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Burpee is a gutted shadow of its former self, and that is a crying shame. When we lived in Riverside, CA, ('72-'84) we bought a lot of garden supplies directly from the large Burpee facility & gardens there, up until it closed. We loved it, and swore by them, and mourned their closing.
Zip forward to the present: We have not bought anything from them since a couple of bad experiences with their seed packets a few years ago.

Excerpted from Wikipedia; full article here:

In 1970, David Burpee sold his company to General Foods. In 1974, Burpee moved from its north Philadelphia location to its current headquarters at 300 Park Avenue in Warminster, Pennsylvania. ...

In 1979 the company was acquired by ITT. David Burpee remained as a consultant until his death in June 1980. (personal opinon: that's when it really started going downhill.) In 1991 the Burpee company was acquired by George Ball, Inc., a diversified horticultural family business. Jonathan Burpee, the founder's grandson, was the last Burpee family member to work for the company.

More about Mr. Ball here

A message board of complaints and woes concerning ordering/buying, mislabeling, poor product, and poor customer service from Burpee here

Ball claims truthfully, but with a forked tongue, that "Monsanto doesn't own Burpee", then goes on to state that "he doesn't buy or sell genetically modified seeds." (article here) and that he gets his seeds from Seminis. NOTE: the article strongly implies that he is NOT producing any seeds; he buys all of them from a single source.

Monsanto OWNS Seminis! source

Seminis was established in 1994 to consolidate leading companies in the fragmented fruit and vegetable seed industry. The process was realized by takeovers of such companies (mostly Dutch) as: Asgrow,[1] Petoseed,[1] Royal Sluis,[1] Bruinsma Seeds,[1] Genecorp.[1] Monsanto still uses some of these brands.[2]

On March 23, 2005, Monsanto Company announced that it had completed its acquisition of Seminis, Inc. According to the press release announcing the deal, Monsanto paid $1.4 billion in cash and assumed debt, plus a performance-based payment of up to $125 million payable by 2007.[1]