to hate garden centers and visitors centers with a passion?

[ssd]

they are rubbish, all over priced stale food, wee women in hair nets working a till they can't use, rubbish over price gifts and cards, crap selling for twice the price you'd see in the local shops

visiting them was the low light of my childhood, my mum loved gardening and I got dragged round them all, my dad loved history so we'd go into the visitor centers for that

thanks god I'm older and don't need to go!

I go for the tea and cake.

Ours is nice. It's overpriced and full of the snobbiest people I've ever encountered, but the cafe is v good.

I like them, they are nice.

Especially on Bank Holiday weekends. They clog up the roas for all of us rushing off to buy more Sofas

Tea and cake was an institution at our local garden centre. Not one of those great big shed type ones but a proper family run one.

I do often find I buy things at garden centres and then find them a heck of lot cheaper elsewhere on the internet though.

YANBU, proper nursery much better. Ours now has a tea room as well, perfect! Plants and cake, no overpriced shite scented candles.

I love them. I am a sucker for overpriced tat to go in my cupboards and never again see the light of day.

YANBU - I can understand why you hate them.

but I love them. And there's a really good on near us where the actual gardening part is excellent - whenever I buy plants from them, they're much better quality than the cheapos I buy elsewere. And I love wandering around them. And DH and I found when DS was very tiny it was a nice day out for the family.

And I love love love Wisley!

The garden centre local to my parents house ( wyvale Bicester incase you were wondering) Is used by all the ok yars as a cheap day out... It's hell at the weekend, if you go on a week day morning it's ok as thats when the normal people go.

There is nothing better than a proper plant based garden centre though.. not the ones that sell 150 tins for string and scented candles, ones that sell actual plants!

( a slice of cake is fine too, as long as you don't have to take out a mortgage to pay for it)

You need to go to non-chain garden centres

wrt the visitor's centres, I feel your pain

this is my sort of place

We have a huge one locally. It has a Hobbycraft. food hall, cafe, aquatices and pets and all the expensive gifts etc and even some plants.

There are usually about 3 coaches there at any one time.

YABU, mostly for using the American English spelling, rather than the British-English spelling of 'centre'

Spell it properly and I may reconsider.

Methe that looks LOVELY

I do like a rummage and a coffee at a garden centre , however i live in a scottish visitors town so we have tartan tatt galore so im used to over priced rubbish , But i love the garden centre even if its expensive i never buy much .

oh and we have a nice 1 near us not a named place its great and sometimes the TATT is unusual and i have bought gifts from there , I am an OAP before my time aint I

I love garden centres and visitor centres. Yes I can see there is a lot of overpriced tat for sale, but i still love them.

I loathe garden centres. They always smell dreadful. And it's COLD. And I don't understand anything about gardening.

However we have a Wyevale which is something a bit better. It's full of 'gifts' and stuff like that, and they have some really good reduced stuff and sometimes, we come home with a ten foot tree stuffed into our hatchback, just because it was half price.

And now they have bunged in a SOFT PLAY as well which is just heaven, though I hate soft play usually...this one is ace because you just abandon the children and wander about aimlessly for hours buying Christmas decorations or RHS tea towels or wellies or something.

It definitely has its place. For actual good plants and so on we go to the family owned one, but it's not such fun.

You can keep your visitor centres full stop (apart from our local one which does cut price train sets ) (for the kids, you understand, I am not obsessed, no, no)

It is bloody lovely :) It's a little bit rough around the edges and off the beaten track but it's heaven to potter round of a couple of hours.. just like a garden centre should be!

Thy have a plant hospital too, where the plants in need of a bit of nurturing are for sale CHEAPLY... not at10% like bloody wyvale. Things like that make me happy :)

ahh Wyevale.. I knew I was spelling it wrong.

Awww Methe plant hospital, sweet. One of my apples trees remains unidentified, it was sold as Label Lost So Take A Chance. It's not a Bramley, that's all I can say. lolo.

YANBU on the whole. They can be pretty miserable places.

My SIL lives near an amazing one which has a small zoo and a little train for the children. She often goes and spends nothing, but it entertains the children for a while.

We used to have a fabulous nursery near us, that specialised in fuschias. We would spend hours there. It's now a faceless garden centre that sells smelly candles and other shite. We no longer go there.