What to expect when you buy.
Our goal is simple, to provide you affordable and healthy plants with a personal touch. We are a family owned and operated business and love what we do. As a result, we've carefully controlled the growth of our company so that we can always be personally involved with each order. Travis handles most of the communication and computer programming, while Emily manages every order from start to finish. We work together on tree care and horticulture to ensure we only have the highest quality stock. Asher helps with stomping boxes flat, labeling, some plant care and the occasional personal touch. Our nursery is located in New Albany, IN, which is directly across from Louisville, KY on the scenic Ohio River.
Perhaps you've order plants online before, or maybe this is your first time. Either way you can order from us knowing that we've spent the last five years perfecting our shipping techniques to maximize your success and keep your costs as low as possible.
When we receive your order, we begin by tagging the highest quality plant in our nursery with your order number. During our shipping season all orders go out on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday for delivery Wednesday-Saturday. Orders placed before Tuesday at 5pm ship the same week. All other orders ship the following Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday.
We stop shipping during summer months because shipping and planting in hot temperatures is too risky and we want to guarantee your plant the best chance of survival. During this time you can still pre-order anything we have in stock and it will be shipped to you during the next window (Jan-May) or (Late September-December). We do take into account your growing zone and will contact you with details about your shipping date. We do usually take a few weeks for ourselves around the winter holidays and in the summer, so you can still order, but we'll probably be a bit less responsive than usual.
When you pre-order your payment will be collected at the time of your order.
24-48 hours prior to shipping Emily and I bring your potted plant to a staging area where we water it thoroughly. The morning of shipping, Emily removes each plant from its pot and packs the roots in our special moisture retention packaging. We then box it and ship it to you.
Why buy plants?
Intentionally planted trees, shrubs, and other landscape plants add aesthetic appeal to urban, rural, and suburban areas. Deciduous shade trees can also help with energy bills and increase environmental sustainability when planted to shade a home in hot summer months and defoliate to provide sunlight in cold winter months. Some trees and shrubs also bear fruit, which provides local, safe, environmentally friendly nutrition to your family.
Emily's Note: A few years ago Travis got a PhD in Cognitive Science. The next paragraph is his attempt to put it to use.
Psychological research shows that plants and natural vistas have the power to rejuvenate the human mind. For example, research on Attention Restoration Theory finds that even a short exposure to a planted landscape can restore the ability to concentrate and solve problems. Natural landscapes can also aid mental endurance and resiliency in patients with mental or physical illness. This effect is still being studied, but many clinicians have begun to appreciate the importance of natural spaces and gardens in hospital and rehabilitation settings.
Plants are a relatively low-cost way to make your home more sustainable, grow your own food, and re-energize your mind and body. Why not start now? Figure out what plants work in your yard and plant a few.
Our Story (Thus far).
The New Blooms story, like many stories in life is one of serendipity and passion. In the spring of 2013, our family made the decision to leave our careers and return to Emily’s 160 acre Anderson family farm on the Indiana side of Louisville, Kentucky. Her family already lived on the property, which was a retired cattle farm full of beautiful pastures and forests. It was home, and we couldn’t imagine a better place to raise our newly born son.
Emily grew up ranching and farming and I grew up with a love of biology, nature, people, and computers. In our first year home, I got a job at the local university, so we toyed around with ideas for permaculture farming, livestock, and homesteading with an infant in tow. It was stressful and exciting, but we couldn’t quite find the perfect fit. Farming, in the traditional sense at least, just wasn’t for us. During that time, we started to feel a little lost, but a Craigslist ad in the spring of 2015 would change our vision of the farm completely.
Craigslist: “2007 two horse Chaparral trailer new tires - $1600.”
We left home on a spring morning with the intention of buying a trailer, but when we arrived at our destination we knew this was no ordinary Indiana farm. Emily and I were struck by the beauty of this place. It was a full arboretum with water features, incredible landscaping, and greenhouses tucked in among the flowering trees and shrubs. We were inspired. So when we had more questions about the greenhouses and landscaping than the trailer, the owners invited us inside for a glass of water and a story. They were retiring from a successful online nursery business, both had left careers at our age, and they were selling the business piece by piece, ready to scale down and enjoy retirement. If we were interested they would be willing to take us under their wing and help us get started.
Needless to say we took them up on the offer, and since then things have clicked. We took what we learned and New Blooms was born. Our mission has always been simple: Provide a selection of high quality landscaping plants at an affordable price, but also educate our customers to be better gardeners, promote the environment (our earth), and live a sustainable lifestyle with time for our business, our community, and family.
We accomplish this by constructing what we call a “liveness” or an amalgamation of business and life with our family. This is easy because we are passionate about plants, our customers, and our lifestyle. We try to learn from our mistakes to continually refine our growing and shipping techniques, while adding new cultivars and nativars. An arboretum is slowly, but surely coming to life around the farm, house and nursery. To be more connected to the community we joined our local Master Gardener chapter, and we volunteer at numerous local events to teach about the importance of plants and pollinators. With the help of the Blue Bird Society, Emily added 101 blue bird boxes to our property, which support our natural ecology, but also add some level of pest control. Finally, we also integrate computers and social media into our farm life, which can honestly be intrusive at times, but it helps us keep costs down and connect with customers on a personal level. I manage the website, Emily and Asher do photography, and we both manage customer service, social media and shipping. If you wonder why we don’t have a phone number, well it’s simply to keep costs down and manage our time.
We love this life and we want you to be successful with your plants. We hope you appreciate our story and we encourage you to take time to educate yourself about your cultivar’s needs and the proper way to plant and subsequently care for it. We know it’s easy to get excited about gardening, but remember there is no substitute for knowledge and experience. To help you on your journey, we will continue to release free educational materials. With a little knowledge, patience and practice we can all be gardeners with beautiful landscapes.
The Ross & Anderson Family
