Secure checkout
3rd September 2026
As we're getting snowed under with orders and expect the month to get even busier, we are adjusting our Grow Kit promise - grow kits will be dispatched 0-3 working days as long as payment is received before 1pm. Spores-only orders are still same day dispatch right now. All product pages have a dispatch promise on them. We removed the Saturday dispatch idea, we just like our beds too much.
Cylocybe.com
28th August 2026
Same day dispatch, or free gift worth Β£5.95 if we are late.
We now dispatch Monday to Saturday, so an order placed before 1pm on any of those days leaves that day (Saturday orders need to be paid before 9am, as the post office closes earlier). Sunday orders leave on the Monday.
(CyLab and liquid cultures are excluded, they take too long to make!)
We added this to the shop yesterday or the day before, and forgot to tell you all about it...
All sterile mushroom grow kits are now covered with a free guaranteed replacement for 12 weeks after dispatch, and the best bit - you don't need to pay an extra penny for it.
Oh and it's just a button click. Y'know, just one of those common self-service replacement buttons you've never seen on any shop ever.
"Say what??", "Are you mental?" and "Niiice" are the thoughts we can sense.
Yes, for any product marked as 'EZ-REPLACEMENT' it means it now includes the coolest warranty system we've ever had. Most spores have it (except swabs/prints/or wild exotics for hopefully obvious reasons!).
Too many people abandon this hobby because they've messed up, or nature's done a number on them at the final hurdle.
Read the full details about how it works, what it excludes etc here.
A second chance is what we're offering. Ahhh, what can be more human π
DON'T ROB US.
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update1st July 2026
We re-opened on 1st July and came back to our original .com after years on the .co.uk! We've also built a monumental site upgrade ourselves to get your orders out faster. As you browse our microscopy spores, grow kits, and cultivation supplies, you'll see new features like Privacy Guest, stock notifications, currency conversion, and live delivery calculations (still a work in progress to get spot on).
We were in a massive rush to get product pages done, so used AI. That's temporary and we know it reads like AI and sucks, there's an interesting story there though... The AI intentionally writes like AI, it's all part of something called SynthID meaning it's all watermarked. If AI wanted to write good stuff, it could, it's just that the models released to the public intentionally spout the weirdest crap going. If you were to use a Chinese AI model, AI would be able to write like you, in your own voice with your own vocabulary. Anyway, getting a little sidetracked.
Update from Thurs 27th August: AI has been removed off of every single spore product page and every single grow kit page as well as a bunch of other products and pages. We do not let AI write for us at all now, it cannot be trusted.
Thank you for coming back! We're going to have fun seeing if we can work our way from 30th position on Google back to our old No. 1 spot. Wish us luck! π
Link to this update27th May 2026
Re-opening 1st July! We're in the middle of a website upgrade, looking forward to working not on a computer! See y'all soon!
Link to this update20th January 2026
Hi folks! Cylocybe is on a break right now! We tend to re-open sometime between late Jan to late Feb, so check back later. Waiting for a reply to an email? We've not been on top of emails during our annual winter holiday - we'll have a lot of catchup up to do π See y'all soon folks for another year of extraordinary mycoscopy adventures!
Link to this update25th December 2025
We're taking a festive break right now. We won't be reading emails while we recharge. Thanks for all the support this year - see you all in 2026 (not sure of a date yet)! β¨
Link to this update20th December 2025
βοΈ Our checkout closed on Fri 12th Dec. Our holiday will begin once we've finished dispatching all orders left on our system. We'll be reopening at some point in January (undecided when exactly!). Thanks so much for 2025 and we'll see you back here in 2026 with an even better selection of products and a website makeover! Cylocybe.co.uk βοΈ
Link to this update5th December 2025
βοΈ Our product offering is purely limited to spores and cultures right now as we are taking a bit of an easier one until 16th January. We may decide to fully close at any time, but for now we'll just see how we feel not having to make a gazillion grow kits and CyLabs each day π Please remember that the postal system is chaos just now with Black Friday and Xmas post (we recommend choosing Tracked services instead of the budget option). Thanks! βοΈ
Link to this update12th November 2025
βοΈ We'll be closed from 1st December to 16th January. Make sure to get your last orders in by 30th November! βοΈ
Link to this update24th August 2025
Hi mushroom lovers, we'll be reopening around midnight tonight after a brief 3 weeks off sorting the place for the busy season ahead. We will update this news page with more info in the coming days about all of the new changes, new products, etc.. Right now, we are focused on getting product pages, terms pages all cleaned up.
Link to this update14th August 2025
Checkout closed from Monday 4th until Monday 25th August to allow us time to restock, reorganise and get prepped for the busiest season of the year! All remaining orders will be dispatched as normal over the coming days.
Link to this update23rd June 2025
Playing it here streams from YouTube, they then see you're on our site. Click "Watch on YouTube" if you don't want that.
The website has never felt so crisp, good and cozy!
Cylocybe isn't a normal shop, so what's the point in pretending it is? The products we sell are like walking a tightrope. It plays on your mind, kinda drives you a wee bit insane if you let it. We take the risk so you can go on life journeys with microscopy, and in return, we get to have some nice things for taking on that burden.
Recently, we wrote a blog post in which we made a passing mention of starving children in Gaza... Guess what happened to our place in Google Search? It knocked us down to 38th position, i.e., no one will ever find us unless they search for 'Cylocybe'. For a spore vendor that spent most of the last seven years at No. 1, it's a bad place to be!
It's a moral test. Do we remove the mention of starving children to get to a better position and more customers, or do we tell Google where to go and be truer to ourselves?..
We deleted their cookie code from the site, so your browser will still get that cookie from virtually every other website, but not from ours, at least.
We need to have a voice at Cylocybe. It's hard enough doing this job as it is, but we've always felt proud of what this shop brings people and it's the nice messages we get from customers that drives us to keep going. If you want to know your mushroom spores come from people that would help you up if you fell over, now you know.
Feel free to scan our site for any sneaky stuff by clicking the following image.
If you want, compare the results with other shops to see the difference.
21st June 2025
Why are our spore syringes suddenly so 'cheap' compared to other shops? It doesn't reflect crappy quality. Let us explain the real story behind the price....
When we first opened Cylocybe, there wasn't another spore vendor in this scene. We knew people would have to spend way more than Β£15 to import from the USA. Essentially, we took advantage of being the only shop and charged too much. We never thought our products would become popular or that we'd make more than a couple of hundred pounds a month. But they did.
With the profit, we stopped making spore syringes inside a SAB and built a proper lab. But we never dropped the prices down to a reasonable amount. Until now.
We have changed as people since our 2023-2025 hiatus. We didn't like where this scene was going, and we didn't want to be part of it any longer. But now that we are back, we have to fix a few things. We have to drive down the profitability of spore syringes; it's ruining this entire scene, and we've been equally complicit.
As the first dedicated website vendor in this UK scene, our perspective has been shaped by watching it grow from the very beginning. It has been a privileged position to be where we have been since the start, to ride that wave of an obscure hobby to a hobby so popular we'd bump into everyday strangers who mentioned they grew or knew someone who grew mushrooms with our injectable MycoBox. Even Vice tried to interview us (twice).
But it wasn't all about us. We wrote a blog post titled Growing Your Own Mushroom Business which explained the basics of getting a shop online properly. We had a lot of folk getting in touch thanking us and asking for advice. We have never been anti-competitor, we just wanted this scene to expand faster and further and for people to see this scene as utterly ripe for new ideas and innovation.
The influence we have in this scene isn't like it used to be. Taking a couple of months away from a business is bad enough, but we closed from '23 till '25 and genuinely didn't give a care about losing our No.1 spot on Google. We were confident that our regulars would return when we did.
In 2025, when there are umpteen different shops, those old, sky-high prices don't make sense. They aren't just unfair to customers' wallets and purses; they are creating a culture where 'money over morels' is the mantra. It's turned into a pure cash grab, where the goal isn't to innovate, but to steal original ideas, trademark common terms, and line pockets at the community's expense.
Magic mushrooms are deeply spiritual (when the spores are looked at through the 'scope...). It just doesn't feel right charging a fortune for them. We do need to make money, but we are going to try making money other ways, as we're effectively cutting our potential revenue from them in half.
A 12ml spore syringe only costs a vendor Β£0.76 to produce. We can fill and cap one hundred 12ml syringes in roughly 15 minutes; it's the bagging and labelling that takes all the time.
If we start making more sales for these spore syringes, we'll knock the price down further than Β£8 (which is half the price). Β£8 is still an extremely profitable markup from 76 pence a spore syringe.
This needs to be the new Cylocybe going forward. We're on a mission to make this hobby less about excess money-making (and the bad behaviour that spawns), starting with us. If we fail, we're out of here.
Next up is a sterile mushroom grow kit (for legal species only!) better than anything you have ever seen. Watch this space.
Link to this update3rd June 2025
This regards a blog post we made years ago about the technical aspects of starting your own business, you can read it on our blog page Running or wanting to run a business like ours?
Correction:
We used to recommend Gandi as a place to buy a domain from, but they aren't actually the same Gandi anymore and we never realised until recently.
In 2023, Gandi switched ownership and removed their "no bullshit" policy. They have since tripled prices! We recommend Cloudflare to buy your domains.
