Buying house plants
The last recommendation for where to buy a good plants was from 2012, and hoping for current update. I don't have a green thumb to keep plants alive if they are not healthy to begin with. I bought house plants from real nurseries that have been recommended here before. I found that the reputation to be a good nursery didn't necessary correlates to how strong the indoor plants they sold. Most of the time, the plants I randomly picked at homedepo do better than the one from those nice real nurseries. It's almost like a real brand name dogs tend to be weaker than mixed kind. Of course, I choose plants are known to be "easy" to care for when I buy one. What is your thoughts on this and where do you recommend going to buy a indoor plants that will grow healthy.
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Flowerland on Solano Ave in Albany has a small but awesome selection of indoor plants. I've never had any come home with bugs and they tend to hold up way better than my plants from other sources. It's a gorgeous store!
East Bay Nursery on San Pablo and Berkeley Horticultural on Hopkins, both in Berkeley, have high quality indoor plants.
However there are a couple of hints in your post that suggest the problem is not where you buy them, but what happens to them after they come home. I have a green thumb and many years of gardening experience. I do not buy indoor plants anymore. The reason is it takes so much work to keep them looking good. Most indoor plants are from the tropics, because tropical plants typically grow under a dense tree canopy so they have evolved to not need bright sunlight, thus they can be grown indoors, in theory. But you still have to replicate a tropical climate for them if you want them to grow and thrive and look good. Regular water, not too hot, not too cold, not too much light but not too much darkness either. The beautiful plants you see in offices and hotels are serviced by businesses that specialize in plant care. They tend to them regularly and swap them out with fresh plants when they start to look ragged. The only people I know who can keep house plants looking good for more than a year are the people who are obsessively devoted them -- spritzing them with water several times a day, fertilizing them regularly, moving them around in a room to find the right spot, moving them outdoors when the weather is nice, etc. I have a friend who gets her orchids to bloom indoors year after year and I admire her for that, but I have other priorities besides checking on my orchids 3 times a day!
Here is my advice: Buy house plants but plan on replacing them before the year is up. Or hire a plant business to come and take care of them for you. Or cultivate potted plants outdoors, like ferns and palms, and bring them inside when you entertain. Or buy fresh flowers every week at the grocery store. Or get a couple of orchids which will keep their blooms for months. Around Christmas you can buy nice big poinsettias that have been hardened in dark container boxes with no water and uneven temperatures so they will look beautiful for weeks even if you forget to water them!
Good luck
Green thumb lazy lady
Don't blame the nursery. Any plant you buy is going to go through an adjustment period when you purchase it. If the plants have been very well cared for, sometimes they go through a larger adjustment period since the change is more dramatic. Buying plants from a specific place is not going to guarantee you results. Your best bet would be to evaluate the location you want to keep a plant - how much light, general temperature, humidity level and size of the space, and be realistic about the care you can provide - how often watering, misting, re-potting etc. Take that information to your local nursery and get some recommendations for that specific spot. Even with this kind of approach, it will take some trial and error. I have a green thumb and can grow most plants, but I find every plant does not do well in every location. I also have found I don't do that well with a few specific species. For instance, I have a hard time growing spider plants even though they are considered easy. You might have some similar surprises along the way.
All that said, I have bought very successful plants from Broadway Terrace Nursery, Thornhill Nursery, East Bay Nursery, The Dry Garden, Grand Ave. Ace Garden Center, and even very many local drug stores and supermarkets. The nurseries will give advice and feedback, the drug stores and supermarkets usually can't help you. If you know how to recognize a healthy plant, it doesn't really matter where you buy it from. Good luck. - Green Thumb
I am terrible at remembering to water plants (my cats, however, get regular care!) so what has worked for me is buying orchids at Trader Joe's. I like that they look good most of the time. No, I haven't yet gotten them to flower again, but the green plants are quite pretty after the flower stalks die and are cut off, and they are pretty forgiving about occasional watering. It has been the one option that has worked for me for about a year so far: a new record. :)