r/Allotment • u/Due_Letterhead810 • 9d ago
Online Seed Swap
Hi everyone I'm the founder of Sow Revolution a website aimed at making seed swapping as easy as possible.
I thought some of you may be interested in joining us.
Let me know if you have any questions at all!
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u/cherryaplle 8d ago
How will it work?
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u/Due_Letterhead810 8d ago
Hiya, this page has a full guide:
https://sowrevolution.com/how-it-works
But short version is you upload your seeds. Go to discover page and look through the other seeds available. Tell us what you do / don’t want. Then when we find a match we let you know and you take it from there.
It’s a bit like a dating site - but for seeds 🤣
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u/Due_Letterhead810 8d ago
I should also add you can set up a group and only swap with people in that group (if you want to). So if you only want to swap with allotment holders on your site you can do. Or in you town / club whatever works for you.
Or you can swap with people all over the country. It’s really up to you how to use it.
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u/AttemptingToBeGood 8d ago
Huh, just came on here after searching for local seed swapping groups with no success all day. I have endless dorset naga and fatalii seeds to swap.
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u/Due_Letterhead810 7d ago
Yes this is exactly why I decided to build it. I want seed swapping to be something that happens all year round.
We have an annual seed swap in our town - and I do occasionally travel to the others nearby. But they all tend to be in spring, so the rest of the year round it’s a bit of a faff to find someone to swap with!
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u/McBexxx 7d ago
2 things.
Random numbers being used here but if I had 500 sweet pea seeds then I doubt anyone would want that many. I'm happy to say to say I have 10 lots of 50 seeds. Maybe that option could be available.
Also a direct swap may not be possible - especially at the beginning. I would be happy to post spare seeds anyway in the hope that someone else would do the same. That might be a bit complicated having a multiway swap. Or just having it done on goodwill. There is a level of trust needed to post seeds etc and hope that others turn up in the post.
I'm still at the relative beginning of my allotment journey so tend to only have seeds that are 'standard' but I'm introducing a different focus next year. My seeds might not match up with someone already at that level but might help someone else. I've also already added most of my seeds to my allotments charity stall, where we swap seeds and raise money for the local community (spare produce goes there as well and anyone can donate to an honesty box in return).
Sorry for the ramble but I know what I meant and hope it makes sense.
And a quick question, are swaps matched up by country as I wouldn't feel comfortable posting to another country or receiving seeds from another country due to different customs rules.
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u/Due_Letterhead810 6d ago
Hiya,
For your sweet pea scenario.
Yes you can do this - you can put in 50 in the quantity box and 10 in packets. It will keep each packet separate so you can swap each one with someone different.One way swaps is something a few people have mentioned - so watch this space.
Yes - as default you only match with people in your customs area (I.e if you are in England you will only see seeds from other people in GB)
Thank you for taking the time to give us feedback- we’re really keen to make the site as user friendly as possible. So it’s really helpful to hear from people.
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u/Maleficent-Writer387 6d ago
I've had a quick look, but it looks quite complicated to me swipes , swaps, locks, not to mention free tier, paid tier, prominence etc.
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u/Due_Letterhead810 6d ago
Hiya - we’re more than happy to help if you want to join.
The free tier is more than enough for most hobby gardeners. So I’d recommend giving it a go.
The main thing you need to know are:
Swipes - this is just how you let us know what seeds you would / wouldn’t like). You can use the filters if for example you only want to see carrots - so you don’t need to go through everything if you don’t want to.
Swaps - this is where you see your matches and arrange the swap with the other person.
Locks - if a seed is locked it just means it is already part of a swap. So no longer shows up for new people who are looking. They get locked for 24 hours to give you and the other user time to decide if you’d like to go ahead. If not they get unlocked and go back into the pool. This all happens automatically so not something you need to worry about.
Let us know if we can help at all - we want to make it as user friendly as possible. Whilst also being transparent about how it works behind the scenes.
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u/spaceoperator 8d ago
Looks interesting. I will definitely take a closer look. Perhaps provide a suggested label template rather than peoples interpretation. Also include "Colour" for flowers, as not knowing can be annoying sometimes.