Monsanto, Seminis and Burpee

Posted by Angela England Jan 11, 2007

I recently recieved an email memo stating that Seminis Inc. was purchasing the familiar W. Atlee Burpee seed company. It also said Seminis was owned by Monsanto and so Burpee would now be part of the Monsanto Corporation. It startled me; I hadn't read anything else about Burpee selling so I did some research to verify.

The second part of the memo was easy enough to verify. A press release on the Seminis website from 1-24-05 confirms that Monsanto did acquire Seminis for 1.4 billion dollars, however the rest of the memo circulating about was harder to find information for. I put a call in to Seminis Inc to find out the truth.

A spokeperson for Seminis, Mica Veihman spoke with me this morning and answered all my questions. Veihman said Seminis has "no intent to purchase Burpee" and this supposed email message was a complete rumor.

Burpee is a dealer of Seminis garden products which is probably how this rumor originated. They have been a customer of Seminis for over 20 years. Other familiar seed catalog companies that purchase from Seminis are Jung Seed, Johnny's Selected Seeds, and Park Seed. A full list of current distributors is available here.

According to the Burpee website the company is, "owned and operated by George Ball Jr. - a passionate plantsman and third generation seedsman".

Rumors can grow as rampant as weeds in the gardening community. Feel free to discuss here.