Privacy Policy

INTRODUCTION

Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden (“the Garden”) created this statement to demonstrate our firm commitment to your privacy. We do not collect personally identifying information about you when you visit our site unless you choose to provide such information to us. Providing such information is strictly voluntary. This policy is your guide to how we will handle information we learn about you from your visit to our website.

Lewisginter.org and shop.lewisginter.org collect customer information for a variety of reasons, including as part of our ongoing efforts to provide superior customer service; to improve our customers’ shopping experience; and to communicate with our customers about our products, services and promotions, including those that we believe may be of particular interest to you based on information we have collected. 

GOOGLE ANALYTICS

The Garden uses Google Analytics to collect information about how you use our website. Google Analytics’ privacy policy explains how this information is collected and used by Google. You may also wish to review Google Analytics’ Terms of Service. We use Google Analytics to improve our website user experience and for reporting to sponsors about the volume of web traffic.  You can prevent Google from collecting this information by disabling cookies in your browser settings.  

COOKIES

A cookie is a small text file that is sent to your browser from a website and stored on your computer’s hard drive. Cookies can’t read data from your hard disk or read cookie files that were created by other sites—the website that creates a cookie is the only one a browser will permit to access it.

Examples of ways in which the Garden might use cookies would be to control access to certain user features, to customize content areas, or to analyze site activity and user behavior. The Garden also reserves the right to use cookies in the future in conjunction with new content or extended functionality.

We also use cookies to collect information about our website users and use cookies in advertising including remarketing campaigns (display, search and social). You are not required to use cookies to use this site. Users should be aware, however, that prohibiting the use of cookies may restrict the user’s access to certain types of content or features. 

TYPES OF INFORMATION COLLECTED

Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden does not collect any personal information about individuals—such as names and postal or email addresses—except when such information is knowingly provided to the Garden by the individual. Personal information might be obtained from online transactions such as purchases (including merchandise from the Garden Shop eStore, classes offered by the Education Department or event tickets), membership subscriptions or donations. Additionally, personal information may be transmitted as part of a form submission or in connection with other activities, services or resources made available on our site. Any personally identifying information retrieved by the Garden must be voluntarily submitted by the user.

The Garden’s website does collect some anonymous “non-personally identifiable” information about visitors automatically when pages on our website are requested through a browser. This information is used for statistical purposes and to help us monitor how guests navigate our site, allowing us to tailor our services for the majority of visitors. Non-personally identifiable information may refer to information about our visitors’ browsers, operating systems, Internet Service Providers or other similar information.

The Garden’s website collects Internet Protocol (IP) addresses as a component of the non-personally identifiable information. An IP address is a number assigned to your computer by a web server when you’re on the Internet. This information is used to collect data such as determining how many users visited a specific area of our site, but personally identifiable information is not included. Such information could, if necessary, be used to identify a user in order to comply with safety and/or security issues or with legal requirements.

USE OF INFORMATION

Any personal information provided to the Garden is maintained and accessible only by the Garden unless the Garden expressly states otherwise.

The following are examples of how the Garden may use the personal information it collects:

• If you made a purchase from the Garden Shop eStore, the required personal information (similar to that provided during a telephone or mail-order purchase) will be used to complete your order.
• If you indicated that you were interested in receiving Garden-related news and information, you might receive emails that we feel may be of interest to you. 
• The following is an example of how the Garden may use the non-personally identifiable information it collects: Cumulative anonymous data could be analyzed to describe the collective characteristics and behaviors of online visitors and subsequently be used to further optimize the effectiveness of our site.

SHARING INFORMATION

The Garden may share with trusted third parties information you provide when corresponding with us or when becoming a Member. If you prefer not to have your personally identifiable information shared in this way, please indicate this to Garden staff.  For example, if you are booking an event here, your contact information may be shared with our in-house caterer, Meriwether Godsey. Your information may also be shared with trusted third parties such as our membership database provider or our education registration provider. You may log in to those third-party providers to update your information and/or contact preferences. If you purchase items from our online store, your information will be managed by our point-of-sale service provider. 

 You may email or write the Garden at the addresses below to review the information collected about you, to request corrections, or to let us know your preference for sharing your information.

We want to be very clear: We will not obtain personally-identifying information about you when you visit our website unless you choose to provide such information to us. Providing such information is strictly voluntary. Except as might be required by law, we do not share any information we receive with any outside parties.

DONOR CONFIDENTIALITY

Lewis Ginter adheres to the highest standards of donor confidentiality. We value our donors and respect their privacy. The Garden will not sell, share, or trade names or personal information of donors with any other entity, nor will we send mailings to our donors on behalf of other organizations. We may publish donor names in our Annual Report, unless a donor requests anonymity in writing. All other donor or prospective donor information shall be kept strictly confidential by the Garden and our authorized personnel.

SECURITY

The Garden protects all personally and non-personally identifiable information that it receives via the Internet against unauthorized access.

