Affiliate Disclosure

Last updated: September 29, 2026

GrowersGuide.ca is reader-supported. Some pages on this site contain affiliate links to products we recommend. This page explains what that means, so you can read our guides with full transparency. Two programs are named below. If we are in a program, it belongs here by name — and every product link on this site now runs through one of them, which is set out below too.

Amazon.ca Associates Program

GrowersGuide.ca is a participant in the Amazon.ca Associates Program — an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.ca. Every Amazon link on this site points to Amazon.ca, because nearly all of our readers are in Canada and buy there.

As an Amazon Associate, GrowersGuide.ca earns from qualifying purchases.

Where they appear: in the "Recommended" product boxes on the growing and houseplant guides, the frost and season-extension pages, the city planting guides, the buying guides and several of the calculators. This is by far our largest affiliate relationship by number of links.

West Coast Seeds Affiliate Program

GrowersGuide.ca is also an affiliate of West Coast Seeds, a Canadian (British Columbia) organic seed company. When we link to seeds or garden products at westcoastseeds.com and you make a purchase, we may earn a small commission — again, at no extra cost to you.

Where they appear: on the crop-timing and seed-sowing guides, the seed-starting pages and the grass-seed buying guides — the places where the honest next step really is buying seed.

Refersion is the affiliate platform West Coast Seeds runs its program on. It is not a separate company we earn from, and Refersion does not pay us; it is named here only because our West Coast Seeds links carry a Refersion tracking code, so you may see rfsn= in the address when you click one.

Other Programs, and Programs We May Join

We may join other garden-related affiliate programs as the site grows. Whatever the program, every affiliate link on this site is governed by the same editorial standards set out below — the product has to earn its place on the page first, and a commission never decides whether or how we recommend something.

This paragraph is a backstop for the gap between joining a program and updating this page. It is not a substitute for naming one. If we are in a program, it belongs in the list above, by name.

Assume Every Product Link Here Earns Us a Commission

Every product link on this site goes to Amazon.ca or to West Coast Seeds, and both of them pay us. That was not always true. Our grow-light guide used to link one manufacturer’s own store directly, which earned us nothing; that link now points at a search for that model on Amazon.ca, so the exception is gone. The rule is simpler than it was, and it is the safer assumption for you: if it is a button to buy something, we are paid when you buy through it.

What has not changed is who is paying. We are not in any manufacturer’s own affiliate program — not Mars Hydro’s, not Spider Farmer’s, not AC Infinity’s. No brand pays us to rank it above another. The commission comes from the retailer, at the same rate whichever brand you end up buying, which is exactly why it cannot decide the order of a comparison.

Plenty of outbound links here still earn us nothing, because they are not product links at all — Environment and Climate Change Canada, Natural Resources Canada, and the municipal bylaw pages we cite. Those are sources, not shopping.

What an Affiliate Link Means

When we recommend a product — a seed-starting heat mat, a frost cloth, a plant pot, a garden tool — we may link to it on Amazon.ca or West Coast Seeds. If you click that link and make a purchase, that retailer pays us a small commission.

This costs you nothing extra. You pay the same price you would pay otherwise, and the commission comes out of the retailer's margin rather than your pocket.

Affiliate links on this site are marked at the link itself, directly beneath the button, so the disclosure is in front of you at the moment it matters. Which wording you see depends on what surrounds the link:

• A product recommendation box carries a "Recommended" label and the full sentence "Affiliate link — GrowersGuide.ca may earn a commission on qualifying purchases, at no extra cost to you".
• A button in a comparison grid, or a West Coast Seeds seed button — where that sentence repeated under a dozen cards would bury the comparison itself — carries the shorter "Affiliate link — we may earn a commission on qualifying purchases, at no extra cost to you".
• On seventeen buying guides the marking beneath the buttons is Amazon’s own required wording instead, "As an Amazon Associate, GrowersGuide.ca earns from qualifying purchases".

All three link back to this page. Two more notices sit outside the links themselves. Some of the longer guides open with a short one near the top of the article — "GrowersGuide.ca is reader-supported. When you buy through links on this page, we may earn an affiliate commission — at no extra cost to you" — before you reach any link at all. And every page carrying an Amazon link — 561 of them, in all three languages — repeats Amazon’s required wording in a band at the foot of the page, whether or not it also appears beside a button. So that sentence is the one you will see most often here, and on most pages it is a page-level statement rather than a per-link mark. Both of these link here too, and both sit on top of the marking at each link, never instead of it.

On French pages that band carries Amazon’s own French sentence, "En tant que Partenaire Amazon, je réalise un bénéfice sur les achats remplissant les conditions requises", because Amazon publishes it and we would rather quote them than translate them. Our Spanish pages carry the English sentence: Amazon publishes a Spanish one for its Spanish marketplace, and the programme we are in is the Canadian one.

Editorial Independence

Our recommendations are not for sale. We only suggest products we believe genuinely help Canadian gardeners — chosen to match the specific advice on the page, our knowledge of Canadian growing conditions, and what real gardeners use. We are not paid by manufacturers to feature products, and a commission never changes whether or how we recommend something.

If a product isn't worth your money, we'd rather not mention it. There are pages where we deliberately carry no product link at all, because the honest advice there is that you do not need one. The affiliate commission is a way to support the free calculators and guides on this site — it is not the reason any product appears here.

Prices and Availability

Product prices and availability change frequently at every retailer we link. Any price or detail mentioned on GrowersGuide.ca was accurate at the time of writing but may have changed since, and products are delisted without notice. The price shown at the retailer at the time of purchase is the price that applies.

Questions

If you have any questions about our affiliate relationships or how we choose the products we recommend, please get in touch through our feedback page.