Running or wanting to run a business like ours?
Link to this update2nd June 2025
Few important updates to talk about!
We have improved our dispatch times. For orders containing only spores, we have moved from 0-7 days to same day dispatch. For grow kit orders, we've moved down to 3 working days (from being at 0-7 working days only a month ago). The grow kit dispatch promise is for orders placed after 1st June. If we break our dispatch promise, we'll always make up for it. Being held accountable for our promises is what keeps us on our toes - nothing like having to work doubly hard making extra spore syringes because we had to give freebie syringes to customers as an apology for being a day late!
Replacements. This is something we have improved too. As long as a customer hasn't been reckless with our grow kits, we will offer replacements on grow kits even if they have used the kit and contaminated it within 6 weeks after dispatch. We have some tricks up our sleeves to prevent people from abusing our generosity because if we don't, we could go out of business. But for the legit, genuine customers who aren't trying to freeload - we have your back for 6 weeks. For the others, we aren't buttoned up the back - and even the most cutting edge AI video generation tools won't be able to fake the video proof we'll require for a replacement (which will also render the kit completely useless, if it wasn't before). We're still to write the detailed replacement policy, it's coming and it's so much better.
This month we are moving our remaining equipment and stock from the unit as the lease comes to its 5 year conclusion. This means we are going to be super busy moving it all, so we've hidden lots of products from our shop to make this month that little bit easier. We've kept what we think are the most important products. After this month, we'll show all the products again.
A more permanent change is the removal of our 3ml Psilocybe cubensis spore syringes. The reason for this is simple, it was becoming too difficult maintaining our huge selection of strains in two different volumes. This little change cuts the work in half, and is a better deal for customers as the cost of one 12ml syringe is Β£15, which is less than the cost of two 3ml's which would add up to Β£16. If we had removed the 12ml and only offered the 3ml, it would feel unfair to customers. The decision was quite easy... Customers over profit.
Regarding that, we have a lot of 3ml's here that we are giving away as a promo. So for every customer who spends at least Β£15 in our shop, we will give them at least one 3ml Psilocybe cubensis spore syringe of our choice. Big orders could see multiple of them! We'll look at how much spent to decide how generous we are going to be.
And lastly, we are sitting on a new product we are keeping secret right now. It's the most game changing product we've come up with to date. When we say gamechanging, we really do mean it. Our customers are going to freaking love it (and our competition are going to freaking hate it). More on this later!
Link to this update23rd May 2025
Technical issues resolved. We just recovered from a server crash and had to revert to old backups of the website. Orders are unaffected.
At around 17:30, our server crashed and wouldn't restart so we had to restore an older backup from a few days ago. Sorry for the inconvenience caused. All orders completely unaffected! Enjoy your weekend π
Link to this update6th May 2025
Other than just more varieties of strains and species of spores, we have kitted our shop with super useful products.
AgarPots, DIY PF-Tek, Kilner Jars, Syringes, Vials, Contamination Control Chemicals, Fertilisers, Peptone, Agar Agar, Unicorn Bags, Dextrose, Rye Grain, Verm, Perlite, you name it... And we aren't done either, many more to follow. Product pictures are still a work-in-progress, but the products themselves are all available to purchase right now.
Take a look through the categories page to see them all, or head over to the /shop page to see everything.
We have also lowered the dispatch time from 7-14 working days for CyLab's to 0-7 working days, which we think is a much more reasonable time to wait for customers π
Link to this update24th April 2025
Note, 28th August 2026: these kits sold out and will be returning in the coming days.
We have just launched our brand-new Cyspec InocuBoxβ’ Grow Kit.
Not only that, but we will soon be launching the full range; InocuTubβ’ / InocuPotβ’ / InocuBagβ’ over the coming days and weeks.
These are the biggest changes to happen since we launched our MonoBox Grow Kit back in 2021, and a big deal to us on our never-ending pursuit to bring the absolute best quality grow kits you can find in the UK. The entire Inocuβ’ series of grow kits are a major jump in quality, value, speed and cleanliness but with no jump in price - rule-breaking at its finest!
Before we go, today we added to the shop fascinating Psilocybe Tampanensis spores (our absolute personal favourite for the microscope!), with stocks of various new Psilocybe cubensis spores such as Lizard King and more ready to be processed into syringes over the coming days.
Link to this update13th April 2025
Within a couple of hours or so, we'll be updating our spore offerings for you guys. We're talking Psilocybe Azurescens, Psilocybe Cyanescens, Panaeolus Cyanescens, and more Psilocybe Cubensis like Red Boy and Tidal Wave. We're even adding a wonderful sclerotia / truffle type that some of you may have heard of called Psilocybe Mexicana, with a personal favourite called Tampanensis (which takes us back to younger microscopy days...) coming within a week or two.
Today is a special day for us and this is what we're all about, exciting spores!
Link to this update18th February 2025
CYLOCYBE RETURNS! The shop is open, sorry for such a long time off. If you want to find out more, there's a news article from Dec 2024 about it (warning though, it's rather heavy!).
But, we are in a good place right now and ready to do something more productive with our time - ie. serving the UK with the most innovative myco products and belter prices you can get for the quality.
Oh, and working towards getting our No.1 spot on Google back, because we have essentially disappeared off it! Get ordering so we can start working again! π
Link to this update11th February 2025
We'll be re-opening at the first minute of Monday, 17th February. See you then!
Link to this update31st December 2024
This is a retrospective news article about why we closed for 15 months.
Health, burn-out, loss, grief, mid-life crisis, you name it.
This is the reason we've not been open this year, all of you fun guys. That's the simplified honest truth.
For a good while, we had started to really despise Cylocybe and the effect this place had on our mental health. I think Covid times took a bigger toll on us than we realised. We were swamped in orders and you just would not believe the amount of constant abuse we were on the receiving end of from a completely new type of customer we hadn't experienced before. It really did feel like every nutter in the UK was shopping at Cylocybe and giving us a fkn' piece of their minds for absolutely everything and anything that had went wrong in their lives up to that point...
Gone was the ability for people to be able to read a payment instruction email or a grow guide, or communicate like civilised people. In with the people with the attention span of goldfish, purchasing grow kits and refusing to read the guides or appreciating what sterile meant... thinking ours were like ones from the Netherlands they could take the lid off to fruit mushrooms from uncolonised PF-Tek and Cylocybe Special MycoBoxes... It was a SURREAL time.
And don't get me started on the American spore supplier that sent us Β£10K worth of trichoderma-covered prints which was more than just a big waste of money, it massively dented our reputation for cleanliness. No flowhood can save you from that. Safe to say we never ordered from them again, they did the full works on us and we don't know why, other than an email exchange we had asking why a recent order wasn't the typical 50-packs with a security seal on each and which always had 20 Grade A prints (big fat, dense) and 30 Grade B in them and instead were just the grade B prints which were fine but about a quarter of the profitability potential - and told us we shouldn't ever have got those packs in the first place and that he would be speaking to the team to correct it.
Next order, it looked like EVERY print had been opened, all creased and messy like done in a rush.. thought I was being a little paranoid, until weeks later when the contam reports started piling in. Wild prints would have been cleaner than these.
Every other supplier from the USA we've worked with have been absolute gems and super nice people. If you are looking to start a business and want prints, head over to Inoculate the World. Unfortunately one of our other favourites, Ryche Hawk from mushrooms.com has closed shop (still miss the random chats with that guy).
Anyway, turning a hobby into a business stops it being a hobby. Everyone gets that. But, the number of work requests we get from people thinking Cylocybe would be super fun to work for all the learning is crazy, it's sitting in front of laminar flow hoods for hours doing the same repetitive task thousands of times, getting pins and needles and horrendous hand muscle problems from pulling a thousand syringes the day before, if any other spore vendors are reading this - those shooting pains that travel up your full arm are the worst. And then you have to bag every one of them and label them. And even at that, the spores are still the easiest part - then you've got the substrate and spawn and steriliser work to do - and fitting those injection ports on to tub lids at 5 a pop for MycoBox lids. When you have 100 MycoBoxes to get sterilised and you have to squeeze a port in to a lid 500 times for around 2% of the lids to break when you are fitting that damn last 5th port!
So, this news story has become a massive grumble. Some people like reading a grumble. No point pretending we are always happy happy at Cylocybe, but the thing that gives us a boost are the nice emails we get from appreciative customers. That can be the thing that makes a boring day less boring and has you feeling good and valued for a minute. But we all have hard jobs, this is the hardest of the 30-40 of them I've worked in!
I personally felt trapped for so long with Cylocybe - for someone who likes change, lots and lots of change, doing the same job year in year out goes against my nature. Ruth is someone who doesn't like change at all. Chalk and cheese I used to call us. Before I met Ruth, I would need to move the furniture around in my flat every month or so, I don't know why. Well, I do - for the change. I needed to. But Ruth works a little differently from me in that if I so much as move a book on the book shelf by a cm, she notices and it will drive her mad. Cylocybe for me became a thing I felt I couldn't control or change, and that's probably where the trapped feelings came from. If I quit Cylocybe, I'd not know what to do with myself. And if you've ever wondered why the site changes look so often, now you know a little snippet into my psychology.
