Dobies Reviews

Used to be a really good company but slipping of late. As others have said, the time between picking plants and plants arriving is too long.
My geranium arrived dead. Dobies customer services (to their credit) were responsive and sent me a replacement which took equally long in transit. The replacement geranium arrived pale, leggy, dry and limp. However, after 24 hours soaking its dry roots, I think it's going to make it. That's 28 days since my original order.
(3-stars since I believe Dobies are still fundamentally a good company, but their current management needs to get a grip before their customers go elsewhere.)

Delayed dispatch of Foxglove plugs, and when they arrived several were dead. I emailed immediately and was told that replacements would be sent urgently. A month later, there were still no replacements. I emailed again, asking for a refund. Got a reply saying the replacements had just been dispatched! When they arrived (two weeks later), many of them were also dead! Avoid this company.

Ordered 3 items online.

1st item - received by in bad condition - this is more the courier's fault as the box had been clearly thrown around so the plant was out of the soil and damaged.

2nd item - the plant plugs I ordered were delayed by weeks after the initial dispatch time. When they were eventually dispatched, they arrived very late and dead. To be fair to Marshalls I was refunded for this product.

3rd item - this was cancelled by Marshalls due to unforeseen circumstances. Around 2 months after I ordered them. I am still awaiting a refund even.

Still had to pay for the bad delivery of all items.

Not a great experience.

"Orders are despatched promptly by post or parcel carrier"
No, no they are not. It took 2 days to dispatch the non-perishable items. I'm also not sure what delivery service they have used but it's been 4 days since dispatch and apparently, it's not even at the delivery depot. For context, I live less than 60 miles from them, a distance Google says I could WALK in 17 hours...

Ordered plants with estimated delivery 24 hours. After several enquiries to customer service. They eventually arrived a month later. Oh what a sight 6 broken puny straggly plants needing water. 3 of them out of their pots . Compost everywhere.
This is the second order of less than healthy plants
Please avoid this supplier and its sister site Suttons
I certainly will not order from them again.

Excellent service and kept us informed right through would recommend to anyone

I used this company 2020 and 2021 and I was very happy with the quality .
Fast forward to this year and the plants all arrived in dreadful state , dry shrivelled poor quality plants . I’m am so disgusted with them .
Last year I got tomato plants from them and they all had lots of flowers on them when delivered. This year no flowers just dried up crumbling leaf’s.
What is going on ?
The order I placed was staggered deliveries and the last plant didn’t even arrive but tracking says it’s delivered.
They do refund but the point is I’m not going to have a decent crop of tomato’s as it’s too late to buy them locally

Dreadful service!
Plants arrived very late but when they did arrive.......the plants were out of their pots, compost dessicated, plants crushed/broken.
Will never do business with Dobies again.
Also, had an identical problem with plants delivered by Suttons - what a coincidence!

I frequently buy plants online. It is misleading that they use dobies.co.uk where the larger company dobbies.com is very similar.This is such a pro lem they have a recorded message about it when you ring.

First. The plants should arrive or dispatched in seven days. Don't hold your breath.
Second. They arrive in dribs and drabs. That wouldn't be a problem if there communication system was fit for purpose. I had ordered several items. I started receiving emails saying items were dispatched. On the same email was the rest of the order saying what had and hadn't been dispatched. Somethings it said had Been dispatched but I hadn't been informed.

Confused? I was so I called and got the message don't get us confused with Dobbies garden center. I lady answered the phone and I explained the problems.

Initially I explained the problems and was told we aren't Mark's and Spencers plants grow at different rates. I can accept that to a point, but if you are running a business like this and advertising a quick turn around you would prepare a steady supply of plants to meet your demand.

Initially she said the emails were sent out when the postage labels were printed. Not when they are dispatched. So they haven't actually been dispatched.

Eventually we went through all the emails and I pointed out that the duplicate listings and cross referencing, didn't make sense, was illogical or just wrong.

The customer service representative eventually said you are right we get a lot of people on the phone saying the same thing, but there is nothing I can do.
Why have customer service if you don't listen to and address the repeat problems that crop up.

Most companies put their trust pilot rating on their website. I am not surprised that Dobies doesn't as only 50% of customers give a good rating.

