser (taking payment then ordering from Pense). I had requested it be shipped 4/4-8 prior to ordering to coordinate with other vendors. My order shipped 4/11-13.

The Honey Berry plants arrived in the poorest condition; pots were crushed, dirt spilled out, plants were mangled, one plant was broken off, some were missing all their leaves, one pot was only dirt (no roots or plant!), and several were bent and crimped at the base of the plant. We received the most complaints about the Honey Berries and had to issue many refunds.

The Blueberry plants were packed on their sides and layered pot-over-neighboring-plant, resulting in damage to every plant ordered, mostly missing leaves and snapped off branches.

The Grapevines, Blackberry and Raspberry canes, Currants, and Elderberries were in slimy bundles and poorly marked. Several had no species or variety written on them at all. We were able to identify them only through a process of elimination. A few of the Elderberry trees were a twig with no root ball. There were some extra Elderberries so we were able to fill all the orders.

We were short one Fig tree, one Fig was only an 8" stick with no roots at all, and another was 2" of stick with a root ball. They were all bundled together so the stick did not break off the 2" stick with roots. We were forced to offer more discounts for the Fig trees.

The reviews before I ordered 1/2022 were mostly positive. The prices were great but the packing for shipping and product received has been very disappointing. Sadly, we could easily grow this fundraiser but it doesn't seem Pense wants our repeat business since no one replied to my email attempts to address my issues with the plants received.

Jacob

Mixed experience with overall positive outcome. Plants were much bigger than I expected (see photos). Prices were much cheaper than I expected. I have about 3 raspberries that might not have survived (unless they are late). I only had about 4 of my 35 strawberries survived (unless they are late). The other 40 plants are doing great. I ordered 4 Arapaho Blackberries, Raspberries - 5 Polka, 5 Joan J, 3 Caroline, 35 Jewel Strawberries, 3 Reliance Grapes, 1 Himrod Grape, 1 York Elderberry. Total was about $150. The bad - I ordered in the core of spring. I'm sure they were slammed so they didn't ship for a few weeks. It was also hard to get ahold of them on the phone but when I did they were knowledgable about the plants and gave great advice. The strange - I got my order twice back to back days. I'm in the Rocky Mountains and ordered March 30 and got shipment on April 21,22. The honest - I called and told them I got two orders. They said it was my lucky day and told me to keep both orders. So I got twice the number of plants for the price. Overall quality plants, friendly people, honest workers that are probably overworked in the spring because we all order at the same time. I would definitely order again but might time my order differently if I could, or understand that their strong point is producing quality plants at a cheap price and forgive the overworked shipping window.

Jason Mcclure

Like many people I ordered well over a month go. I called and emailed didn't hear anything until I started a credit card dispute. They sent my order to a wrong address and I finally got something from UPS. Not sure if things will grow. Very poor communication.

Nice reply and all. It's your business and as you take orders you know your capacity. It's a bit unrealistic to expect customers to wait weeks for live plants.

Out of 20 plants only 3 survived

Gearhead Eric

Probably the best pricing out there but I'm pretty disappointed with the customer service, but at the end of the day you get what you get. Just like everyone else the shipping time was very poor! I ordered in January with a ship date of the beginning of April, almost 2 weeks after the selected date, I emailed twice and called a bunch. No response. Eventually the order was fulfilled, just alot later in the season then I'd want.

On the positive side, after just a few days in the dirt just about every single one of my bare root strawberry plants has developed leaves and growing well. So I am very happy with how the plants are.. now that I have finally received them.

It certainly seems they are a great people running the nursery, but they need to either scale back or have someone in charge of the online sales.

If I can figure out how to add a picture I will.

Elena Viscomi

UPDATED REVIEW: Literally 17 minutes after posting this, I got a notification that a shipping label had been printed, but still never received a return phone call or email after having emailed and called twice to try to get an update. So, if you're waiting for shipping, do a review and then they'll ship it. I finally received my plants yesterday. It's too soon to tell how they'll do, but I will say it literally looked like all 5 plants were THROWN in a plastic bag. Nothing to protect the soil in the potted plants, nothing to protect the leaves. There was soil dumped everywhere, everything was a total mess. The potted plants were no longer potted. I've ordered many, many plants online and this was the worst packaging I've seen to date. I hope they end up surviving and doing well, but for the $30 shipping costs, I expected my plants to ship on the date I was prompted to choose and expected much better packaging and care of the plants.

Hoping I can update my review soon. I put in an order 3 weeks ago. I have paid, but have no received any shipping information. I was asked to select a ship date upon check out and I selected 4/1. It is now 4/9 and my plants still have not shipped. I have email and called multiple times with no responses. I understand everyone is busy, but I paid good money and expected to have my plants in the ground by now.

brad krueger

Ordered plants 25 days ago. Email came back that it went through and a shipping label is created but still no update on when to expect the items. Their website says they are about a week behind orders which is fine and understandable but I have tried to call and email them so I have some sort of idea when to expect my shipment or I may have to cancel and find a different option but I have yet to receive a response. If it goes too much longer I guess I will have to put a dispute with my credit card company and go somewhere else. I was really hoping the reviews where wrong as I wanted to help support a good family business.