Thing is with Cylocybe, the money can be good which lets you afford some nice things for once, but really we just wanted to go back to our lives before. We never intended for a whole year to pass and not to open up. That "one extra week" became the thing we said the next week, then after a while we stopped even talking about it. The months just kept passing and passing and re-opening got harder and harder to even think about. I rediscovered all the hobbies I hadn't had the time for for years, got back into coding and some super pointless projects which I could put all my focus on for months at a time (my brain needs to be constantly busy).
Why did Cylocybe have that effect on us? It's simple - being over worked. We created a blog post in 2021 trying to get new businesses to get involved, showing the tech stuff involved because we were struggling to keep up. Yes, we could have hired more people but unless you run a spore AND kit business at the same time, trust is a luxury you don't get to have with most people. If we were running a kit or spore business, you just don't need to have that same level of trust in the people working for you.
Cylocybe cost us personal relationships, employing pals - the dynamic changes after a few years. You start to piss them off and they start to do the same to you. And when you haven't learned how to be a good manager, like me, you make a double mess of things - you might think they know that work ends at closing time and you're pals after as usual, but the pal you berated (like a prick) for having to replace 10 wrong orders that week ends up resenting you. Self-reflection comes later, and you realise you were a 'boss' instead of a manager. If you want to destroy relationships within a few years, hire your pals to work for you.
So everything above is basically where our heads were at throughout much of 2024, until we got our shit in gear around Christmas time for a February 2025 opening!
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update2nd December 2023
We're a little unsure when we'll be reopening, January or February. We'll let you know closer to the time π
As soon as we're back, we'll be working on a few ideas for Cylocybe. Some absolute belter products we're planning, and if all goes to plan, 2024 is going to be an exciting year around here.
Link to this update31st October 2023
29th June 2023
That's all the parcels now out, folks. So our summer break has officially started.
This means we'll only be replying to emails about the big stuff like payment issues or lost mail. Now, if you're dealing with contamination issues, we feel bad for you, son, we've got 99 problems but trich ain't one. Unless our products were contaminated before you used them, which is pretty rare, we're not classifying things like that as important as we have no control over nature or your sterile technique (or lack of).
Take care, have fun, and see y'all back here on 28th July!
Link to this update20th June 2023
Cylocybe's summer break is from 21st June to 28th July.
Ensure your orders are placed and paid for before midnight tonight strikes! After that, we're turning our checkout sign to 'closed' for the summer break, and late payments will need to be refunded which is a hassle for everyone.
Make sure to follow the payment instructions email precisely (especially the part in orange which says '[Order No.] <- IMPORTANT!' and especially today) as we will not process any orders from today with payment mistakes but will refund them for you of course.
Again, to make clear, if you haven't sent your payment (correctly) before midnight - the only thing you will receive is a refund, you won't receive your order. So do not try to wire us a bank payment after midnight for an order regardless of us being closed because we won't fulfil that. We need our break.
Once we've sent out all your orders, we're switching to full summer mode. That means we'll only be replying to emails about the big stuff like payment issues or lost mail. Now, if you're dealing with contamination issues, we feel bad for you, son, we've got 99 problems but trich ain't one. Unless our products were contaminated before you used them, which is pretty rare, we're not classifying things like that as important as we have no control over nature or your sterile technique (or lack of).
To those who emailed today, worried about their orders not getting shipped before our holiday - relax. Of course, we're sending out the orders. We're setting the cut-off tonight so we have the time to close up shop and get your orders on their way. We're on top of it!
Starting off our summer vibes, we're heading out later tonight to see The War on Drugs in Glasgow - can't wait!
Thanks for your support and we wish y'all a brilliant summer.
PS. We just launched a SpawnBag version of our XXL MonoBox Grow Kit at a discount rate of Β£35 as a kind of goodbye gift.
Link to this update14th May 2023
9th May 2023
We wanted to just use Parcelforce, but it turns out they do not like envelopes and prefer boxes. Who would have thought?! So, we're back to using RM for orders which fit in an envelope. Prices are lower as a result for those customers.
Link to this update4th May 2023
Since reopening last month, we've been busy with many orders, and it's been great to see the warm welcome from our customers. Your support and excitement for our return mean the world to us and show how much you value our products and the effort we put into them.
Link to this update14th April 2023
After a 6-month break from Cylocybe, we're back and ready for action. Most importantly, our heads are in the zone.
Since reopening two weeks ago, we've been absolutely inundated with orders. While it's nothing we can't handle, we honestly didn't expect so many people to be looking forward to our return. Thank you for the genuine and welcome surprise!
We now use Parcelforce for all orders to Scotland, England and Wales, no matter how big or small. No Royal Mail. We are taking the hit ourselves, as it's costing us more than the Β£5 we are charging.
Link to this update4th April 2023
Parcelforce for all UK orders - no matter how big or small. No Royal Mail. And we are taking the hit ourselves, because it costs us a lot more than the Β£5 we charge you. Can you tell we're in good moods? π
Our replacements policy has changed, and we believe it is much more customer-friendly than our previous policy. We highly recommend you read it in full. Here is the shortened gist of it: Established customers can now receive free replacements for reportedly contaminated microscopy spore syringes, while new customers will receive replacements on a case-by-case basis. New customers are now able to potentially receive kit replacements even after they have used the kit and contaminated it, up to a total value of Β£50. Established customers aren't restricted to the same limitations as new customers. RMA may be required for us to agree to any replacements.
Link to this update24th December 2022
We are taking a well-deserved (if we do say so!) break until the start of the New Year! No late orders or payments will be processed until then, however, all orders that were paid for prior to the cut off time will be dispatched this week.
We are truly thankful to you fun guys for this past year and the positive impact our products have had on folks lives. We can't wait to come back refreshed, with new ideas and products!
Wishing you all a very merry Christmas and a magical New Year!
Link to this update16th November 2022
On Sunday 4th December for one day only we will have all grow kits in stock and available for purchase.
This might be handy for those Christmas pressies (or to just treat yourself!).
As soon as Monday 5th December comes, we will be closing the shop until January and getting all the orders on the way out to you all.
We are not sure which date in January we'll be opening, still deciding on that one and will update y'all soon!
Link to this update6th November 2022
Sunday 13th of November is the last day you can buy things from our shop until the new year.
Well, with one exception...
We will re-open on Sunday 4th December for one day for Christmas pressies for your lucky friends, partners, kids, parents and such! This gives us plenty of time to make sure they turn up on time!
Please don't send payments when our website is closed. We will not be coming into our unit to spend all day making a grow kit and then waiting all of the following day for a courier to come and collect it. If you miss your opportunity to purchase, you will have another on Sunday 4th December π
But as soon as it hits 12am on Sunday night, we are closed.
ps. Cash in Post is now disabled at checkout - we don't want cash envelopes turning up when we're closed.
Link to this update4th November 2022
We've re-enabled Bank Transfers.
If you have made an order and selected Cash in Post - don't send us a Bank Transfer unless you are looking to cause us hassle! ie, don't take the biscuit with our time please π Simply create a new order and follow the provided payment instructions.
We're not sure how long we will keep bank transfer options or even our shop open. It has been a relentless few months. We are on top of orders right now but we'd be lying if we said we didn't want a holiday... The positives though is that we know that we are bringing joy to other peoples lives, as cheesy as that sounds. That fact alone does make it more bearable.
All we need from you guys is to make sure you are reading those emails. If we send an email, it's going to have important information in it. It feels like we are always hitting a brick wall trying to drum this into people. 5 years ago when we first started we didn't have an issue with people not reading emails or the website, but every year since we've seen the attention span get less and less... to the point where 80% of emails sitting in our inbox are completely avoidable. Sometimes we just wished we had a normal business selling normal things and taking normal payments... But in saying that, normal gets boring after a while... so back to reality it is!
Link to this update27th October 2022
We made the decision to temporarily disable bank transfer at checkout this week and maybe next (we're unsure how long exactly).
If you still want to order from us and are prepared to use one of the other payment methods at checkout, that's A-OK!
The reason we've chosen to disable Bank Transfers is because we need to shrink the number of orders coming in til we're on top of things and through experience having just Crypto or Cash in Post is enough to filter the people who really want our products or who just want products (if you get what we mean).
Sorry for the inconvenience folks, but we're up to our eyeballs right now.
Link to this update26th October 2022
Honestly - we're not intentionally ignoring people (except some, but that's for legal reasons!).
If you've sent an email our way but not had a reply, we're sorry.
While we are managing (just) to keep within order dispatch times, the unread emails sitting on our system have been piling up.
And this is us working 12 hour shifts!
We try to skim to the important ones from the subject lines, like issues with payments etc. But God love the folk who can't write a meaningful subject line!
These past few months have been the busiest ever for our shop, even crushing lockdown.
We know we need more staff, but finding people who can cut the mustard is difficult and time consuming. We've put a lot of time and effort into training the wrong people before and we don't want to repeat our mistakes.
Some products are being made out of stock today to try to make things a bit more manageable for us.
If you are buying something from our shop then please make sure to read, read, read. Reading our site and emails carefully avoids the majority of emails needing to be sent in the first place, therefore resulting in a better experience all around.
Link to this update13th October 2022
We've launched three brand new promos this evening.
If you like surprises and mushrooms, you are going to lose your absolute shiitake with these!
