Dirt Exchange

The veggie mix we got at the beginning of spring has our vegetable garden producing the most out of all the others on the block. I plan on coming back next year to get a few buckets full. If you don’t need a lot you can get up to five 5-​gallon buckets worth of what you need, but if you need more than rent a truck. The guys who load the stuff in to trucks are artists with their machines. Thank you for helping feed my family.

This place in AWESOME. I was helping my sister with her rockery and we got everything needed. Great service. I would highly recommend to anyone!

Very easy process. Simple, easy to read signage on where to enter, park and pay for the soil. The pricing is great.

This is the 2^nd time we have worked with Dirt Exchange, and again we were very happy with our experience. We went here originally because it was close and convenient to our Ballard house, but return because of the great customer service we receive. The woman in the office was always very helpful with options and prices. This time, we ordered our rock on Friday for a Saturday morning delivery. The friendly guy who delivered the rockery was running late, by about an hour, but let us know and then called when he was on his way with the delivery. The rockery was great, but there were also some larger, mis-​colored rocks that we did not order. The delivery guy happily offered to leave us those at no cost or take them back. We opted to keep those. We needed more rockery later that day, so gave us another few yards at an extreme discount due to the earlier «mistake». To note, they also take yard waste and concrete, at a fraction of the cost of taking it to the dump. Friendly service, convenient, and great pricing.

Hey Gurl,
Do you see this soil? It’s tomato material.
If dirt could talk, then the Vegetable Garden Mix would have that Ryan Gossling croon. Just sayin’.
Gardening is not for wusses. It’s dirty. It’s sweaty. Your back aches from hauling bags of decomposed poop from there to there like some competitor in some Public Access deadlift competition. You get gains from gardening. You see this ‘bis’ and ‘tris’?
All. Gardening. Gains.
One gardens because they know they can’t get any more local than their own yard. You do it because you know that if Global Warming decides to not be a d-​bag, your initial investment will end up feeding you for the rest of the year. People may call you a cheap bastid, but when you hand them that cabbage that’s as big as a Fremont studio apartment, then they’ll want your produce on speed dial.
If you’re serious about getting a productive garden, then the Dirt Exchange is the place to get soil and the initial round of compost. Stuff is black gold. The coaxer of kale. The zen to zucchini. It’s rich, easy to shovel and tasty to critters who are into dirt buffet. Our yard turned from Wasteland to Eden over a weekend. Dirt Exchange gives better quality for your buck and it’s less expansive than chain hardware stores. We priced multiple and our math always pointed to DE. Side note? Their tree mulch is off the chain. It’s a fast seller for a reason.
So the location isn’t Hipster friendly. *Kanye Shrug*
When we called expressing our gardening plans, the staff gave helpful advice, directions to the site and informed us about the entrance. There is no window shopping. No lovely glass lawn sculptures, sparkling water and garden gnomes. That experience is for wusses and wusses go to Home Depot.

