GBW Premium Quality Grass Seed Review

While the other four lawn seed mixes that I tested contained just two or three varieties of grass seed, GBW’s DEFRA-approved offering came out on top with four types of grass:

• Dwarf Amenity Ryegrass – a type of perennial ryegrass with a dense growing habit
• Creeping Red Fescue – creeping rhizomes that form a dense and hardy lawn
• Chewings Fescue – flat-bladed with a fine texture. Known for its creeping and binding qualities
• Brown Top Bent – loved for its fine, dense, and vividly green leaves

Compared to its competition, this mix is much more diverse, meaning that the lawn that it forms will be as well. The main benefit of this is that it gives you a much better likelihood of quickly creating a lush lawn – if one variety struggles to do well in your garden’s conditions, there’s a good chance that one of the others will still thrive. A diverse lawn also does great things for soil health and the overall biodiversity of your garden.

GBW promises that this grass seed mix grows in all conditions. I was hoping that this was true because it was being sown in far from ideal conditions in terms of weather. I sowed the seed in October, after which it had to deal with hard frosts and winter storms.

Luckily, the seeds persevered and, 16 days later, started poking their heads through the ground. This was longer than the 7-10 day germination claimed by GBW but, like I said, the seeds had a lot to contend with so I won’t hold this against them!

GBW also states that it takes between two to four weeks to see proper results from this seed. Needless to say, this wasn’t the case for me – four weeks after sowing saw this lawn covered in snow and ice! However, again, the seed handled it just fine, with the grass emerging from the frigid conditions looking unscathed. 

Three months later and growth has continued to be steady. It’s not as fast or as impressive as some of the other grass seed mixes that I sowed, such as Pronto Seed’s and Gardeners Dream’s, but it has still produced a respectable lawn.

This grass seed comes in a recyclable bag. Stapled to the top of the bag is a small piece of paper that explains how the seed should be sown. 

I started by raking out my soil, scattering the seed over the top, raking it once more, and then watering. The bag itself can’t be resealed, so you’ll need to find a way to do this yourself if you don’t use all of the seed and need to store the rest.

One thing that I did notice was that this grass seed mix is lighter than the other four that I tested. This is down to the bent grass in the mix, which consists of smaller and finer seeds. This isn’t an issue, per se, but it’s worth keeping in mind if, like I did, you’re sowing seed on a breezy day. Keep your hand as low to the ground as possible when scattering the seed, otherwise the wind will end up blowing the bent grass seeds away.

In terms of price, this grass seed sits somewhat in the middle of the five that I tested. It wasn’t the cheapest but it also wasn’t the most expensive, even though it contains a seed variety that none of the other grass seed mixes have. 

This pricing strategy pretty much reflects its performance too. Although it wasn’t the best, it wasn’t the worst, making its price a fair one. For the lawn that you end up with, it works out to be pretty good value for money!

Although this grass seed took a little longer to get going than some of the others that I tested, slow and steady often wins the race! It has given me a good covering of dense-ish grass while proving to be resilient in the poorest of conditions. If you’re looking for a reliable and cost-effective grass seed mix that offers a little more variety and biodiversity than standard mixes, the GBW Premium Quality Grass Seed won’t disappoint.