A message from the staff at Holland Ridge Farms

We are receiving some aggressive emails and comments stating that we are not doing a good enough job at customer service.

We are responding to as many comments, messages, and emails as physically possible. We have brought in a third person to help respond to people and try to resolve issues. Every day we are responding to customers from 6 in the morning until midnight sometimes. We cannot do any more than that unless we chose not to sleep and not to see our families. We state on the help section of our website we will respond within 1-2 business days. Meaning if you respond now we will try and get back to you by Tuesday. More than likely it will be the same or next day since we don’t want to create a backlog of emails and we know flower deliveries are time-sensitive. We have apologized countless times for issues that are within our control and beyond our control. We have issued refunds for all of those issues where possible, and that is all we can do right now. We are brand new at this, doing pickups at the farm and shipping tulips across the East coast.

Many of the issues our customers are experiencing are FedEx delivery issues which are completely beyond our control. Once we ship your tulip boxes we rely on FedEx to deliver them on time within 1-2 days. That is what they have promised us and what in turn we have promised you. We have the same tracking info as you once it ships, they do not provide us with any more detailed info. We have to call and sit on hold just like you to figure out why a box is delayed or missing. As with all shipping companies, mistakes happen. There are unforeseen delays. These are not due to our poor customer service or that we do not care about your order or your friends and family receiving flowers. We also cannot track each and every order one by one since we send out hundreds of orders per day. Another issue includes customers entering incorrect information at checkout, asking us to correct it even though we are unable to, then complaining that we are not doing enough to help them. To help streamline our production process, we pay for and print our shipping labels and gift messages soon after your order it’s received. It will print with the info you provide us, whether that is right or wrong. If wrong it will likely get held up and even returned to us.

First and foremost, we are farmers and growers. We are not a buttoned-up e-commerce giant with unlimited resources. We are doing our best with what we have available. We realize everyone is stressed and anxious during this time and we are under those same stresses as all of you. We hope we do not come across ungrateful because we are eternally grateful for the orders. Every time someone chooses to buy our tulips and deliver some joy to their household or the home of someone else it warms our hearts. We are trying to bring color to the community and at the same time save our family business. We feel that some of you have lost sight of that. It’s sad that we even have to write this, but please, be patient, be considerate of others, and give us a chance to correct things before jumping to conclusions or jumping on social media to publicly shame our process and our family business.

It is now midnight which means it’s Easter Sunday. Some of us will be at the farm at the crack of dawn, bunching flowers ready for today’s pickup, others will be waking up with their siblings, families and young children, and most likely checking more emails. Whatever you may be doing today please think about others in this time of need. If we all chose to support each other, be compassionate and caring, the world will get through this pandemic and be more positive for it.

Please note the majority of people have been overwhelmingly positive and we love reading all your comments and messages of support. If you do see a negative comment please do not engage if possible and let us try to solve their problem. If you do have an issue with an order, please contact us at orders@hollandridgefarms.com. This is the easiest and best way for us to respond timely and resolve your problem. If you have general questions that cannot be answered on the website, you can email us at info@hollandridgefarms.com.