Link to this update4th October 2022
Note, 28th August 2026: we dropped this silly frustrated idea straight after saying it. You don't need an incubator to buy a grow kit.
You will need an incubator next month to grow mushrooms!
Starting after 5th November. Ending when it's a bit warmer!
Do you remember we closed last winter for 4 months?
We don't want to close for that long this year.
It's pretty depressing not having anything to do for months on end during the dark cold parts of the year.
But we also don't want to go through the same frustrating winter we've been through so many times before with Cylocybe...
Unless you have a business like ours, trust us when we say that it can be a struggle to keep everyone happy.
If customers are trying to grow sub-tropical species of mushrooms in cold conditions and expecting success, that's not our fault. Being blamed for failed grows and receiving replacement / refund demands as well as abusive messages is not fun at any time of the year, but winter time is by far the worst.
So we thought... instead of closing for a long time this winter, let's try something a bit different! π
As of next month, you'll need an incubator to buy our mushroom grow kits.
Microscopy spores and supplies are exempt from this.
But with grow kits, you'll need to be using some sort of incubator.
We want you having success. Not failure.
This winter will be worse than ever. Energy costs have doubled and everyone is struggling these days.
We cannot take money in good conscience knowing the vast majority of you won't be able to keep your grow kits warm enough if you don't have an incubator.
Maintaining 20C+ temps (optimum is 26C during incubation) will cost you a fortune if you are just relying on home heating. Most people are going to have a rather cold winter.
It's not just for our self preservation in trying to avoid annoyed customers. We want you guys to have successful grows and keep coming back to us year after year - we will be shooting ourselves in the foot if we easily allow you to fail because you will simply go elsewhere (and suffer the same issues with possibly inferior products).
Don't worry, we'll soon have a video up showing you how to build a good one like our CyLab. Which also has a heated fruiting chamber.
But if you don't want to build an incubator, you should also be able to buy one from us very soon.
Around Β£5 per month in electricity costs to run.
Let's say the heating element within the incubator is around 40W per hour.
If this was running for 24 hours per day, it would add to 28.8KW in a month. If the average cost per KW is around Β£0.34 (October, 2022) then it would cost Β£9.80 for a whole month of use.
But remember, an incubator is insulated well so would probably only be running for around half the time - let's say 12 hours a day.
Could be up to Β£500 per month to run. But it all depends on so many factors.
To keep a small 2KW electric heater working full pelt for even just half a day will amount to 12hours x 2KW = 24KW.
Over a month this will be 720KW at approx 34p per KW... Costing Β£244.80.
But that's only the half of it (literally).
Consider the fact that most homes are so cold and poorly insulated that even a 2KW heater running full pelt for 24 hours a day (Β£489.60 a month) probably wouldn't be enough to keep your home (or grow kits) above 20C. Forget reaching the optimum 26C either.
During checkout, when there's a grow kit in the basket we will make sure that a button to upload a picture of your incubator setup is there.
We simply want to drive home how important temperature is before an order is made to avoid disappointment and potentially save you a fortune in energy costs. And have you coming back here year after year and hopefully spreading the love for us with your friends.
When our customers are happy and having success growing mushrooms, we are happy. We just want you guys to have the tools for success this winter. And that's an incubator π
Link to this update16th February 2022
There's an expectation on us by some to solve failed grow attempts and send free replacements when shit happens. Whether that expectation is fair or not depends on a few things, like was it bad luck or being careless (rarely does anyone admit to being careless!).
We've been producing these replacements whether it's fair or not, for far too long. Winter is the worst because too many people don't do their maths before buying at our shop... if they did, they'd know that even keeping a single 2KW electric heater on at full pelt can cost over Β£250 per month (768 hours x Β£0.19 per kWh x 2kW).
We've intentionally kept our shop closed these past few months because we know what happens. So many folk buy our products during winter, have temperature issues and then email us for replacements. It was just a couple of days ago we had an email from a customer admitting their house was cold and telling us to send a free replacement, without as much as a please or thank you.
Keeping our business closed every winter is a terrible solution, but we're fed up with this current situation.. So we're asking for your input here. We have two solutions which we can make work.
Option 1 (on approx. 20% of the vote at 16:45 on Feb 18th)
Speedy, no-fuss replacements at the touch of a button (ie. no email or proof needed). We'll also provide limited support on cultivation questions. This will put the price up by quite a bit, which might make it unaffordable to some.
Option 2 (on approx. 80% of the vote at 16:45 on Feb 18th)
Only providing a very limited replacements policy (like damage in transit) and offering zero support or advice on anything cultivation related. This keeps our prices the same but is bound to piss off a lot of customers who want replacements or answers to their cultivation questions.
Both options have their own pros and cons. If we could make Option 1 work without putting the prices up then we would. But let's be realistic for a minute. Option 2 might generate a lot of hate for us whereas option 1 could make us too exclusive.
Link to this update5th January 2022
Apologies to all customers who came here on the 1st of January expecting the shop to be open... We were still in full holiday mode!
But, we are back and focussed on preparing our business unit for another busy year!
We will be using the coming days to catch up on customer emails and implement some new ideas we want to bring to our site this year.
Link to this update19th November 2021
We're on a self-preservation break from 19th Nov, 2021 until 1st Jan, 2022.
Please ensure all orders are paid for by 23:59 on Friday 19th. If we receive a payment after this time, your order won't be dispatched until the new year.
But don't worry - all active orders on the system will be dispatched as usual and all emails will be replied to before we go on our break!
Since the very first lockdown last year, it's all been work, work, work for us and it's time for us to look after ourselves. Not having a break in that long is unhealthy so we've decided in 2022 to do things a little differently and try to have more of a work/life balance.
During our time off, we may spend a couple of hours max each week on replying to emails - but it certainly won't be any more than this, and even that only covers a handful for emails. Expect delays in replies as we won't be checking them very often.
To every single person who still ordered with us even when we were stuck with just cash and crypto, you guys really saved our shop. If it weren't for you being willing to put in that little extra bit of effort, we would 100% have been gone by now.
We have so many new ideas for Cylocybe in 2022 and we can't wait to make them a reality, especially the equipment section of our shop π
Link to this update1st September 2021
26th July 2021
All current orders will be dispatched but we won't be taking new ones yet.
If you're waiting on an email reply - don't worry, we will get back to you.
Link to this update14th April 2021
Don't worry, there's nothing wrong!
All current orders will be shipped by Friday.
If you need to get in touch about something important, please select 'Critical' in the dropdown below!
Messages sent which are lower priority may not be responded to during our break.
See you in two weeks!
Thanks so much folks
Link to this update19th March 2021
With a sad heart, we have to tell you that TrustPilot have banned us.
And no, not for anything grotesque like terrorism or fake reviews but for being what they like to call a "bad fit" business...
On Friday, 19th March at 8.05am we received an email saying we were a "bad fit" and that we break their "ethical" standards.
Trustpilot will ban for any one of these categories:
Bad-Fit Businesses <- This one.
Profile Misuse
Abuse towards the Trustpilot community
So to the person spreading nonsense that we were banned for fake reviews... Get your facts right and read our old profile. We hope that you are just a bit clueless, rather than intentionally spiteful for whatever reason.
Could it be the microscopy products we offer?
We were thinking it may have been the microscopy spores because they are from the Psilocybe species of fungi and commonly referred to as "magic". To make it abundantly clear, as it is on the rest of our website - we offer these products to look at under the 'scope.. If we were to sell products to "grow magic mushrooms" we would probably be swamped in business, considering the boom in those Netherlands-based businesses! But, nowhere do we advertise, promote, condone or facilitate illegal activity on our website or communications. Did Trustpilot even read our website before they took this nuclear option?
This past year we have been chatting with our Trustpilot account manager about all sorts of features, getting API access etc... They like to call and email and treat us like good friends. Meagan would look through our site and suggest where best to place widgets for best effect etc. What other features might be good here and there. Trustpilot understood and knew our business. On January 19th, 2021 Meagan (our account manager) asked us to arrange a time to discuss renewing our contract which was due to expire on 19th March 2021. We were so busy that we forgot about that email and didn't get back in touch. Then came today, the 19th March 2021. Contract renewal date. Today is the day when we were banned completely out of the blue. Our "ethics" miraculously went bad on the renewal date, or so Trustpilot are trying to make you believe!
Being kicked when you're down
To make things worse, seemingly out of spite they have left behind a defaced profile page for everyone to assume the worst about us. Check it out here
What even is a bad-fit business?
We are sorry you even have to see some of these words:
"The types of businesses we don't want on Trustpilot, and would consider to be bad-fits, are those that:"
aid businesses or individuals to manipulate news, reviews, documents and results;
promote hatred, violence, terrorism, xenophobia or any form of discrimination against any individual or group;
offer illegal products and services; illegal drugs, prescription drugs sold on the illegal market;
provide or facilitate the provision of escort services, mail-order brides, prostitution or any form of forced labour or human trafficking;
offer or produce any sexual abuse or explicit imagery, and any material that presents children or animals in a sexual or illegal manner;
organize illegal animal fights or sell products made with endangered animal parts
facilitate criminal activities of any sort, including those carried out by means of computers or the Internet;
are engaged in financial scams such as pyramid schemes, credit card fraud, mortgage scams; or, otherwise operate illegally; for example, selling fake or unsafe goods and services, or generally mis-sell.
