Privacy Policy | Real Food Grower

Last updated: June 30, 2026

This Privacy Policy describes how Real Food Grower ("we", "us", "our") collects, uses, and shares information about you when you visit realfoodgrower.com (the "Site"). We've tried to write this in plain English. If anything is unclear, email us at info@realfoodgrower.com and we'll explain.

1. Who We Are

Real Food Grower is an independent container-gardening publisher. We publish climate-coded growing guides for plants and US cities. We are the data controller responsible for any personal information processed through this Site.

Contact: info@realfoodgrower.com
Site: https://realfoodgrower.com/

2. What Data We Collect

We try to collect as little as possible. The categories are:

Analytics data. When you visit a page, our analytics provider records the URL, referring page, approximate location (country, region, city — derived from IP, not stored as a precise location), device type, browser, and operating system. This data is aggregated and used to understand which guides are useful.
IP address. Your IP is briefly processed by our CDN (Cloudflare) for security, abuse prevention, and to serve the closest cached copy of the page. We do not store raw IP addresses tied to your browsing history.
Voluntary form submissions. If you email us, your message and email address are stored in our email system. We do not currently run newsletter signups, accounts, or comment systems, so we collect no other personally identifiable information (PII).
Cookie identifiers. A small set of cookies (described below) may be set by us or third parties. None of them are advertising cookies at this time.

We do not collect: payment information, account credentials, precise location (GPS), contact lists, health data, or any special-category data under GDPR Article 9.

3. How We Use Cookies

Cookies are small text files stored by your browser. We use them in two categories:

Strictly necessary cookies. Required for the Site to work — for example, remembering whether you've accepted the cookie banner, and Cloudflare's bot-protection token. These cookies do not require consent under EU law.
Analytics cookies (Google Analytics 4). We use Google Analytics 4 to count page views and understand which guides perform well. GA4 may set cookies such as _ga and _ga_* with a default lifetime of up to 24 months. We have IP anonymisation enabled and we do not use Google Signals or advertising features. EU/UK/California visitors must opt in via the cookie banner before any GA4 cookies are set.
Advertising cookies. We do not currently set advertising or retargeting cookies. If we add them in the future, this policy will be updated and the cookie banner will offer separate consent for them.

You can withdraw cookie consent at any time using the cookie-settings link in our footer, or by clearing cookies in your browser settings.

4. Third Parties We Share With

We only share data with the following service providers, and only to the extent necessary for them to do their job:

Google LLC (Google Analytics 4). Aggregated, anonymised analytics data. Subject to Google's Privacy Policy.
Cloudflare, Inc. Acts as our content-delivery network and DDoS protection layer. Processes IP addresses for security purposes. Subject to Cloudflare's Privacy Policy.
Affiliate networks (Amazon Associates and others). When you click an outbound affiliate link, the destination platform may set its own cookies to track the referral. We do not pass any personal data to these networks directly — they only see that someone arrived via a link on our site. See our Affiliate Disclosure for details.

We do not sell, rent, or trade personal information. We do not share data with brokers, ad-tech networks, or data-enrichment services.

5. Your Rights — GDPR (EU / EEA / UK Visitors)

If you are in the European Economic Area, the UK, or another GDPR jurisdiction, you have the following rights regarding personal data we hold about you:

Right of access — request a copy of the personal data we hold about you.
Right to rectification — ask us to correct inaccurate data.
Right to erasure — ask us to delete your personal data ("right to be forgotten").
Right to restriction — ask us to stop processing your data while a complaint is reviewed.
Right to data portability — receive your data in a portable, machine-readable format.
Right to object — object to processing based on our legitimate interests.
Right to withdraw consent — where processing relies on consent, you can withdraw it at any time without affecting prior processing.
Right to lodge a complaint — file a complaint with your national data-protection authority.

To exercise any of these rights, email info@realfoodgrower.com. We aim to respond within 30 days as required by GDPR Article 12.

6. Your Rights — CCPA (California Residents)

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act (as amended by the CPRA), California residents have the right to:

Know what personal information we collect, use, and disclose.
Delete personal information we have collected from you.
Correct inaccurate personal information.
Opt out of the "sale" or "sharing" of personal information.
Limit use of sensitive personal information.
Non-discrimination for exercising any of these rights.

We do not sell or share personal information within the meaning of the CCPA. To exercise any CCPA right, email info@realfoodgrower.com with the subject line "CCPA Request" and let us know which right you wish to exercise. We will verify your request using the email address on file.

7. Legal Basis for Processing (GDPR)

Where GDPR applies, we rely on the following legal bases:

Consent (Art. 6(1)(a)) — for analytics cookies and any future marketing cookies.
Legitimate interests (Art. 6(1)(f)) — for strictly-necessary site operation, security, and aggregate readership measurement that cannot be tied to an individual.
Legal obligation (Art. 6(1)(c)) — where we must retain records to comply with tax or legal requirements.

8. Data Retention

We retain personal data only as long as we have a reason to:

Analytics data — Google Analytics 4 is configured with a maximum user-data retention of 26 months, after which event-level data is deleted automatically.
Aggregated, anonymous metrics (e.g. total page views per month) — kept indefinitely for historical reporting.
Email correspondence — kept for up to 3 years after the last reply, then deleted unless an ongoing matter requires longer retention.
Server logs / CDN logs — typically purged within 30 days per Cloudflare's defaults.

9. Children's Privacy (COPPA)

Real Food Grower is not directed at children under 13 years of age. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13. If you are a parent or guardian and believe your child has provided us with personal information, please contact info@realfoodgrower.com and we will delete it promptly.

10. International Data Transfers

Real Food Grower is operated from the United States, and our service providers (Cloudflare, Google) maintain global infrastructure. If you access the Site from outside the United States, your information may be transferred to, stored in, and processed in the US or other countries where data-protection laws differ from those in your country.

Where we transfer personal data of EU/UK residents outside the EEA, we rely on Standard Contractual Clauses (SCCs) and the EU-US Data Privacy Framework as legal mechanisms for such transfers.

11. Security

We use HTTPS for all pages, secure-cookie attributes, content-security headers, and a managed CDN with DDoS protection. No system is fully impenetrable, but we take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect the limited data we hold. If we ever suffer a breach affecting personal data, we will notify affected users and applicable authorities within the timeframes required by law.

12. Affiliate Disclosure

Real Food Grower participates in affiliate programs, which means we may earn a commission when you click certain outbound links and make a purchase. Affiliate clicks may involve third-party cookies set by the destination platform. For a full description of our affiliate relationships and our editorial-independence policy, see our Affiliate Disclosure.

13. Cookie Settings

You can review or change your consent at any time by using the cookie-settings link in our footer. You can also clear cookies in your browser, or use browser-level controls (e.g. "Do Not Track", Global Privacy Control) — we honour the Global Privacy Control signal as an opt-out of any future sale or sharing of personal information.

14. Changes to This Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices, technology, legal requirements, or for other operational reasons. When we do, we will update the "Last updated" date at the top of this page. Material changes will also be announced via a banner on the homepage for at least 30 days.

15. Contact

For any privacy question, complaint, or rights request:

Email: info@realfoodgrower.com
Subject line: "Privacy Request" (or "GDPR Request" / "CCPA Request" as applicable)

We aim to acknowledge all privacy requests within 5 business days and to complete them within 30 days.