Allotments 4 All

General => News => Topic started by: cambourne7 on September 14, 2007, 20:36:24

Title: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: cambourne7 on September 14, 2007, 20:36:24
Watching BBC Gardeners World and there doing another seed give away no details on yet i am sure they will be revelied at the end of the program.

Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
To celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the series, Gardeners' World is offering a limited collection of three sweet peas named after presenters. 'Percy Thrower', 'Alan Titchmarsh' and the newly launched 'Monty Don' are all available on a first come first served basis. One thousand packets of each variety are on offer.

To get your free packet of seeds, send in a self-addressed envelope with the name of the sweet pea you want in the top right hand corner to: BBC Gardeners' World, Sweet Pea Giveaway, Birmingham, B1 1RF
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Tin Shed on September 14, 2007, 22:46:58
Thanks, Cambourne - didn't get time to write the postcode down!!!
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: sarah on September 15, 2007, 07:59:05
well done cambourne. i am going to go for the percy throwers.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: dandelion on September 15, 2007, 09:38:23
Watching BBC Gardeners World and there doing another seed give away no details on yet i am sure they will be revelied at the end of the program.

Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
To celebrate the fortieth anniversary of the series, Gardeners' World is offering a limited collection of three sweet peas named after presenters. 'Percy Thrower', 'Alan Titchmarsh' and the newly launched 'Monty Don' are all available on a first come first served basis. One thousand packets of each variety are on offer.

To get your free packet of seeds, send in a self-addressed envelope with the name of the sweet pea you want in the top right hand corner to: BBC Gardeners' World, Sweet Pea Giveaway, Birmingham, B1 1RF


No postage stamp then?
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: caroline7758 on September 15, 2007, 12:26:38
No, they specificaaly said no stamp on the self-addressed envelope.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: cambourne7 on September 15, 2007, 16:16:17
yes you write the name of the variaty you want in the top right hand corner where the stamp is.

Sweet Pea - Alan Titchmarsh  - http://www.unwinsdirect.co.uk/?PAGEID=20670&STK_PROD_CODE=5010-2110&CTL_CAT_CODE=11014

Sweet Pea - 'Monty Don' http://www.rpsweetpeas.co.uk/Monty%20Don.htm

Sweet Pea - 'Percy Thrower' http://www.unwinsdirect.co.uk/rkmain.asp?PAGEID=20670&STK_PROD_CODE=5010-2118

My envelope is going into the post monday as we dont get a collection saturday, and i am going for Monty Don :-) If you look at the link for monty don above you will also see details on how you can order it from the grower.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Baaaaaaaa on September 18, 2007, 12:12:44

Sweet Pea - 'Monty Don' http://www.rpsweetpeas.co.uk/Monty%20Don.htm



At a pod popping £3.00 + £0.80 p&p for 10 seeds ! - is Roger Parsons the 'Young Offender' that Monty Don is funding ?
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Baaaaaaaa on October 01, 2007, 12:48:29
Has anyone received any seeds yet?

Is this another TV scam - 50,000 applications * 34p postage = nice fat income for the post office.

I wonder what the kickback was  ???

For someone who bangs on about being organic, how many trees were destroyed in making envelopes for this 'offer' ? Will we see them in the Berryfields compost heap ?
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: SteveJ on October 01, 2007, 14:34:36
I got my seeds today - a whopping 5 seeds of the 'Monty Don' variety, 

Still, I'm not gonna complain as I seem to be one of the lucky ones.......
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: cambourne7 on October 01, 2007, 16:49:40
SteveJ I am glad you got some seeds, i was not so lucky.

I dont believe that GW had thought that the offer would be so popular, what they should be doing is putting them on the magazine so if people want them they should get the magazine. I am sure that if monty has anything to do with it most of the stuff would be shreaded and put on the compost heap BUT as the envelopes have peoples details on them and the data protection act is in place so i would guess the BBC would have to pay for all these to be taken away and shreaded securly. And i have no idea what happens to that stuff i did read somewhere that its sold to make recycled toiled rolls etc
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Baaaaaaaa on October 02, 2007, 01:30:38
How many of GW seed "Offers" have not been over subscribed many fold. If this were a genuine offer then at least 50% of applicants should receive something - otherwise its a 'lottery' not an offer.

They may as well ask one of those multi-choise questions, so you can use your skill and judgement.

    Which is a plant :
                                  A: Sweet talk
                                  B: Sweet pea
                                  C: Sweet FA


I'm sure if the seeds were on front of the GW magazine, their sales would increase and everyone would be happier.

Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Obelixx on October 02, 2007, 10:21:17
Cambourne 7 - The Data protection Act only applies to digitally stored info.  It can actually be got around by storing sensitive data on paper.  When it first was introduced I was responsible for its implementation and staff training in a software house and at one info seminar, the guy from a large computer manufacturer proudly told us their personnel department was transefrring all sensitive comments on staff performance to paper because they then ecaped the obligation to give access to the data.

As for having 3000 packets of seed to offer, it's a nice idea but a woefully inadequate quantity given the weekly viewing figures.   "Must try harder" is what I'd put on the GW giveaways assessment form.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: cambourne7 on October 02, 2007, 11:49:11
Obbelix your probably right the problem is that as we have seen in the past these companies dont always know what there doing.

I agree with your assessment :)
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: OllieC on October 02, 2007, 12:23:27
As a registered "data controller" under the DPA, I can confirm that it covers all personal data - whether digital or on paper.

