New Years in November?

by Ken Greene

It’s not quite New Years, but we’re already tackling “out with the old, in with the new.”

Here’s what’s new with the Seed Library.

NEW WEBSITE
We’ve done a complete overhaul of the old seedlibrary.org, including a new e-commerce platform. Right now just the Holiday Catalog is up. The full catalog will be up in January. We hope you like the new design, but we hope you’ll find that the new shop is easier to navigate and has more of what you’re looking for.

We’ve listened to the many comments we’ve gotten and added:

1.    More photos: Each variety has a slideshow of photos from our farm and other real gardens, not the stock photos you find in most seed catalogs. It’s been a big undertaking on our part and we’ll be continuing to add to the slide shows between now and January. If you have a photo of one of our varieties growing in your garden, send it to us and we’ll add it!
2.    Search feature: Now you can search key words directly from the search box.
3.    More interactivity: You can write reviews of individual varieties and share your favorites on Facebook. Try it out! It’s very helpful for other gardeners and we really need your help spreading the word about the Seed Library. Thanks!
4.    Seeder’s Digest Blog: We’re working on culling through our many blog posts and we’ll be re-categorizing them so that the first tab in the blog section is the latest posts and the second tab is just hands-on gardening how-to. This is still in the works.
5.    More info: You’ll notice that when you click into a variety there’s a tabbed section, like a classic library card catalog. Each tab has info about that variety. We’ll be adding more info to these tabs between now and January.
6.    More About Us: Many of you have wanted to know more about our seeds, seed farm, and our artists. Check out the new About Us page here.
7.    We’ll renew or resolutions in January by adding even more newness including: 150+varieties, Seed Library Memberships, more photos, more how-to, and more awesome moreness!

NEW MEMBERSHIP
We’ve also reinvented our Seed Library Membership program. The new membership, called Community Seeds, is based on the popular “Community Reads” programs run by book libraries all over the country. We’ve added more discounts, more seed saving education, and seed donations to community groups- it’s a whole new seed saving experience! Right now Gift Memberships are available. Personal memberships will be on the website starting in January. You can read more about it here.

NEW VARIETIES & GIFTS
There are 26 new Art Packs in the Holiday Catalog and we’re almost done cleaning and testing the new seeds for the full catalog in January. Check out our brand new Seedy Greetings card line, Gift Baskets, and themed seed collections like Container Gardens, Edible Landscaping, and Homestead Essentials.

NEW BUGS?

If you stumble over any bugs with all this newness, please let us know so we can fix it! Thank you!