Even if they are bothered to read this I don't think they care and won't make any changes. Let's hope the terrible record is shown on the search engines and other customers don't have to experience this shabby company.

Multiple orders this year totalling 18 plants - and only 3 of them are usable. The rest arrived near death - withered, crushed, broken, limp, and badly packaged. A complaint brought nothing better than replacement plants, all in the same awful condition.

I'd used this company in 2020 and 2021, and was reasonably impressed. I was looking forward to the various plants and vegetables I'd ordered early this year. Now, in late June, it's too late for me to source these from garden centres. Talk about disappointing... Thanks a bunch...

Dobie's may have been reliable in the past, but not now. I've lost a lot of money with all these worthless orders, and my greenhouse is pretty empty for summer '22.


I will NEVER use Dobie's again. Steer well clear of this place.

This company use to be good and based on that I joined their garden club and ordered lots of plants early in the year so I could ensure that I got the plants I wanted. I have bought grafted vegetables from them before and they have all been supplied in large pots about 12 to 15inches high. This year the quality was disgusting and supplied in the smallest of pots and about 3 inches high if that e.g aubergines. I received flowering plants that were dead last Thursday and I have sent photos with my email twice, my email has not been responded to or acknowledged. Next year I have learnt my lesson and will avoid them at all cost and stop recommending them to people and tell them to actively avoid this company. There is so much more but it just angers me to think about it all. I am extremely disappointed with their customer care. Seems like they are happy to take your money but have no pride in the goods they supply. Rant over!!

Not to be confused with Dobbies Garden Centre ( which I did). Ordered various plants all to be dispatched within 7 days ( great) I even bought their gardeners club card @ £10. Then waited, and waited in drips and drabs bits of the order arrived and the past few weeks had been a constant mission to chase up the plants before I went away. Although customer services tried to be helpful nothing really changed eventually got a refund. The plants that arrived have been ok - but chasing the order has been frustrating. Won’t use again.

We rrdered several plants last week. Dobies mails this out on Friday (or Thursday evening), BUT not 24 hour delivery. The plants arrived today on Tuesday i.e. five days later. Now you have to question the customer-centredness, of a live plant supplier who sends out deliveries at the end of the week on a slow-mail process (with no deliveries over the weekend) AND - not a box with air holes, but a sealed box! Surprise, surprise... the slow delivery and the sealed box creates dead plants!
Equally, the manner in which the plants were packed was really poor - such that they were thrown around inside, so as well as being dead, they were also snapped and broken (some).
As other reviews have pointed out Dobies (with one 'b'), has a string of complaints about bad packaging on Trustpilot.
The only merit in this sad case is that we have been promised a refund, although we had to ring Dobies before we got any response from them. Again, other reviews point out this same issue with their customer service.

On the 31/5/22, I wrote to Dobies informing them that the geranium plants x 3 were half dead, enclosing a photo, stating that I would my money back. I was told that they were going to look into it but no response till today. I have tried ringing and emailing but without any response. This is a shocking way to behave as it only stops me and my contacts from buying from them again.
Reference S0006886903, KC824U

What on earth has happened to this company? Last year I ordered lots of vegetable plants, which were very satisfactory. This year has been appalling. My orders of courgettes, tomatoes, parsley, broad beans, peas, dwarf French beans, climbing French beans were sent in ridiculously sub-standard packaging, with the result that all plants, without exception, arrived totally destroyed, with shoots broken off, root balls no longer in trays, and a mess of light fluffy material passing for compost which had never seen a drop of moisture. Even if the packaging had enabled them to arrive intact, many of the plants - the peas, tomatoes, french beans, in particular - were very substandard, being extremely etiolated with yellowing leaves. They were not plants suitable for sale. In addition, those plants sold as 9cm pots were another con; they had clearly been put into the pot just before despatch as not a single root had grown out from the plug into the surrounding compost.
A friend, to whom I had recommended Dobies, has had a similar experience, as, clearly, have many other reviewers on this site. I have been offered refunds, but from emails and telephone calls the company seems blithely unconcerned about their gross failings in packaging and quality control. I shall not be using this company again, and strongly advise others to avoid using them.