...It has only been one day and we've already experienced nasty accusations because we have been linked to this list! Trustpilot is trying to slaughter our business. A business we have put almost every single waking hour into since 2017 when we were amongst the only folks trying to revive a dying mycology scene in the UK with a half decent place to buy products from. We don't feel positive today, that's for sure.
Not a hint of consistency...
Trustpilot allows huge (30K+ reviews) Netherlands-based webshops on their platform who make a business selling magic truffles containing Psilocybin (UK Class A) and fully colonised magic mushroom substrates amongst a tonne of other mind bending chemicals. ...So surely it couldn't be our harmless microscopy spores that Trustpilot has used as their reason to ban us? How does that make any sense? None of this makes sense.
A disgruntled customer or a jealous competitor?
Over the years, it's fair to say we've experienced our fair share of despicable customers. Sorry, we would like to tell you that everyone who shops with us is great but that would be a downright lie. Most are though. In this day and age it's too easy for any small online-based business like ours to be reported for violating terms and have their service terminated. Thorough investigations are a thing of the past and you can rarely (if at all) have a decision reviewed unless the news somehow goes viral. After being banned from Shopify because of a troll who reported that our microscopy spore syringes were for injecting into an arm to get high, we quickly learned that the internet was savage to everyone! ...Yes, a troll successfully took our entire website down using total nonsense and a Shopify advisor blindly believed them; hook, line and sinker. We had to build from scratch and self-host our own website after that. Recently we took notice of another UK competitor suffer the same banning issue as us on Trustpilot. We were devastated for them... they didn't deserve it. It's an unwritten rule not to be evil to your competitors (even when they pilfer your product ideas, names and content), so we would like to hope / think that this wasn't another competitor.
What's your purpose anyway, Trustpilot?
Trustpilot, you have zero expertise on this industry or the products we sell and your ethics are pure nonsense. If Trustpilot has any idea what they were doing, they would see a major difference between a business like ours who specialises in all things fungi and the other (bigger...) businesses on their platform who specialise in customers getting as high as a kite. Let us remind you of your purpose, Trustpilot... You are a review website. Stick to what you are good at; making insane amounts of money simply to sell 'extra' email invitations for customers to review a business! The more you pay Trustpilot for the invites, the less their "ethics" get in the way it seems. It's also interesting to note that this scenario happened at the end of our yearly contract!
Closing words
Now when someone searches for us on Trustpilot all they will see is a nasty message to give the impression we did something wrong... No, we didn't. Our products harm no living things, they bring joy, knowledge and they teach fungi through the cultivation of mushrooms. Customers get a chance to experience the amazing and still highly unexplored health benefits mushrooms provide to mind and body. Our microscopy spore products allow us to visualise the beginnings of the journey through a microscope, where it all starts. Yes, it's true that there are customers out there who could use our products in ways which go against our terms, but that can be said about any business including your own where fake reviews are a business in itself. And if Trustpilot thinks it's going to easily push our small business about and shit over our entire reputation by essentially accusing us of everything in that list by not defining which one applies to us, then it's their ethics at question, not ours. Take your 'ethics' and shove 'em up your ass, Trustpilot!
RIP Cylocybe @ Trustpilot Jan 2018 - Mar 2021 Excellent 4.9 / 5
Link to this update24th November 2020
We will do a proper end of the year news update for you all soon but for now, we just need to give some more info about our December closure:
Any orders made before these times will be dispatched as normal before we go on holiday.
Whenever we close for some time off, we always end up working an extra week or so to get all of the grow kits prepared, sterilised and dispatched - so, we thought it made sense to continue to offer spores and supplies during this time as they are quicker to prepare and dispatch.
During the time we're closed, we will have the option available to purchase gift vouchers - there has already been lots of you asking if gift vouchers are available to buy for Christmas presents!
This will be the first year that we've offered this option, and we're really excited about it!
If it goes well, we may continue to offer gift vouchers permanently.
We will also have a pre-order system available, so you can place orders for dispatch after we return.
Again, this will be the first time that we've had this feature on our website and we can't wait to see how it goes!..
Thanks so much π€
Team Cylocybe x
Link to this update11th August 2020
Years of running your own business can build up a lot of rage frustration at times.. So, why not take this out on a few deserving walls with a sledgehammer?!
A highlight of our industrial unit renovation, for sure.
Lots of you have been wondering how our project is going.. it's been tough but we are finally getting there. Every day of our 4 week shop closure was spent working on the unit and the business as a whole. This week we have finally been in a position to start moving most of our equipment and stock over and we're trying to create as little downtime as possible in our operations so that you guys shouldn't experience any delays to regular dispatch times. But, the week is still young, so if we are delayed by a day or two on getting orders out - this is why and please be patient with us.
We intend to build multiple rooms and have a full second floor spanning almost the entire area of the unit, but for now we are basically treating the place as one very large room and an office area.
The main challenge with the unit has been the scale of dirt build-up for more than two decades. Yep, you read that right - two decades! It was a garage before we moved in, so imagine the worst and triple it..
This photo was taken whilst the ceiling was being cleaned.. look at that side-by-side difference!
Now that we have more space, we have also invested in two massive autoclaves with a 580L capacity each. So at any single time we can be sterilising way more than a volumetric tonne!! Touchscreening it all the way too.. Badass if you ask us π
The engineers are due out this week to help us understand how to use them and to program the onboard computers to suit our sterilisation requirements.
Here is a quick before and after of the place - we're sure you're all dying to see after us going on about it..
Not 100% finished, but what a difference.
We have set up an Instagram profile again to share some more photos of the renovation and the business progression.
You can find us by searching for @cylomylo in your Instagram app - or click here
A big apology is owed to the folks who have been waiting a while for an email reply.. We completely hold our hands up to this - we never kept on top of them properly and they have piled up to become the Everest of emails. During our shop closure, we had planned on replying to emails every few days but the work involved in the unit has been so much more than we ever anticipated and time just completely runs away from us every single day. Pissed off people are the flavour of the month right now, and rightfully so. But please know that we haven't been sitting on our butts neglecting our business - the majority of our waking life has been dedicated to our new unit, making sure that we are in there as soon as possible to operate from a much more efficient environment.. which means better service for our customers too.
We have been dedicating time to catching up on emails this week and aim to have a reply sent to every one this week. Very, very soon we will be set up in our new work space and our service as a whole will return to the normal 5 star standard that we are known for.
A lot of you have also been getting in touch to offer some words of support during this incredibly stressful time and we cannot thank you enough for that, it genuinely means so much to us.
Keep an eye on the Instagram page for more photo updates and we will also update this News page as often as we can!
Love, always
Cylocybe team
Link to this update21st June 2020
An overview of what's been happening the past few months, exciting things ahead for us and the reason why we have to close the shop to accepting new orders for a few weeks - starting on Sunday 28th June until Tuesday 28th July.
You may remember we went on an innovation break on 14th March (9 days before the UK went on lockdown).. During this time, we were already booked up to go to Mycelia's 'Group training on substrate and mushroom production' course in Belgium.
We were rather excited about this 5 day training course (understatement) but Covid-19 got in the way for us and we couldn't risk travelling and having borders being shut on us. Yeah, deflating..
We were meant to be reopening again on 27th March, but we realised we couldn't manage to stick to that opening date because we were having trouble sourcing much of our needed supplies / stock (..we all know about the toilet paper fiasco!).
Instead of making promises to open the site up a week later just to let you all down again, we decided to come back on the 28th April.
Whenever we reopen after being closed, we are always busy but the magnitude and scale of this was very different and far from ordinary.. minute after minute there was an order from the USA, Scotland, Ireland, Norway, etc.. It just wouldn't stop. Mylocybe was being flooded with orders to the point we had to eventually put restrictions in place for how many kits people could buy.
It seemed a LOT of people chose to hang on and wait for us to reopen rather than going elsewhere, which is fantastic and appreciated but wow did it take its toll on us.
It's a horrible feeling realising that no matter how hard you try, the lack of hours in the day make it impossible to stick to dispatch timescales we had previously promised prior to Covid-19. 18 hour days, 7 days a week became the new normal for us to be able to catch up.
Most customers were appreciative of the delays due to Covid-19 and how busy we were, but we would be lying if we tried to sugar coat this..
We don't know what's going on in this new world, but there's a lot of people who need to take a step back from their phone screens sometimes and evaluate first what they are about to send. Be better than that!
..It usually goes the same way too - customer gets angry because they haven't received a quick reply, then the 2nd irate email saying we are scammers then another email an hour later and before we know it we have a dozen emails sitting there which get nastier and nastier when we finally get a chance to read emails! C'mon folks..
We had a list as long as our arm for all the things we changed during our (Covid-extended) innovation break. But we're only going to tell you about the most exciting ones which immediately spring to mind.
You can probably guess that fighting contamination has always been a major priority for us; we know that the first growing experience can be make or break for people - failure can mean abandoning the hobby entirely whilst success can mean the start of an exciting new lifelong journey for people.
Our aim is to make indoor mushroom cultivation a reality in even the most mouldy of homes and clumsy of people and with SteriBag and other things we have planned soon, we are taking those crucial steps.
