Cheap Orchid Flasks?
 

Does anyone know where I can get cheap flasks?
I want to try deflasking, but all the available products I can find are very expensive. I know Roellke-Orchideen sells some, but they don't have a wide selection and shipping costs too much. I am looking for US vendors, maybe South American as well, that sell species flasks for $20 or lower.

Try on eBay.

I have flasks from Roellke, no doubt they have good price.

Ebay flasks are $50 plus shipping.

Remember, a flask is likely to contain 25 or more plants. So you're asking for someone to sell for less than a dollar a plant. And the seller has gone to the effort to propagate the plant, sow the seed, go through one or several replates, and probably spend considerably more than a year doing it. I doubt that you're going to find anything so cheap, at least for something that would be worth the time and effort to grow.

Cheap flasks are usually going to grow mold or fungus. For the reasons Roberta stated

ah, I don't care about replates. Someone could probably make a killing selling small test tubes or ampoules with plants in them. Bloomify Tech already got the idea and is cornering the market. I do think that selling small jars with 2-4 plants in them is a good idea. I'll try it when I actually get some seed to flask!

---------- Post added at 06:04 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:01 PM ----------


Normally I'd just suck it up and buy a full size flask, but there aren't many ways for me to earn money right now. I can't really sell garden plants to the neighbors or anything, and no one is going to buy cooked or mixed goods like lemonade or cookies.

REplating is part of the flasking process... Start with the mother flask, then as the babies (protocorms) start to take up space, they're replated so that's when the number of flasks multiplies, still a sterile operation. (Nobody's going to sell you the "original" starting flask, if they went to the trouble of getting to that point they are going to want to have some to keep) Typically when flasks are sold, they're close to being ready for deflasking.

Like Roberta says, replating is part of the entire process. You can't leave a flask untouched from sowing to deflasking. It would be too crowded otherwise, and a different medium is often used for the replated plants. The cheap flasks Roelke sells are replated seedlings. The reason they are so cheap is because they make mini flasks of 3 to 4 plants. I doubt you will find a standard size flask for under $50.

That is right Camille & Roberta. The pack from this vendors are not like wholesales or professional flasks distributors, these are for hobbies growers, so you get like max 4-6 plants.

Your price expectation is unrealistic. The actual production costs are:

• $10 for Priority Mail, shipping pod from grower to the lab.
• $20 for sowing of mother flask for germination
• $20 for each replate flask (with 25-35 seedlings)** [$18 if producing more than 5 flasks]
• $20-30 shipping flasks from lab to grower

That means that my average production cost per flask is:
If producing 4 flasks $32.50 each
If producing 10 flasks $24.00 each

Considering that I am making an investment in a product, which may or may not be of interest to the orchid growing community, a normal return on investment = 2.5 to 3.0 multiplier. This leads to retail sales prices:

4 flasks: $81-98 each
10 flasks: $60-72 each

Then comes the big issue: Should flasks be shipped unopened (can be subject to jumbling in transit & bruised seedlings), or should I deflask and rinse the seedlings prior to shipping? The latter is an additional & time consuming process.

The lab I use can make smaller 'hobby grower' flasks with 8-13 seedlings. These could be sold for $25-30 each, but it is a loosing proposition for me to make these. If they do not sell, then my average cost per seedling goes up.

I have re-started seed production (primarily Cattleya + some small Vandaceous), and will probably send some 8-12 pods to the lab this season. That means that I will have flasks available some 20-28 months later.

Perhaps a price compromise would be to take pre-orders for hobby size flasks, so that we only produce the number we have orders for. That would require pre-payment at the time of ordering, with delivery to follow some 9-14 months later.