They have been bought out (along with Weeks Roses) by a company called Gardens Alive and are in the process of reorganizing. Hopefully this will be a good thing as J&P has been struggling for some time now. But only time will tell what Gardens Alive will do with them. If they've any sense they'll keep the brand name alive because it's been a standard in the industry for decades and has a lot of recognition. Not that their roses were any better or worse than anyone else's but it does have that familiarity that people look for.

Unless these are own-root plants that they've grown in the past year, I'd avoid it. They have NO GROWING GROUNDS anymore. The land was sold for development.

I think the general plan is to grow roses own-root -- as Nor-East does -- but it's very unlikely that you will again see newly-grown field-grown, budded roses under that label.

Jeri

I wish I had read Jeri's response before I went and ordered a few roses. I remember J&P from a long time ago.

I hope that they don't go out of business. I got three beautiful grafted bareroot roses in the mail today. I've always been pleased with their roses. Don't know how their roses compare to others but they do put out a beautiful catalog that I can't resist!

You may find this thread of interest regarding Garden's Alive the new owners.

Here is a link that might be useful: Mail order rose plugs!!

This is very frustrating and the effects will be felt for many years, I suspect. Anything but Knockouts may become "quaint" or "eccentric" in future years, I'm afraid.

I really regret that I didn't get the chance to get Pope John Paul - that seemed like one of the best white roses to come along in years.

Pope John Paul is available from Angel Gardens, rosetom.

Excellent sale this early in the season! I just got 5 roses including shipping for less than $50...fun, fun!

This is the first I've heard of this, rose plugs. I just cannot imagine what a rose plug would look like. Just one cane?

Here is a short article on the acquisition. Since I ordered from the new J&P, I'll write about the roses when they arrive. Change is not always bad, I'm going to wait and see what I get before making a judgment.

Here is a link that might be useful: article

I haven't seen ROSE "plugs." You've all seen "plugs," though, in places like Home Depot. Usually they'd be teeny plants of "landscape" things. Sweet alyssum might come that way, or impatiens.

If you're growing roses that way, you might be working with Tissue Culture. They'd have to be starting with a very small amount of material, anyhow. Tissue Culture is something the old Armstrong Roses corp. experimented with long ago. They poured funds into the project, which failed because the public would not accept it. It broke them.

(I know about this, since J&P later bought the Somis, CA, facility where Armstrong's shuttered tissue-culture lab was. They never tried to use it, but that land was J&P's "research" site, where Keith Zary worked.)

Maybe that's the Direction Gardens Alive is moving in. We're in a different age, now. Field-grown budded roses are simply too expensive to produce, in today's world, and other methods involving own-root are looking more attractive than they did long ago.

Jeri

Here is a link that might be useful: Landscape nursery

seil:
"Pope John Paul is available from Angel Gardens, rosetom."

Thanks for that. I will check it out.

I used "help me find roses" to find a J and P rose at a nursery near me. Call them before you go out there. Some places still have some unsold pots of J and P.

Here is a link that might be useful: Help me find roses

Jackson and Perkins was NOT bought by Gardens Alive, the owner of Weeks. Gardens Alive put in a bid for them, but lost, because the bankruptcy court judge was convinced he needed to keep jobs in South Carolina at Park Seed's HQ. So they kept the company in South Carolina, and it is run by folks who know the seed biz, but who also know ABSOLUTELY NOTHING about roses. I would avoid them like the plague. They keep introducing roses under "marketing names" and no one can figure out whether they are new roses, or recycled old roses with new names. And if you call their customer service, you won't get any info -- they simply know nothing about what they are trying to sell.

The Gardens Alive people, who now own Weeks after a similar bidding process in bankruptcy court, hired in J&P's expertise in the form of Keith and Deb Zary to run the biz, so they are knowledgeable, and a completely different result than the travesty that has become Jackson & Perkins. The only thing that "Jackson & Perkins" has in common with the old company is the name. That's it.

Good to know, Kathy, thank you! I'm glad at least Week's seems at least, a bit more secure. Though I haven't bought from J&P for some time (never had anything I was looking for), it's so very sad for such an historic American company to suffer such a fate. Kim

EXCEPT that Weeks -- which once enjoyed the innovative breeding ideas of Tom Carruth -- now has the Zarys -- who are more directed toward Hybrid Tea Roses.

