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Re: [GWL]: Your Opinion of Thompson and Morgan

Some years ago Thompson & Morgan had, and deserved, a bad reputation 
for the quality of their seed. This was because much of it, the 
perennials and alpines at least, were sourced from small amateur 
growers whose quality contrrol was non-existent. This, plus a lack of 
lab controls at T&M, resulted in some poor seed being sold. The mass 
market bedding varieties (petunias, geraniums etc) were all sourced 
from the same breeders (Goldsmiths etc) as everyone else and were 
fine.

I remember going to a press conference at the HQ in England when the 
then chairman, Keith Sangster, got up and said, in so many words: 
we've deserved our bad reputation in the past, now we're doing 
something about it. They ditched many of these small suppliers, cut 
back their range (as has been mentioned), improved their lab testing 
(I've seen what they do now, it's as good as anyone else's) and 
started to grow seed crops of an increasing range of the more unusual 
varieties themselves - so they could control the quality.

But the reputation lingers... anyone who buys T&M seed and has poor 
germination blames to seed - whatever the real cause. They're not 
perfect, and some of their seed does need special treatment... 
varieties that others don't bother with. A blind trial would be 
interesting.

But as to their prices... I've written up price comparisons in the 
past, T&M are usually the most expensive.

Graham Rice

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