SteriBag is simply an autoclavable bag which your MycoBoxes etc are placed in prior to sterilisation. It's more work for us, but for you it means you can feel confident knowing the kit literally cannot be any more clean.
It also means no wiping injection ports anymore! And as long as you follow our simple inoculation technique, you will have the best chance against contamination we have yet seen out there. Groundbreaking seems an overstatement, but it has to be close.
We'll call this another unique thing we came up with just like Inject-Thru π But if you know otherwise, please get in touch so we can correct this and give credit where it's due!
We have changed so many things on our site and continue to do so on an almost daily basis. Basically, we overhauled our entire payment system and made it much easier to do. As a result we've had an 80% drop in the number of customers making mistakes when paying us (ie. forgetting to use the correct payment references when sending payment through their banks).
We have had to learn how to adapt to a changing landscape in microscopy study and gourmet mushroom growing, so whilst facing a mountain of orders on a daily basis we realised how much time we were losing to an inefficient communication system. So we decided to fix it.
All of our automated emails have been redone, plus there are more emails keeping customers in the loop throughout their entire order process.
We're sure you've already seen it π Hope you all like it.
Our syringes are processed better and are packed cleaner than ever, with more enhancements coming very soon (see Cleanroom*)
As some of you may remember, Cylocybe was born in a 1 bedroom flat in Glasgow. Suffice to say, we quickly ran out of space!
Our next upgrade was to a 5 bedroom house in the countryside with large outbuildings and outdoor space / storage.. but even this was too small for the business..
So we rented a shipping container. Then another. And another. Then we started storing stuff in our transit van until we finally said enough was enough..
The business is moving into new premises and we will be reclaiming our home for the first time π
The exciting evolution of our business and how far we've come.. It's a proud moment for us and probably will be for many of our customers who've been with us since the start.
The new unit needs a good bit of work, which is why we are closing the shop to new orders all of July. Time to get our DIY hats on.
Any important questions or issues throughout this period, we'll still be here for you of course.
Our industrial unit gives us many more options with the space we have.
We have purchased a very large ISO Class 5 Cleanroom Tent which will be installed within the next couple of weeks.
If you are unsure about cleanrooms, the lower the ISO Class the better and a Class 5 has particularly high end air cleanliness.
Cleanroom (ISO Class 5) - Clean Tent Model 1700 / Removes 99.995% of Airborne Particles 0.3 Micrometers (ΞΌm) in Size.
This is a temporary solution until we have fitted an even larger rigid walled cleanroom.
Clean Tent Model 1700
Laminar Flowhood (ISO Class 4) - HLF1800 / Removes 99.9998% of Airborne Particles 0.12 Micrometers (ΞΌm) in Size.
Within our already incredible clean room, we are installing a brand new 1.8m horizontal laminar flow hood which has much better filtration than a typical ISO Class 5 laminar flow hood commonly used in mycology.
It cost us a fortune, but it's important for us to keep improving our products to the point of world class quality. Customers who've known us from the start know that we're genuinely all about high quality.
Issue after issue left unresolved, refunds for damaged parcels not being provided to us, customer parcels not being collected from us, the list goes on..
Finally a courier we can rely on to do their bit right!
We've sent a tonne of parcels so far with not a single issue. Plus, we have our very own DPD manager so if something goes wrong it will be sorted swiftly. Perfect.
Fixed many bugs within the login system, change of password etc.
We disabled non-account holders from purchasing on our site a few weeks back, this was to slow the number of orders coming in because it's been chaotic to say the least.
So if our competitors are reading this and wondering why more customers are ordering from them; you're welcome π
You may have noticed we've had a banner on our site looking for artists. As we are moving into a new chapter for our business, we wanted to reach out to customers to help add a bit of life to our new digs.
Plenty of opportunity to be creative, murals etc. We have had a few very talented artists get in touch with so far, but we need many more as it's a very large space we are moving into. Travelling in July to us in Ayrshire, Scotland is a must for this project.
Get in touch on project@cylocybe.com
As you can tell, we've been hard at work for months and have so much more to do to get where we want.
Just remember to get your orders in before 28th June, as we won't be accepting new orders until the 28th July whilst we transition to the next stage of our business.
Thank you for supporting us through and through over the years. Without your trust in us, we would never have made it this far and we wouldn't be about to break new grounds in the future of Cylocybe. We have had a lot of people supporting our cause because they believe in what we are doing. We want to thank every one of you from the bottom of our hearts.
Cylocybe Team x
Link to this update26th March 2020
It's with heavy hearts that we have to let you know we are extending our break until 28th April as huge delays on obtaining crucial stock right now is hitting us hard.
Coronavirus is causing havoc in so many ways.
We know that many of you will be hugely disappointed when you come onto our site tonight at 12am expecting everything to be up and running but this is a decision we just have to make right now.
To see some positivity in it all, we are going to use this extra time to really build upon what we have. The development opportunity is unprecedented and we have a chance to do loads more with Cylocybe over the next 30 days.
We send our well wishes to you and your loved ones during this uncertain time.
Peace, love and positivity as always
Cylocybe Team
Link to this update9th December 2019
We will now be having a break from accepting new orders until 10th January.
There has been a banner on our website for the past couple of weeks letting everyone know about these holiday dates and you guys have certainly been getting your orders in before our website is put on pause..
..We're going to be working through all of these orders ASAP and getting them sent out to you this week.
A lot of you have emailed asking if orders will arrive before Christmas because you have bought them as presents - Don't worry, they will be dispatched by us in plenty of time for you to gift the wonders of mushrooms to your loved ones!
Cylocybe continues to grow bigger with each month and we continue to be amazed by all the support we receive.
With this growth, of course comes a much heavier workload and longer hours.. so it's absolutely crucial for us to have a break and try to avoid feeling completely burned out. We will come back with clearer, focused minds to further our efforts in bringing quality service and products to the mycology scene.
We have lots of exciting ideas for 2020 floating around in our heads.. New products, new tutorials (we hope to soon gain new skills in video and animation to really ramp up our grow guides to the next level) and work on ways to help our processes in the background, like speeding up dispatch times for you.
We won't be checking our emails every day over this break and don't guarantee any replies until we return on 10th January. Responding to the volume of emails we receive daily is a full time job in itself, so please understand that we also need time away from this.
If your email is absolutely urgent and cannot wait - Put 'Urgent' in the subject line and we will know to check it, but we have to ask that you please only use this for genuinely time-sensitive queries and respect our holiday time.
Our website will stay live, so that you can all still get access to our grow kit instructions and we also may be running a very special competition over the next couple of weeks to win a brand new 23L Presto Pressure Cooker - So definitely keep checking out the website for that!
2019 has been monumental for Cylocybe and we hope to continue this over the years to come with you all by our sides.
Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
Ruth, Nick and Clive x
Oh, we have had a few requests recently for more pictures of Clive, so as not to disappoint the fans - Here's our favourite photo of the year! - A wild Clive appears..
Link to this update1st November 2019
It gets us down when we can't get orders to you in time for the weekend, because we know how excited you are to get started with your projects. It's very rare for us to be in this situation at the end of a week and we are so sorry, knowing that there'll be many disappointed folks out there..
On Wednesday night we were involved in an accident - our car slid off an icy country road late in the evening and smashed through a sturdy farm fence and steel gates.
Because of this, we've been having to try our hardest to keep up with dispatching orders and responding to emails, whilst dealing with our abysmal insurance provider (cheap insurance providers through brokers - avoid them if you can!) - and considering we have very limited time as it is running Cylocybe, this has all resulted in delays for some orders.
Trust us when we say we feel guilty - and please know that we always do our best.
We will be working all weekend to catch up on lost time and will be back to normal by Monday or Tuesday.
If you have sent an email and haven't had a reply - please don't stress, we'll get back to you ASAP.
Ruth and Nick
Link to this update18th October 2019
All work and no development makes Cylocybe a dull site.
All work and no development makes Cylocybe a dull site.
We're taking a short break from orders next week:
During this time, you won't be able to add items to the basket as the checkout will be disabled. The rest of the site will work as per usual and you can still browse around and read guides, etc.
We'll continue to dispatch orders until all the payments come in, but if we do not receive your bank transfers or cash in post orders by 10am on Tuesday 22nd (at the very latest), then your orders won't be sent until the week later. Cash in post orders will need to be sent on a next day Royal Mail service to ensure the payments arrive safely with us on Tuesday morning with our post person.
As usual, we'll be using the majority of our break to develop Cylocybe (and Cyanita.com) further. We'll hopefully squeeze in some well needed time for visiting family and friends, just to remind them what we look like (it's been that busy here!).
Some of the things we'll be working on include new product ideas (especially for the DIYers!!), more payment options, getting a van for our business (we both just passed our driving tests), promotions for the Halloween / Guy Fawkes week and lots more ideas we need time to sort through and see what makes the cut.
Unless there is some absolute major issue which needs addressing - please hold off on the emails until we are back on Monday 28th.
Thank you, as always.
The Cylocybe team
Link to this update5th October 2019
Cash, Bank Transfers and Cryptocurrencies available as per usual.
Sorry about this folks, but PayPal has such a moral disliking to our hugely popular microscopy spore products that they abruptly shut down their payment service with us yesterday.
