About
There is no warehouse. There’s a table.
Vice Seeds is one man, one packing table and a scale, in Mustang, Oklahoma. We buy seed in bulk from growers we can name, test it, and fill the packets by hand. That’s the whole operation, and it’s the reason we can tell you things a larger company can’t.
Who you’re buying from
I’m Kenneth Vice
I started this because ordering seed online had become a guessing game. Packets arrive with no lot number, no test date and no count — just a picture of a tomato and a phrase like “generous packet.” You plant it, half of it doesn’t come up, and there is no way to know whether that was the seed, the weather, or you.
So Vice Seeds does the opposite. Every lot gets a germination test before anything is packed. The rate, the date of the test and the lot number go on the back of the packet, where you can read them. If a variety tests badly, it doesn’t get sold — it gets composted, which is expensive and correct.
I pack the orders myself, in a shop building behind the house. If something goes wrong with your order, the person who answers is the person who filled it.
About the name
Vice is a family name, not a wink. It’s on my birth certificate and my father’s before that, and it seemed a waste to put anything else on the packet.
We do sell a poppy mix, and we always will — poppies are among the oldest garden flowers in the world and they belong in a cutting bed. But it is one variety among many, sitting on the shelf next to the beans and the basil, and it does not run this company. If you came here for tomatoes, you’ll find we take those just as seriously.
Four things we hold to
Test before we pack
Every lot, every season. The germination rate and test date are printed on the packet, so you’re never guessing how old your seed is.
Keep the catalogue small
We would rather carry forty varieties we can vouch for than four hundred we’ve never put in the ground. Every addition has to earn its shelf.
Say the number
Seed counts, sowing depth, spacing and days to maturity are on every product page. No “generous packet,” no vague pictures of vegetables.
Replace it if it fails
Write to us and we’ll send another packet. Usually it turns out to be soil temperature or planting depth — but working that out is our job, not yours.
And four things we won’t do
- Sell treated seed. Nothing we carry is fungicide-coated, chemically treated or pelleted. If that ever changes for a particular variety, the product page will say so in plain words.
- Relabel old stock. Seed that has sat a year gets retested and the new date goes on the packet, or it doesn’t go out. Nothing is repacked with a fresh face and an old inside.
- Pad a packet with filler. What’s in the packet is seed, and the count on the page is the count in your hand.
- Pretend we grew it. We buy from growers and wholesalers and pack it ourselves. We’ll tell you that plainly rather than dressing up a seed shed as a farm.
Where your order comes from
Mustang, Oklahoma
Central Oklahoma is hard ground to garden. The last frost moves around, the wind takes seedlings, and summer arrives in a week rather than a month. Growing here makes you honest about what a variety can actually take.
Orders leave here within two business days, packed by hand and shipped from the post office in town. Free shipping over $35.
Have a look at the catalogue
Small on purpose, tested before it’s packed, and dated so you know what you’re planting.