Anyone with a Green Thumb?

Home Depot and Lowe's are where I go for garden things.
Prices are the same.
Shipping costs for potting soil/mulch could be expensive - which is why I wouldn't do Amazon for garden stuff.

Gardener's Supply Company has some very nice stuff - excellent quality - but it's a bit pricey.
It's fun to look at all the wonderful things they have - but look for a sale or clearance.

https://www.gardeners.com/homepage

For potting soil and pots, it's all pretty much the same, IMO. I go to a store - locally owned if I can - to support them, but the stuff is the same. When it comes to buying the actual plants, it's a totally different story. For plants/seeds, I highly recommend finding a local nursery where the people know what grows well in your area.

I buy my potting soil and seed trays/pots and seeds from Menards (it's like Lowe's). I go to a local green house for my plants and sometimes buy my seeds there too. Not sure what kind of gardening you're talking about - flowers? veggies?

I wouldn't buy anything heavy from a place like Amazon. All that shipping makes zero sense to me!

I like to shop locally. If you don't feel you know what you are doing, making friends with the employees of a local garden center is your absolutely best bet.

In shopping at big stores, I look at their corporate culture. Do they give money to causes or political candidates I loathe? Do they pay their employees so little that they set up food donation stations for customers to support the workers? Then I don't line that owner's pockets. So personally, I do not shop in Walmart or Home Depot. But for supplies, they're all equivalent. Dirt is dirt, so potting soil is potting soil. You might save a few bucks at Lowe's over the local garden center, but you won't always get great advice on the planting. So if all your plants die, you'd have been better off paying a little more. If your garden center is more based on the gift shop model, you might pay more for pots and decorative stuff, so you can look around for those. I buy at different places, watching the sales.

Another advantage to your local places is free advice. I stop by a combination organic farm/garden center with a gift shop option off to the side. Besides enjoying supporting local, family-run businesses, I needed advice because of something wrong with one of my shrubs. I cut off a piece of it and sealed it in a zipper plastic bag. I showed it to the owner (I did not open it so that whatever disease it had didn't infect his stock!) and he was able to look right through the clear bag and tell me I had 2 problems (scale and thrips). He sent me right over to the counter with the organic spray that would treat both problems. Saved me an expensive shrub!

Never heard of Armstrong or Orchard, but I have bought my potting soil and pots from Wal-Mart, or at times, Aldi, believe it or not. I got a large bag of potting soil there a few weeks ago for about $4.99. Other pots were hand-me-downs from mom, I have bought some items on Craigslist too. Home Depot pots are extremely expensive in my opinion, as are their plants. When it comes to plants, I go out to the rural parts of South Florida where the nurseries are, out in the boondocks, and get very low-priced, well-maintained plants.

I buy soil from our Lowe's, Home Depot, or Menards. Pots from Wal-Mart or a local pottery store. And plants from a nursery down the street because I want their expertise. I buy mulch/ compost that is sold by our zoo. It's made with manure and bedding from their animals, has a beautiful color, doesn't smell, and works amazingly well.

i get potting soil at costco. they're huge and very difficult to manage, but by far the best value. i'm getting up there in age and may not be able to manhandle them around for too much longer, though.

the cheapest pots are at walmart but i loathe walmart and rarely shop there. i try to hit the stores at the end of the season and stock up for the next year on their sales. i also use random things as pots- old watering cans, horse water buckets, baskets. if you can knock a hole or two in the bottom or line it with landscaping fabric you can usually turn it into a flower pot.

but i get my flowers at local plant nurseries, and my veg plants from local organic growers. most of their gardening supplies are just too expensive, but i want plants that are started locally.

khairete
S.

We do Home Depot and then do little local places

** Potting soil watch for deals. Pots I get end of season (sales).

Now that I have good garden space, I am really making an effort to buy from local greenhouses. At one local greenhouse I was able to buy fresh compost soil for $1 something for a 5 gallon bucket. Then my husband found free compost at the place where we take our grass clippings and leaves. It did have rocks and sticks in it since it was made from people’s yard waste, but overall was pretty good.

I have found several pots at garage sales. Also check places like Michaels crafts. They tend to be cheaper there and they always have coupons and sales going on.

Consider buying your plants at places that are “bee friendly”. A lot of the big box stores use an herbicide that kills bees. I’ve gotten 90% of my plants from our farmers market from growers that don’t use any chemicals. (One of the people I buy from just uses a spray made from water and blue Dawn dish soap.) The are growing better than the plants that have been treated with bee friendly chemicals. Even my tomato plant that was hit with hail is surviving! And the small cat mint plant we bought (because it is native to our area and attracts butterflies) almost needs to be repotted after just a couple of weeks! I’ve never had such beautiful plants from big box stores.