What a nightmare. I’d headed here from my Ballard home with such positive plans. The idea of being able to pick up a load of compost or mulch in my own pickup was a great idea. Gardening is so relaxing.
But using the Dirt Exchange is not. It’s stressful and dangerous for the first time user, like myself, who didn’t know there was another entrance.
Do not come into the business off 15^th… unless you want to drive through a gauntlet of larger vehicles leaving, or the loader and truck with whatever. I was in the way of another large truck trying to leave (and I’m sorry guy, I was scared of driving behind the loader so I decided to take it slow).
Why on earth wouldn’t they put signs up to warn people NOT to come through the yard, that they have another Customer friendly entrance!!!
I could not even see that part from 15^th.
So I drove through the supply yard where the dirt, rocks, gravel, mulch, etc are stored and where trucks, tractor and leaving customers are moving about. They all stopped for my intrusion. Thank you. I was trying to figure out where on earth I was supposed to be, but where the large vehicles were blocking the view… I could only see a glass building on the other end and hoped that was where to go. A LARGE sign saying ‘OFFICE” like at a construction site, would be great.
Stress. give me more.
Really, most of us city dwelling gardeners do not go into places like this ever. Safety should be paramount here. The idea of my 83 yo neighbor coming here is terrifying. BUT, safety doesn’t seem to be much of a consideration.
ZERO signage for directions, parking (small grayish worded signs come into view when you are AT the office end and there are no vehicles between you and the building, but do nothing for you as you enter off 15^th), some sort of way to explain the customer path to get to safer entrance.
I drove by this place on the Ballard Bridge for months. I wasn’t sure I was allowed in here. There’s nothing to point out commercial v. customers welcomed here. So I rolled the dice and still lost, LOLOL. The winner was the kid at the desk, at least he was very nice. I appreciated that. After no one answered his call to find out if there was the stuff I needed I was done. He tried.
Knowing there was a safer, stress and drama free entrance would have made the difference in my first time visit 1000%. First impressions are hard to overcome.
I’m thinking this isn’t the right place for the regular little guy like me. A homeowner in Ballard, who needs a load of mulch and compost once a year or so.
I’d spoken with neighbors and friends in Ballard, who garden like me, but everyone was waiting for someone else to try it. No one seemed sure if «we» were allowed to use it or not. It looks so «commercial». So I wanted to get going on my garden today and tried it. Lucky me.
I wanted to support local business. I’ve lived in Ballard for years. We love our gardens. The majority of my neighbors grow pretty decent gardens these days. But I would tell them not to risk their safety or joy by coming here, it ain’t worth the hassle or stress.
All for some signage. and in reading the other comments, I see I am not the first with this issue. What are you waiting for?!! someone to be run over by the loader? The box trucks?.. the «hurry up» and get out of my way «commercial» gardner guy that was in a truck towing a horse trailer full of dirt…
Ballard is FULL of gardeners. I know I am far from the only one around here who has been wondering about using this place. I think it still makes sense to drive all the way north to Skyway before defying death by coming off 15^th. It’s not for little gardeners like me. It’s really for the guys with the bigger set up or maybe the delivery, for an extra fee.
No sale.

Filled out an online delivery request for a Saturday delivery, never heard back from them. I called the morning I was expecting the delivery, as it turns out they don’t make delivery’s on Saturdays in the winter. (This is fall by the way) Of course it didn’t say that on the delivery request form. She said that they tried to call, if they did they didn’t leave a message, they also had my e-​mail address. Very poor communication and insincere customer service. She made no attempt to make it right, apparently they have so much business they don’t need good customer service.

I tried returning a sprinkler head which had started leaking and first was told that they
did not take returns. I had to explain to their sales person that the no return policy was for «bulk» items and that a sprinkler head was not a bulk item. I was then shuffled to someone who told me that he would have to do some checking and kept me waiting until I finally left. It was almost as if the guy figured that if he kept me waiting I would leave. All this for a $ 12.00 item. These people are clueless when it comes to customer service. The certainly lost a lot more than $ 12.00 worth of business from me.

Awesome dirt. Great yard for the stuff your yard needs. Super service and the quality of the products is top notch.

Great prices and super quick service. We borrowed a truck and picked up a yard and a half of the vegetable garden mix. It was only 60 bucks!
That volume of soil would have been well over $ 200 if purchased as individual bags.
Admittedly the signage for entrance/​parking is confusing. I circled around, then missed the general public parking strip and sort of awkwardly waited until someone took pity on me and came out. I wish they’d have come out sooner rather than just look out from the office window.

Absolutely recommend Dirt Exchange for all your dirt-​y needs… from the ground, up.
We have a huge (for us) project in our backyard… the Dirt Exchange is the foundation of our success! We liked our first delivery SO MUCH (yesterday) that we ordered more today.
Thank you, Dirt Exchange!

Great service and great location. We were able to schedule a delivery online and then, got a call to make sure that all the details were correct– very professional. So much easier and cheaper than going to any store. Definitely will use them again!!!