..Not just that, they also ran off with our entire balance which we use for everything from stock to paying our utility bills! But it's OK because they promise to give us it all back in 180 days! ..Seriously?! If we were a small business, this would probably ruin us.
One interesting PayPal fact you might like to know:
With approximately 10,000 orders processed via PayPal so far, we had only two instances of people attempting to do a charge-back on us! And one of them dropped as soon as we proved it was a scam (that customer must have been in a pretty rubbish place to feel he needed to resort to that with us..). These figures are pretty awesome though, clearly a combination of amazingly honest customers and us doing a pretty decent job of handling everything nicely!
But we always knew that PayPal was the weakest link in our chain. These internet giants (mostly American, aren't they?) rule the internet - whatever they say goes because they can. They don't give a toss about the wee people like us or you, it's all about the dollar and power. Their ideologies are our arch nemesis and the reason we even started this project - to prove that you could be a humanist and run a pretty cool store where people get a brilliant experience and a (sometimes life-changing) new hobby to indulge in.. There is so much crap in this world that we wanted to bring something good into it.
But don't stress, just like in March '19 when we were taken offline and had to rebuild ourselves a brand new website from scratch - we always come back bigger and stronger. We are twice the size we were back then because we're a relentless bunch. Just as well we purchased an amazing new piece of equipment hours before PayPal struck - a gigantic 110Litre digital autoclave with a powerful air compressor (now bringing our total capacity up to 271L). It feels like Christmas has come early for Cylocybe! So you can all feel free to give us everything you got, we have the sterilising capacity to take you all on π
Bank transfer and cash in post payment options will remain available for UK customers and CoinPayments (for cryptocurrencies) will remain available for all customers.
We will be working on sourcing some new reliable and trustworthy payment methods over the coming weeks. If any readers have or know of some good payment solutions which are reliable and not run by closed minded companies, please get in touch with us.
Thank you, as always.
The Cylocybe team
Link to this update22nd September 2019
No orders will be dispatched on Mon 23 Sep due to bank holiday - Hope you all have a nice weekend!
Link to this update15th August 2019
The website has been bombarded with orders since we put the banner up about our break so it looks like we will need to work up until Friday to get everything out to you all.
We plan on coming back with some more new products and changes to our site, also hoping to finally set up worldwide shipping rates for all of our products instead of limiting international customers to just our spore and culture products.. It sounds an easy task setting up shipping rates, but trust us - when things are more than a hundred grams, virtually every single country outside the UK massively varies in price to ship, making a comprehensive list of these prices for each country and varying weights is a mammoth task.
We will give you all an early teaser on just one of the new products planned for our return on the 28th - The Cylocybe Special Mycopots. They look beautiful, colonise fast and have an awesome fruiting capability so we'd be surprised if they don't become an instant hit!
Link to this update28th June 2019
After a sufficient battery recharge - Cylocybe is live and accepting orders again!
Please remember that we won't start dispatching orders until Tuesday 2nd July, as we are using this Monday to trial run a new way of fulfilling and dispatching orders. We will be using a whole new system, which we expect will help us get through an extra 40% of orders each day.
This will be the biggest change for us behind the scenes since we started our business.. It may sound a bit boring for you guys, but for us - oh we can't wait!
It's exciting knowing how much more efficient our dispatch process is going to become - We're not going to be at Amazon level speed any time soon, but if we can speed up dispatch times for everyone by even one day.. that means happy customers and happy us!
Other than big changes behind the scenes.. We have also developed a new substrate which we've named 'Cylo-Tek' (our reinvented PF-Tek recipe) and this is available right now as MycoPot and MycoBox Grow Kits.
..It has taken months of experimenting to nail down a perfect recipe and incredible results, and we are now insanely proud to bring you yet another original Cylocybe product!
We will also have this available in MycoBags over the coming days, for those of you who enjoy this style of grow.
Due to the unpopularity of our rye grain products (MycoJar and MycoBag) we decided to remove them from our website. This was a sad decision to make, but, if only one or two people order these each week, then it means that our steriliser capacity isn't being used efficiently and run virtually empty - which slows down the production of our other kits and causes us a bottleneck in our production. This has a chain reaction effect on every process down the line, right into our dispatch times for all customers.
Every little part of the business is connected to everything else and we are learning how best to move forward with efficiency in mind.. We need to constantly work on this (which is why the time off is so important) to make sure we can cope with the ever increasing demand on us.
In other happy news, we have invested in an extra 72 litres of sterilisation capacity, which now brings us close to 200 Litres all in all.. Another important step in keeping up with demand!
We still have lots more planned for Cylocybe and there's always things going on behind the scenes.. We won't ever become stale, that's for sure!
Thank you again to everyone for all the love and support, we have come across some really lovely people during our time in running Cylocybe and long may that continue π
Peace, love and positivity, always..
Ruth and Nick x
Link to this update20th June 2019
Our website will not accept any new orders from Friday 21st June - Friday 28th June.
We will then begin dispatching orders on Tuesday 2nd July.
Link to this update19th June 2019
As mentioned in our previous news post back in April, we are going to try and take a break from fulfilling orders every couple of months to work on improving our business.. and to recharge our batteries!
We will not be accepting any new orders from Friday 21st June until Tuesday 2nd July.
All orders placed before 12am Friday 21st June will be dispatched as normal and we will re-open the website at 12am on Tuesday 2nd July to begin accepting orders again.
This time is extremely important for us and our business and we see it as essential for us to continue to develop Cylocybe - We have been discussing the changes that we want to make for weeks now, so it will feel amazing to finally get everything on that to-do list checked off!
Thanks again to all of you π
Ruth and Nick
Link to this update25th May 2019
We have been working hard on re-stocking and adding to our gourmet, medicinal and novelty mushroom culture syringes over the past month and now have a huge range of 29 species available!
You will now also be able to get these wonderful cultures in handy 3ml syringes.
This is a substantial expansion to where we want to take Cylocybe - to not only provide the absolute best experience for our magic mushroom microscopy enthusiasts, but to provide this same experience for absolutely everyone who adores mushrooms like we do.
We have also just restocked many popular species within our microscopy spores category which have been out of stock for a few days.. Azurescens, Wavy Cap, P.E. and many more (you guys really have your favourites!).
On another note..
It looks like we have some fresh competition from an old source, a UK based salvia site which has just rebranded to focus on magic mushroom spores - Now, we don't mind competition, in fact we love having some competition because it keeps us on our toes! But, in the time we have been running our business, we have experienced some other suppliers who have plagiarised our products, which we spend a lot of time innovating, and even one who copied almost every bit of content from our website (we confronted them.. they disappeared).
Now, this newly rebranded site is claiming to be the UK's 'best supplier' for spores.
We added our own statement thanking you all for helping us become the UK's biggest and most trusted supplier of spores a couple of months ago, as we knew this to be absolutely true due to our search engine rankings, service reviews and many other factors.
This was actually added to our website after we experienced devastating technical issues which we managed to bounce back from in only 5 days (a whole new website had to be built and hosted on our own server) - We wanted to basically show a big confident two-finger salute to the people who managed to take us offline and show that thanks to the support of our customers, we were still the UK's number one!
We regularly work around 120 hours a week to specialise in what we do, provide a first class experience for you all and are proud to now see ourselves as the UK's number 1 spore supplier. We have worked unbelievably hard to get where we are.
So, it feels a bit frustrating that this website thinks they can just do a simple rebrand after making their name specialising in another field for 18 years (stick a mushroom in their logo).. and then just walk straight into this field and claim to be the UK's best spore supplier.
In fact, they actually then claim to sell the highest quality magic mushroom spores and spore vials anywhere in the world.. Seriously - BOLD!
We're sorry about having to bring this up, but we needed to get the frustration off our chests. When you have a genuine passion for your business - these types of things really do hurt.
We just want to thank you all again for your continuous support and we will keep working hard to grow Cylocybe into an even bigger and better business.
Nothing worth having comes easy!
Ruth and Nick x
Link to this update7th May 2019
Just a quick update to let you know that since accepting orders on 26th April (see last news post), we have been utterly bombarded with them.. we are under a whole heap of stress trying to frantically catch up! So please bear with us if there are any delays.
We will hopefully soon be hiring a small team of staff to cope with this - but it will take time to source the right people who we can totally put our trust in.
Until then, stress stress stress!
p.s. For the BRF lovers - we decided to make the PF-Tek MycoBoxes out of stock.. Most of you are choosing our round grow pots and bags anyway, so it seems the wise choice to for us to make some needed steriliser time efficiency savings! If you really love the MycoBox style grow - just opt for our Cylocybe Special which is the number one kit in our shop!
Link to this update26th April 2019
Since going on our break we have made some new developments:
We have invested heavily in new equipment such as an industrial grade substrate mixer, lab supplies and the huge All American 75X Electric Steriliser! This now brings our total sterilisation capacity up to 104 litres when you take in the other equipment which we use - and we have plans to add another 220 litres to this capacity in the coming months!
A 6 foot by 4 foot tall laminar flow hood has been added to our lab - massive.. so you can probably figure that we are planning something quite big here.. and we need all the big guns to achieve it.
Our stock rooms have been restructured to allow more inventory to be held and we also moved our office/shipping room into a bigger space to cope with bigger demand.
