Pretty awful. I wrote last summer about a horrendous experience I had with chicks getting stranded at Sacramento's main distribution center for 3 days and arriving in bad shape. That same thing happened again in the fall with my cornish cross chicks. This year, I've had two orders of hatching eggs arrive with smashed boxes and broken eggs.
Well, apparently I'm not the only person who has suffered in Northern California. I just saw that one major hatchery, Jenks in Oregon, will no longer ship small orders of chicks (less then 200) to any California address due to "delivery and logistics issues, resulting in chick loss." You can either order 200 or more, and they will arrange a flight with a private carrier, or they will ship them to a Oregon border city and you can drive to get them. (This is a separate issue from the Southern California quarantine due to Newcastles disease, as Northern California is not under quarantine)
It's crazy -- they are able to safely ship to anywhere else in the US -- even Hawaii and Alaska -- but not to the state right next door because the postal service distribution center here cannot be trusted to treat the chicks carefully, and deliver them in a timely fashion I can only imagine the level of complaints they have had to deal with before deciding to pull the plug on California.
I have been buying my meat birds from this company for 5 years, and really liked their birds and service. It's a shame. Other hatcheries are still willing to ship here, but I'm reluctant to buy any shipped birds at this point. It's pretty clear that my problems last year were not simply bad luck, but rather business as usual.
Well, apparently I'm not the only person who has suffered in Northern California. I just saw that one major hatchery, Jenks in Oregon, will no longer ship small orders of chicks (less then 200) to any California address due to "delivery and logistics issues, resulting in chick loss." You can either order 200 or more, and they will arrange a flight with a private carrier, or they will ship them to a Oregon border city and you can drive to get them. (This is a separate issue from the Southern California quarantine due to Newcastles disease, as Northern California is not under quarantine)
It's crazy -- they are able to safely ship to anywhere else in the US -- even Hawaii and Alaska -- but not to the state right next door because the postal service distribution center here cannot be trusted to treat the chicks carefully, and deliver them in a timely fashion I can only imagine the level of complaints they have had to deal with before deciding to pull the plug on California.
I have been buying my meat birds from this company for 5 years, and really liked their birds and service. It's a shame. Other hatcheries are still willing to ship here, but I'm reluctant to buy any shipped birds at this point. It's pretty clear that my problems last year were not simply bad luck, but rather business as usual.
