If you ordered switchgrass from us in the past month it is very likely that your order was slow to arrive. In a few cases customers actually received their orders for switchgrass seed and we then asked them to return it for a replacement bag. Real World prides itself on customer service so we think we owe you an explanation regarding why your order may have taken longer than normal to arrive.
We buy our switchgrass seed in bulk by the ton. When we get a new lot of switchgrass seed it comes with a germination report provided to us by the grower. To help ensure the highest quality we have a practice of also submitting samples of each new lot of seed to an independent lab for a second germination test to check the accuracy of the germination report that we receive from the grower.
Due to factors beyond our control we did not get our switchgrass seed in hand this winter as soon as we would have liked. In fact when it did show up we already had orders for the seed and started processing those orders before we had the second germination test back from the lab. We were surprised when the second test came back and the germination was not as good as we were led to believe and in fact was below what we would consider acceptable. We immediately stopped selling this lot of seed and recalled the seed that had already left our facility. This seed was later returned and we acquired a new lot of switchgrass seed. We were not going to repeat our mistake and this time we waited for the germination test to come back before shipping out any of this new seed. This whole process took over a month and in that time orders for our switchgrass seed piled up. Eventually we got the favorable lab report back and was able to start shipping seed with the confidence that we were selling our customers a high-quality seed.
It would have been very easy for us to sell the original seed as the germination was such that a good percentage of it would grow and our customers would likely never know the difference. That is the kind of thing we refuse to do however and is what sets Real World apart from many other seed companies. In fact, a lot of companies marketing food plot seed see the hunting industry as a place to get rid of seed with lower germination rates. Our customers expect more from us and we value our customers too much to take this approach.
We apologize for any inconvenience that this issue might have caused our valued customers. Luckily we are now caught up on all orders and have plenty of high-quality switchgrass seed in stock with plenty of time left for everyone to frost-seed their switchgrass plots.
If you are not familiar with Real World switchgrass, it is the very best variety of switchgrass we have found for standability and grows up to 8′ tall depending on soil fertility. Real World switchgrass is also tolerant of wetter sites and even occasional flooding.
These test plots are only 20′ apart and show the difference between Real World switchgrass and the popular cave-in-rock variety. These photos were taken after an entire winter of winds and snows that would knock a lot of switchgrass varieties flat to the ground.
