Chris King of Foliage

CHRIS KING’S PLANTS ARE FULL OF BUGS!!! My husband & I just moved to New York and purchased a huge palm for our bedroom from Chris beginning of May 2014. A few weeks after the plant was delivered we started finding dead millipedes around the bedroom. There were no other bug issues in our bldg and we even had an exterminator come out to spray our bedroom. We continued to find millipedes on a daily basis, many actually crawling on the floor now and then I saw a huge worm come out of the plant! We have called Chris and his store multiple times and they have done nothing!!! We have had many plants in our homes over the years and have never had any issues. I wish I had read reviews before purchasing from Chris King b/​c clearly this bug problem has been an issue in his plants for some time. It is disgusting and his store employees have told us to dump alcohol in the dirt to kill the millipedes and worms (so gross!) and we’ve now done this multiple times which I’m sure is not good for the plant and there are still bugs 4 months later! So disgusting, DO NOT PURCHASE PLANTS FROM CHRIS KING!

can’t believe these guys are still in business!
there are so many other plant stores on this street that are way better than them — stay away
spent a whooping $ 300+ on a plant we loved — deteriorated from the minute we got home. had one of their guys come take a look, paid him about $ 30 — he said we need to be patient. couple more months after that, the plant is dead
went back to talk to the owner (any guy who names a store after himself and calls himself the ‘king’ must be a character!) to see if he could do *something* and yup, he screamed at me and threatened to punch my face! i understand plants have no guarantee, but other stores on the street will take care of u if u spend $ 300+ — this guy (the ‘king’) is a low-​life who screams at u. if u even remotely care about customer service, the ‘king’ is not ur guy
and his plants aint all that, the prices are higher
i am surprised he is still in business. really

Wow, I wish I had come to Unilocal before shopping here. I, also, reported these guys to the BBB. This may have been the worst shopping experience of my life. No joke.
itOne of my items was missing in my delivery. I called to find out what was up and I received a ridiculous amount of hostility and talk-​around. Eventually, they agreed to deliver my item later that week. Come Friday, nothing had arrived, so I called again. This time, a guy claiming to be the owner totally went off on me. The worst language and even threatened to kick my a$$. Dared me to come to the store. Claimed he was a heavy weight champion! I cannot make this stuff up. All I wanted was my item. I asked him if he really did business this way and he said, «yeah, I know how to take care of you NYC kids.» Never mind I’m a 42 year old man who just wanted decent customer service. The whole ineptitude and audacity of the situation was absurd. Do yourself a favor and go elsewhere. Tell your friends to do the same. These people don’t deserve to have a business.

Similar experience, bought a large plant and after delivery realized that there was bugs/​worms all over the plant and they began crawling all over the place.

Bought a beautiful (and huge!) Song of Jamaica plant (Dracaena Arborea) from this place a couple weeks ago and it’s doing great in its new home. Haven’t had any problems with bugs that other reviewers are reporting, though perhaps I was just lucky.
The owner was friendly and helpful and even lent me a handcart on good faith to take the plant back to Brooklyn. I got a great price too, based on prices I’ve seen for comparable plants in other stores.
I liked their selection and would shop here again.

I never report companies to the Better Business Bureau. But I did with Chris King of Foliage (aka Chris King of Plants).
I work in the gardening & plant industry, and had an incredibly bad experience with this business. (Damaged, sick plant, property was damaged during delivery, was refused a refund, was YELLED AT by the owner, was never given an apology, etc, etc.)…Since my bad experience, and after speaking with other fellow gardeners & plant vendors, I hear nothing but horror stories about this business. (One vendor down the block told me that this business takes the plants that they throw out because they’re sick or damaged, & repots/​resells them!)
There are so many nice vendors in the Plant District, and they sell healthy, beautiful plants (and if they don’t have them, they’ll bend over backwards to order what you need). There’s no reason to shop at this place when there are many better options on the same block. I learned my lesson, but hope others take heed & avoid this place!

Been renting plants for photo shoots for nine years and they could not have done more! The trees are always fresh; they have a huge truck load of new exotic plants and palms and trees from their Florida farm every couple of weeks! It turns out they place trees in a bunch of the top end rest. in NYC! As a business owner, it is great when you match quality with service! Awesome plants and trees! You must always go for gifts too! The Orchids and all the rest are the best!

Ditto to the previous reviewer — two plants bought from them had severe (and two different) bug infestations and they are breathtakingly unpleasant to deal with.

I reported this business to the Better Business Bureau, and the business NEVER RESPONDED to the BBB complaint — to me directly or to the BBB. Obviously this business has horrible company practices, and has bug infestations in their plants, and is therefore afraid it will get out and they will lose customers… STAY AWAY!