With some rare Scottish sun making an appearance, we did manage to squeeze in some chill out time.. when not trying to rescue birds from our 'Head of Security' cat - who can take his job too serious.
As you will see below, a lot of changes have been made to our website and eBay shop, with many new products that we're excited about still to make an appearance over the coming days and weeks.
Website changes:
eBay changes:
New products still to come:
13th April 2019
Hi everyone, you are probably wondering why we aren't accepting any new orders until 26th April?
Well, it's nothing bad - actually, it's pretty exciting..
You may already know that cylocybe.com is our first and only business. Thanks to you all, you've kept us the UK's biggest spore vendor even with all the new competition on the scene. It feels strange for us to even write that, so you can figure how insanely proud we are as we put our entire life and soul into this business.
What you might not realise though is that we are each working 100-120 hour weeks on keeping cylocybe.com going this strong and meeting the huge demand on us - that's like three full time jobs.. for anyone else who works those kinds of hours, hats off to you, seriously!
The last time we had some time off was at Christmas and New Year and guess what? - We came back with our most popular grow kit yet - the Cylocybe Special Grow Kit.
Due to the complete lack of time that we have, we are struggling to make so many new products available for you all.. growing supplies that we know you would love are literally just gathering dust in our store rooms. It's driving us crazy not having the time to do the things we want because what keeps us motivated is innovation - keeping Cylocybe fresh, getting orders out quickly and hearing how happy you guys are with the entire experience we provide.
So, enough is enough..
We are taking a break from preparing and fulfilling orders to allow ourselves the time to think through our business - the products that are working well, the ones which need improving, making our guides easier to follow.. there are many questions and ideas floating around in our heads, which we haven't had the time to do anything with.. until now.
From now on, we plan to take a week or two off to work on improving our business every couple of months. We are sure that you will all understand our reasons why - essentially, we want to continue to make Cylocybe bigger and better!
Sending love, peace and positivity to you all, as always.
p.s. All orders which haven't been sent yet will be going out on Monday!
Link to this update19th March 2019
We will add more to this later - we just want to sit down and chill after this hectic week of setting up a brand new site!
Link to this update13th March 2019
We have been having power cuts here due to the big storms last night. It seems every time we have our systems all set up to start fulfilling orders, it just goes down again.
After speaking with the power grid, they have assured us that it will be fully operational sometime this afternoon. But, unfortunately this means delays for many orders and a really busy day ahead trying to catch up on the time lost!
Link to this update2nd March 2019
We have lots more grow kits, ready to use substrates and raw substrates products now available on our site, as promised back in January. It looks like our brand new Cylocybe Special MycoBox Grow Kits are really taking off which we are excited about as it adds a bit more variety to our days (which used to be almost exclusively BRF PF-Tek). The contrast of white mycelium against the black substrate looks very amazing too!
Other than just new products, we have also created guides for each of the available grow kits which you will find linked to within the product descriptions and also within the Guides section of our website.
We have lots more planned, as ever, so stay tuned!
Link to this update15th December 2018
If you have placed an order, don't worry, we'll be dispatching all orders currently on the system as per usual (we just aren't taking new orders). If you need to get in touch, head over to the contact form or drop us an email. Contaminations? Get in touch, we'll be close by.
It's been such an eventful year, so much has happened. Grow Kits, the move, the lab, driving lessons and busier than ever. Business has sky-rocketed and we are able to get all the post out of the door quicker than ever with all the extra space we have. The products are cleaner, and higher quality because we have the room for the tools. We are well kitted with electric sterilisers here, that's for sure!
We'll try to update around Christmas, but if we don't, have a fantastic Christmas and a Happy New Year and see you back on 7th January for some hopefully brand new products!
Thanks.
Peace, love & positivity,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update30th November 2018
Hey folks, it's been a super busy last couple of months here. And we're looking forward to that Christmas time off to put our feet up for a few days. That will also be a time we can stop and think through some nifty innovations, we have some ideas we want to try out for a new product π
Between 15th December and 7th January, we'll be closed, so get your orders in as soon as you can to avoid Christmas delays (they'll all be mobbed).
Any questions, get in touch as ever.
Speak soon fun guys!
Peace, love & positivity,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update10th October 2018
We have set up shop in our new premises - take a look:
This is a special moment for Cylocybe, and it's all thanks to you fun guys that got us here! We finally have a home which we can work in, it's even on the contract with the landlord that we can run our business from here. Our landlords are super chill with it all - which is a massive relief. We've got HEPA flowhoods installed in the lab - no more working in restricted SABs. We spent much of our days in a 4ft x 5ft cupboard making all of our syringes within a SAB - it was fine, it worked and with skill it can still get great results ... The bigger problem is with space efficiency, it gets messy fast and it slows production, which is fine if working on a few things but if you're having to make hundreds of spore syringes then a SAB just won't cut it. And now we'll very rarely ever need to use our SAB.
Only problem with the new place is that none of us can drive, and there are no buses or shops. We've had to book ourselves driving lessons.
See you all soon folks!
Peace, love & positivity,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update27th September 2018
Any questions, please get in touch. Otherwise, see you all back here on 10th October!
Mush love,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update26th September 2018
If you are considering making an order, remember we will be closing at midnight tonight. All orders made and paid will be dispatched as per usual, if you need to get in touch about something we'll still be here answering emails.
Wish us luck for the house move!!
Thanks,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update1st September 2018
It has become almost impossible to keep up with demand where we currently live, only able to buy 2 weeks stock at a time because of those space constraints!
Next month we are moving to a new home, from our one-bedroom flat in the city to a massive property in the country, we'll finally have plenty of space for the business to keep growing! We have outbuildings, a garage, huge garden space, as well as half a dozen rooms inside the property we can use for a lab, office, stock room, you name it. We will have all the space we need.
This means we will have to close briefly for a couple of weeks.
Between 27th September and 10th October we will be closed. We will continue dispatching orders until there are none left on the system, so if you want to order make sure you do so before 27th September. We'll still be answering emails as ever during this time, so don't hesitate if you need to get in touch about something!
Thanks,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update5th July 2018
After a wildly successful launch of our new injectable XL PF-Tek MycoBox Grow Kit in May, with no-one yet claiming their free grow kit by finding another example of the Inject-Thru system being used elsewhere before us, we are celebrating by adding two more grow kits to our shop available right now:
We are struggling so much for space within our kitchen to keep up with the demand that we're already starting to look for another home for running the business... Our 1-bedroom flat has almost entirely turned into a warehouse and we are struggling to even move around. Wish us luck on our house-hunting adventures!
Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.
Mush love,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update16th May 2018
Today we are proud to release the XL PF-Tek MycoBox Grow Kit.
You will notice the unique-looking grow box lid with six built-in self-healing rubber injection ports designed for super easy inoculation with a liquid culture syringe straight through and into the sterile brown rice flour-based substrate.
We spent a long time developing a brand new kind of commercial mushroom grow kit from top to bottom, imagining the kind of grow kit we wished was on the market when we first got into mushrooms, and then we built it. For reference, there are only a couple of online shops in the UK which provide a sterile mushroom grow kit but none like this! Grow kit innovation has been stagnant for nearly two decades. This makes the PF-Tek MycoBox Grow Kit one of the most modern, innovative, customer-friendly, all-in-one, sterile mushroom grow kits in the UK right now (and possibly the world).
This grow kit took a lot of trial and error to develop, first trying all sorts of different methods to make inoculation as simple as possible, trying RTV silicone glues, which weren't reliable enough (as well as too slow to be a commercial product). Then after hitting our heads off a brick wall and staring at a table full of cut-up syringes, washers, needles, bolts and silicone glues, we had the eureka moment of not using glue at all and doing something we've never seen anyone else doing - drilling a small hole and sourcing rubber stoppers for vials, squeezing them tight into the hole and letting that force and friction hold tight. At first, we simply didn't trust it would work because we hadn't seen a single person on the Shroomery or any other shop doing this, and it seemed "too simple", so we tested and tested and there was zero contamination after injecting it - just nice clean healthy mycelium every time.
If you have seen this same technique being used for any kind of lid, be it a mason jar lid or anything for mushroom growing - please let us know and we will provide you with a free grow kit as we have trawled the forums and the shops across the internet and we couldn't find a single instance of it. We don't want to claim something is ours when it isn't, but we are confident this solution is new.
We call this system Inject-Thru. As well as this, we have developed the grow kit to grow virtually any species of mushroom you want to inject, like Blue or Pink Oyster.
Other than Inject-Thru, we provide sterile gloves, perlite for humidity, humidity tent for fruiting as well as vermiculite for "Dunk 'n' Roll" technique. All of this is explained in the cultivation guide that comes with the grow kit.
We hope you enjoy using the XL PF-Tek MycoBox Grow Kit as much as we enjoyed designing it for you all!
Mush love,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this update3rd January 2018
After our spore products became such a success on eBay, we decided to take the plunge and build our own shop! If you want to find out more about us, please see our 'about us' page.
In the mean time, take a look around, we're bound to have what you need. And if we don't, get in touch with us!
Mush love,
Cylocybe.com
Link to this updateAll updates from 2017 were put on our eBay shop before we opened Cylocybe.com on 1st January, 2018.
