Posting seeds the Fair-Dinkum-Seeds way.
Why do we pack seeds a bit different to the other guys?
Every step of the way we pay attention to what we do, and every little thing we do is for a specific reason.
After many years of buying literally thousands of packets of seeds, from several hundred suppliers, and swapping seeds with hundreds of people all over the world, this is the best that me and the Mrs have come up with.
We noticed that there are several issues with the common ways people package seeds.
The first and most frustrating is spillage from other commercial sellers who pack cheaply in paper packets and baggies only.
The poor quality cheap bags never seal properly, and there is always a % lost.
Always.
Even more frustrating is when the seeds arrive and look OK, but when you actually open the packet you find that half of them are stuck to the glue, gum or tape that holds the packet together, and the majority are stuffed anyway.
Really pushes my buttons.
The next is crushing damage and is often caused by the sheer weight of the mail on top, which bubble mailers and foam can definitely help to avoid.
This type of injury is exasperated by conveyor belts dropping flat heavy items on top of each other, or from the dude at the end of the belt throwing them into big trolleys, then into the train, truck or plane.
I say throwing, because if you have actually ever seen them, you will know that’s exactly how it is done.
It’s like the dude is practising his bloody rugby pass!
While bubble mailers are good and we use them quite a bit with bigger orders and tougher seeds, it is very important the seeds are suitable and that they are evenly spaced preventing them from piling up on each other.
You can do this experiment to see for yourself why that is an issue.
In one hand put two shelled raw peanuts.
In the other hand put one shelled peanut and one small marble or metal ball bearing.
Squeeze both hands with even pressure and inspect the damage.
Soft on top of hard means your poor little seeds turn into peanut butter, but if spaced evenly and held in place this doesn’t happen as often, if at all.
The other reason it is important to space them out is because of settling in transit.
While it may all fit nicely when it leaves, if you were to chuck your package in a tumble dryer for a minute then pull it out, you will see all the seeds naturally want to bunch up on top of each other at one end.
One reason why this is bad is that when that happens the mail is either too thick to be classed as “Large Letter” and the postal service charges the recipient extra money on arrival.
Even more commonly, when they go down the conveyor belts and through the stamp reading and sorting machines, they are squeezed back to the <20mm that they should be to be sent as a letter in the first place.
Something has to give and it is always the delicate seeds, not the great big metal industrial machine that collapses under the pressure.
Just like a tube of toothpaste under your foot, this also often blows the end off the package too.
That brings me to the last and by far the most common cause of damage to delicate seeds, and by far the hardest to protect from.
That’s sharp edge impact.
Bubble mailers and single layer of foam work quite well for standard weight crushing damage, but unfortunately, they do nothing to stop this kind of injury to seeds.
In all honesty, ours is the only method that really does, and even that’s not 100% fool proof.
We love to recycle and reused whenever is possible as it cuts down our costs, and is awesome from an environmental stand point.
Our made to order multi-layer irregular shaped pods, with the smooth shiny tape covering, left semi-loose in the envelope doesn’t look that fancy, but trust me when I say it is really important especially with delicate seeds.
That unique design means that in the event of crushing impact the seeds are very well protected.
The pods are tapered meaning they slide through the sorting machines without any dramas too.
They work so well because when bashed by the sharp edge or corner of yet another heavy box, the poor little parcel of seeds can move independently inside the actual envelope, and they deflect the impact of the blow to surrounding surfaces.
It’s hard to explain, but just imagine trying to jump on a handful of marbles.
It’s quite hard to do as you tend to slide right past the smooth surface of the glass.
All that weight and downward momentum immediately turns into sideways movement and deflects your impact.
Down you go with a thump.
The marbles roll away unharmed.
The majority of the time the impact forces are diverted away from you, and the force is dispersed through the ground.
If that 1% does happen where a box corner scores a direct hit on our poor little pod, and in the unlikely event the impact isn’t deflected, the multi-layers of unevenly spaced padding still does the best job of protection of your precious seeds possible, much better than all the other methods I have seen.
It does take a little longer to pack, and it might not look super fancy, but it is the best we can do from an environmental point of view, and just as importantly, it is also the very best method by far that I have seen for protection your precious seeds from damage.
So good that at the time of writing this, I have not had a single complaint of crushed or damaged seeds since 2015. In that case the buyer was mistaken and they hadn’t looked at the pictures in the advert.
They just didn’t know the seeds were meant to look like little bits of dust and that was normal.
They were expecting large bean or pea like seeds but Callistemon, the species they bought, are actually more like an irregular shaped coarse powder.
So yeah, years and years, thousands of orders without incident.
I did search my emails and try and find the very last complaint of crushed or flattened seeds that I had from a customer, but after after stuffing around for ~20mins I just gave up.
Pretty sure it was way back in ~2013 and it was the reason I wrote this page in the first place.
I clearly remember laughing as the envelope had tyre tread marks on it.
It had clearly been run over with a forklift or vehicle at some stage of the journey, but yeah, just trust me when I say it is very rare.
We want you to get these seeds in the same high level of quality that we send them at, so that’s why we do it this way.
We NEED happy, recommending and returning customers, and every single thing we do is focused on making that happen.
If you are happy, please tell the world as that helps me keep the rent paid.
🙂
If you are not happy for any reason please tell me too.
Don’t be shy, I really do want to know.
If I stuffed up it was an accident, and I will do my very best to fix it.
If there was a problem or you know a better way to do things let me know that too.
I am open to the input of others and I will always give it very serious consideration.
Oh yeah, on a final note, we don’t have any hidden postage charges so there is no unhappy surprises at the checkout. Everything sent within Australia is FREE STANDARD POSTAGE.
International postage is an extra $40.00 flat rate to cover the extra cost, hassle and paper work involved, and at that price it isn’t something we recommend.
For example>>>
*1item + $40.00 international postage fee = $XX.XX
*10items + $40.00 international postage fee = $XXX.XX
*100items + $40.00 international postage fee = $XXX.XX
Google told me that was ~$26.88 US Dollars or ~€24.69 Euro last time I checked.
Don’t get me wrong, we are happy to ship anywhere in the world, but only at the buyers risk.
Shipping outside Australia is always a gamble and therefore we don’t recommend it.
Unfortunately we can only guarantee to pack and ship your order.
We can no longer offer any guarantee of actual delivery, but I will firmly cross my fingers for you..
See this LINK for more info.