So I guess that's good news for those who love Hybrid Tea Roses, and notso good for those who love roses of a shrubbier type, bred for general garden use.

Jeri

I thought I read that Keith was breeding fruit trees, leaving Bedard to the roses, Jeri? Kim

I thought I had heard or read that Keith Zary had retired from roses recently too.

I hadn't heard.
(The truth is, I don't pay as much attention to new roses as I do to old ones.)

But I think if I were Keith, I might do that myself.
Tom and Keith BOTH gone from roses. WOW.

I imagine creating fruit trees might be a more secure career path, these days, than creating roses.

Jeri

There are plenty of wonderful nurseries that still offer all kinds of roses. Knock outs are more popular at the big box stores, since they're seen as 'easy care' roses. I have two yellow ones (from Lowe's) which I like very much...but they're not any easier to care for, than the old fashioned shrub roses, in the rest of the garden.

If you're looking for a larger selection...Rogue Valley Roses, Heirloom Roses and Northland Rosarium all have excellent roses (in my experience) and the bands were all healthy and beautiful. Hope that helps :)

rosetom I hope you're not right because knockouts are not my favorite although that's what I fear.

Knock-outs are not roses - they are an appeasement for roses.

Knock outs are indeed roses. They can be a step into the rose world for some, or bring a bit of color to a garden. Simply because you have different kinds of favorites does not mean that the Knockout roses can't be a part of a garden and enjoyed.

I just got my order from J&P. The two quart Icebergs are small but healthy, arrived well packed and with moist soil in the containers.
The bare roots? A couple were marginally acceptable. Two were ridiculous, puny little sticks with short roots. If I had seen them a Walmart in a sale bin I might have given $1 for them.
I'm wondering why this happened. I know that these might be late season bare roots and picked over. But each plant they send out now is an ambassador for the new company. These plants didn't have to go out. There are tax breaks, and write-offs for started companies. They could have let the puny roses grow another year.
Instead, they put them on sale and sent them out. In the old days they might have gotten away with sending out shameful looking roses because many rosarians were not on Gardenweb and didn't necessarily know how to compare. But this is the Age of Information, and if you send crud, the crud receivers are going to say something.

I was ready to give them a chance and if they had sent out nice plants I would have said so. The little Icebergs are nice. But the bare roots just didn't make the grade.

They took the opportunity to make themselves a name and blew it.
Sure. I'll plant the pitiful sticks and in time maybe get some nice roses. But every time I look at these guys, I'll think of those 300 employees that are counting on this company surviving, and the managers who did me, and those employees wrong by shipping out crud.

I can't find it at the moment, but it was reported in these forums a while back that J&P hadn't any provisions for stock to sell. Their growing fields were sold to land developers. The name and remaining "business" went to the people who operate it now. They aren't growing anything, or weren't very recently, so they've had to obtain the roses you received. With no crop in the fields (no fields!) they are pulling the old Wayside Gardens and Publisher's Clearing House routine...find out what they can get cheap and then sell it to you. Not much different from buying them at Walmart, except you pay the postage and can't select the dried up plants you want. Kim

I'd rather take my chances at Wal-Mart. Sometimes they get some different and interesting varieties in!

I agree. I have roses coming from other vendors though so I don't think there will be room for Walmart roses. My Sombreuil from ARE were big and beautiful on arrival and had buds, and my bands from Rogue Valley are on the way.
Thank goodness there are still quality places left.

I emailed J&P and told them I was unhappy with the quality of some of the roses.
They said they will replace those. Hopefully the replacements will be better.

I just received two roses from J & P the Pope John Paul II rose and the Queen Elizabeth rose. Both roses were in great shape. Good strong canes and the roots were strong and healthy. The PJPII rose had buds all over it and the QE rose had some bud on it also. The box they came had these names on it: J&P, Park Seed and Wayside Gardens. I bought the QE rose to compare it to a no name pink I have and the PJPII rose because of the blooms and scent. Mom has one of the PJPII roses and it's beatiful. Pembroke

I got my replacements. So at least they were willing to do that. But the replacements were the same tiny size and few canes as the first shipment I had issues with. I won't be buying from them again.