This is a good question. I love talking about things that can ease frustrations. LONG ago, I asked the owner of a mom & pop garden center, who had a few minutes to spend with me, this same question. My uproar at the time stemmed from realizing many of the annuals I bought were just perennials that freeze to death every year. Some of them could be saved! In addition to the reasons mentioned above, this is what she said. The tags are put in by the suppliers, replacing them at garden center level would make the plants financially unattractive, passing this cost on to the customer every time. Once you know how different plants behave in your yard, do you want to pay for that each time? Although I rarely pass by an opportunity to bash big boxes, I don't think any criticism is warranted in this instance, just bland explanation. Unless a discussion about narrow selection/same selection everywhere starts up... The less info they put on the tag, the wider the scope of suitability. Specific info varies by climate. A generic tag is as good in FL as in ME, for example, where conditions are going to be very different, in timing and beviour. Specific advice is regional. As far as lack of culinary info, I don't think it's any different than buying ripe tomatoes. There's no label on those of how to cook them or how they taste. There are probably flavors you don't like, so if a tag said "delicious on chicken" you might totally disagree. She also said frustrated novice gardeners can get disheartened, as alluded to by digdirt/Dave, and give up. If they have no expectations, they're excited to get 5 cucumbers instead of being disappointed about not getting tons of them. These are the folks who she would see the next year, buying more.

All of these ideas are nifty but the ones that hold up the longest by far are the copper plant tags which is why so many botanical gardens use them. They are nothing to make, in fact its just a little more work than writing. Take a copper sheet from lowes/hobby lobby for 12$ and cut it into whatever size strips. I usually get about 200 copper labels for 12$... then I save any copper eletrical wire from junk appliances people toss out and use that for the cordage because with the rubber coating it holds tight and doesn't rub the plant. Buy plastic labels from china via ebay for stuff you sell or plan on putting in ground/low cover items. In fact I was on here to try and help others, I am about to order 500 hanging tags and 100 in ground for like 15$ total. Also, if you do your whole yard like I have with the copper its great when your like is that a Louisiana sweet or was that a navel, oh let me check after 5 years and it makes life easy. I wish there was an easy way to engrave the plastic labels, I was kind of looking for something without having to go the whole dremmel route, but ideally that would be great as well. I just find the plastic finds it way into the soil or if its a plant tag breaks after a couple of years. Copper is pretty permanent, I have found some that are like 40-80 years old and still legible.

I think its fun to run around and plant at random and then be surpirsed by the unknowns when they bloom and you can best identify them. I have this experience alot because I travel so much and gather seeds from everywhere I go from plants that appeal to me on the road. This year I have five unkowns from Vermont and one unknown from Montana that I am anxious to see bloom. If I find I have miss located them that's not really a problem. I just dig them and move them if they are perennials and if they are annuals I just gather the seeds and move them the folowing year by seeding them in a more sensible place. I use to be pretty anal about color and height and coordination and texture and spacing and blah blah blah. Now I'm a messy gardener and plant wherever the heck I feel like it. Instead of having 30-40 types of plants in well coordinated, picture pefect gardens, I now have 2 acres of well over 300 varieties of flowering plants planted cottage garden style for splash of color and fun eye appeal in almost any direction I look in my yard at all times in the growing season!

Re: Foil tape... This is the best, most dependable labeling tape there is. It is in the hardware store or big box store with the duct tapes, but it is real shiney and looks like tin foil. It has a paper backing you peel off as you use it. You can stick it on anything, and write with any pen you want -- even one that has no ink! It makes an engraving that lasts forever, and the tape adhesive is water resistant. Mine are always out there year round through New England winters, and I've never had one lose it sticky-ness. (Can't say that for regular duct tape, that's for sure.) For a winter project, I wrap coffee stirrers (the flat wooden kind) with this tape, then I always have them handy for planting out. For winter sowing I stick a piece right on the milk jug and write on it there. I put 2 labels on each jug though, one near the bottom and one near the top. That's so I can read them from above, but there will still be a label on it when I cut the tops off in the spring. Get the foil tape. One roll will last you forever.