When it was first introduced it was digital only. Things were changed in the 1998 act.

I'll get me anorak!

And what a bunch of shysters (sp?) (GW, not the Information Commissioner, of course!), that was never going to be enough seeds. Are they just trying to upset people?
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Robert_Brenchley on October 02, 2007, 22:11:06
That was a ridiculous situation with the original DPA, only covering digital info. I had quite an argument once on some job training, trying to convince the people responsible for delivering said training that they'd got it wrong and it didn't cover paper records. In the end I had to produce a copy of the Act to convince them.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Obelixx on October 03, 2007, 08:55:04
Yes, and it didn't include credit info either as that was covered by a different act.  Our personnel department positively jumped with glee when I mentioned what the big computer manufacturer was doing to get round the bits it ddn't like.  I'm glad it's been extended to paper now.   Thanks for that info Ollie.  As I live in Belgium that had passed me by.

As for GW, I'm more concerned about "arty" camera work and direction than the seeds give away.   Monty has posted on the Beeb boards saying he can't see what the problem is as he thinks the camera work is very professional and it's the same team that's been doing it for years.  Apparently they use several producers though and it was clearly a wrong 'un last week.  Other than that I think the general tone and content of the programme have improved since it started again last month.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: tartonterro on October 03, 2007, 18:54:06
got my seeds - so did my mum - we must have been some of the lucky ones, havent looked at how many yet.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Slug_killer on October 03, 2007, 19:12:25


They may as well ask one of those multi-choise questions, so you can use your skill and judgement.

    Which is a plant :
                                  A: Sweet talk
                                  B: Sweet pea
                                  C: Sweet FA



Shouldn't the question be "What is Monty Don well known for ?"  ??
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: caroline7758 on October 03, 2007, 19:33:15
Obbelix, def. agree with you about the camera work last week- all that panning in and out so you couldn't see what they were doing half the time. >:(
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Obelixx on October 04, 2007, 08:50:16
We've been having a concerted go about that on the Beeb boards for ages and there has definitely been some improvement since the spring and early summer progs.  However, this week it was a retrogade step back to arty shots.  The plants and flowers are beautiful enough and don't need tarting up and the techniques and trouble shooting definitely need to be seen close up and in focus.   
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Heldi on October 04, 2007, 11:04:43
Agreed re the camera work last week. It was plain annoying. Why do we need to see different views of the presenters presenting? Why do we need to go into blurred vision? Had to do a double take at my wine bottle! The only thing I would have liked to have seen in a long shot were those asters in Monty's pick of the week, so we could see how they looked in the border...but they blurred those too didn't they?

Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Kea on October 04, 2007, 12:27:50
When they did the climate change thing with the tulips I would have liked to have taken part but couldn't get the right tulip. The next year I thought they might have given us a planting date again for those that missed out but they didn't.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Obelixx on October 04, 2007, 17:10:16
We've also had a constructive moan about the lack of follow ups in GW and this has led to the new feature where we see bits of the garden taht are doing well but it is true the global warming tulip experiment has dropped off their radar and the alpine house and beds seem to have disappeared too.  I don't recall any proper follow up of the slug trials a couple of years ago either.

Anyway, if you want the programme to improve, you need to post comments on the Beeb TV boards because they are actually read by Monty and Alice (?) the head gardener at Berryfields and we occasionally get feedback..

I agree about those asters.  They should have been shown in context as well as close up.  After Monty's eulogy on GW I was actually tempted to buy some for part of my garden but when I saw them close up at the market on Wednesday I realised I really do dislike them still so bought some stokesia instead - similar colour but much more attractive and no mildew.
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Baaaaaaaa on October 04, 2007, 20:02:57
When they did the climate change thing with the tulips ... have given us a planting date again ....


'Twas Bonfire night.

(With all the PC stuff  these days are we still allowed to set fire to Catholic protesters from 1605  & with all the environmentalists - are we still allowed to burn stuff that could have gone int the recycle bin ?)
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Amazin on October 05, 2007, 00:22:39
SteveJ,

Quote
I got my seeds today - a whopping 5 seeds of the 'Monty Don' variety, 

Still, I'm not gonna complain as I seem to be one of the lucky ones.......

Not so lucky if you've paid £3.80 for five seeds!

http://www.rpsweetpeas.co.uk/Monty%20Don.htm

Check it out - it clearly says a minimum of 10 seeds

 :'(
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: cambourne7 on October 05, 2007, 16:37:00
maybe they split the amounts to try and share to more people???
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Lauren S on October 05, 2007, 18:05:11
They divided the amounts but still took the same money for each set of seeds. Trades description might have some say about that  :o
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: SteveJ on October 08, 2007, 15:10:44
Amazin,
The packs sent out were not the commercial packs, but specially prepared packs for the GW giveaway.  which I guess is the reason they contained 5 seeds instead of the 'minimum 10 seeds'. 

They even had a disclaimer on the back absolving the BBC from any responsibility for the seeds, fair enough I guess, although I would have been slightly concerned about if I had paid £3.80 for them!

Steve
 
Title: Re: BBC Gardeners' World sweet pea seed giveaway
Post by: Amazin on October 09, 2007, 01:09:07
Ah, that explains it then. Phew! I'll sleep better now (potential loss of dosh always makes me nervous).

 ;D
SimplePortal 2.3.5 © 2008-2012, SimplePortal