In addition, the Garden’s website uses Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption to process purchases made on the Garden Shop eStore and third-party ticketing systems. Because we use this technology, online customers can feel confident that their personal information is protected from interception by any third party. Sensitive credit card information is not permanently stored on any Garden web server; and though your order information is retained for our records, this information is never shared with other companies or persons.

Unfortunately, no online data transmission or storage system can be guaranteed to be 100 percent secure. If you have reason to believe that your information is no longer secure, please immediately notify the Garden.  

WHAT IS A SECURE CONNECTION?

When a secure connection is established between your browser and a website, any data that is transferred over the connection will be encrypted to prevent it from being viewed by a third party. Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption, the standard for most browsers and servers, makes it very difficult for anyone to intercept or decode messages exchanged over this type of secure connection.

Most browsers display an image of a locked padlock in their status bar when connected to a secure site. Secure transactions are also indicated when the prefix in the location bar of your browser switches from http:// to https://. If you do not see the padlock displayed in the status bar, if the padlock is unlocked, or if the protocol in the location bar is not listed as https://, then any data exchanged with the website is potentially visible to others.

Depending on your browser, you may be able to view authentication information about a secure page by clicking on the locked padlock in the status bar. For more information on how your software establishes a secure connection, see the help files for your particular browser.

Estore credit card information is not stored on any Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden web server.  Your order information is retained for our records, but this information is never shared with other companies or persons. For other transactions with the Garden, credit card information is not permanently stored on any Garden web server; and though our order information is retained for our records, this information is never shared with other companies or persons.

LINKS TO OTHER SITES

Users may find content on the Garden’s website or the Garden Shop’s eStore that links to the sites and services of our partners, sponsors, vendors or other third parties. In many cases, these links represent cooperative projects or are established with persons or entities that have a significant connection to or relationship with our site. Although every effort is made to ensure that any referrals are to reputable and relevant sources, the Garden does not control the content or links that appear on these sites. In addition, these sites or services, including their content and links, may be constantly changing. These sites and services may have their own privacy policies and customer service policies, or no policy at all. The Garden maintains a policy against the non-consensual collection or sharing of personal information and encourages visitors to review the privacy policies of any sites they visit to ensure their personal information is being protected.

The Garden is not responsible for the information collection, use, disclosure or security policies or practices of other organizations, particularly in regards to social media. 

USE OF TEXT AND IMAGES

If you would like to publish information or images that you find on our website, please send your request to [email protected].  Information about using our logo and images can be obtained by contacting the Garden using the information provided at the end of this policy. For usage of our wordmark, please view our wordmark branding guidelines (PDF) and fill out a request form. 

ACCESSIBILITY

The Garden’s website is designed to be accessible to visitors with disabilities and to comply with federal guidelines concerning accessibility. We welcome any comments or suggestions you may have in this regard. To learn more about visitor accessibility at the Garden, please visit the accessibility page of our web site.

POLICY CHANGES

Occasional changes may be made to this document as new services and content are added to our site or to reflect changes in the Garden’s policies. Visitors to the Garden’s website or the Garden Shop eStore are encouraged to check this document periodically to stay informed of current privacy guidelines.

ACCEPTANCE OF TERMS

By using the Garden’s website, you signify your acceptance of our privacy policy. If you do not agree to this policy, please do not use our site. Your continued use of any Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden website following the posting of changes to these terms will indicate your acceptance of those changes.

EMAIL

You also may decide to send us personally-identifying information, for example, in an email message containing a question or comment, or by filling out a web form that provides us this information. We use personally identifying information from email primarily to respond to your requests. We may forward your email to other employees (including catering staff) who are better able to answer your questions. We may also use your email to contact you in the future about our programs that may be of interest.

If you sign up for one of our email lists, we will only send you the kinds of information you have requested. We won’t share your name or email address with any outside parties. You can unsubscribe from our emails at any time by updating your preferences on our database or by clicking “unsubscribe” on the bottom of the email.

YOUTH AND PRIVACY

We take special care when working with youth information. For youth ages 4 – 12, parents provide basic registration information online via Active Network  for students enrolled in out-of-school time programs. For those ages 13 – 18 applying to youth volunteer and service programs we collect information via an online form via  Volgistics volunteer management software and/or email.  We never share any information about youth; all information is confidential. We allow parents of youth participating in our programs to opt in or out of signing our photo release, however, even with a photo release on file, we never identify the youth in a photo by more than a first name.  

ONLINE PROFILE UPDATES AND DONATIONS

If you complete the Profile Update Form and share your personally identifying information, this information will be used only to provide you with more targeted content. We may use your contact information to send further information about our organization or to contact you when necessary. You may always opt out of receiving future mailings. Our site provides users the opportunity to opt out of receiving communications from us. You may choose to receive only specific communications or none at all. You can not remove yourself from our database, but you can prevent unwanted communication.

QUESTIONS ABOUT OUR POLICIES

Please contact us if you have questions.
Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden
1800 Lakeside Avenue
Richmond, Virginia 23228
(804) 262-9887
[email protected]