That's a very healthy, typical looking flytrap!
Based on my experience with plants that show similar characteristics, I'm guessing you'll get the odd trap here and there that arcs, but the majority of them are going to look like the ones currently on the plant.
Anymal911 wrote:SEASONS, not years... It probably loses its shape in the fall, and gains it back in the spring... I'm just suggesting he should wait, especially if nobody on here has any experience with this particular cultivar before...
Still, is it fair to ask for a refund after SEASONS with the plant? And that's just speculation. The description should really give more detail about the plant, like when to expect the arced traps, if the trait isn't shown all the time.
I guess the real question is: Is it fair to the consumer to buy a plant expecting a certain trait to be exhibited, but it's not?
The main issue I have with this is that there is no history given about this plant and the description says that the plant is "topped with traps that typically have a really nice arc to them" but, in fact, the plant Alex received doesn't have a single highly-arced trap. I agree with Sarah that the plant is being falsely represented on their website.
This is why we (FlytrapStore) don't sell plants until they're either widely distributed and their growth habits are well known, or we've personally observed over the course of a few years and have sent plants to others to grow them as well to evaluate them and the trait for which the plant is being selected can be well described.
It's just too easy to name every single plant that shows some little promise of uniqueness then take a good photo of it, as was done here, when it's showing that trait, but in reality the plant rarely shows that trait.
Quite a few growers in the UK have been complaining about people doing this for years. Thankfully here in the US, there hasn't been that same problem at any significant level. On eBay you can almost always find some named flytraps that are impossible to find photos of or any sort of history on. And I suspect that those plants would be disappointing as well in most cases. But no stores that I know of have yet started selling plants like that...until now? Hopefully it's just a one time thing but some of the other offerings look kinda suspect too.
In any case, I normally avoid spending money on plants that are new or I've never heard of, where the product description is lacking, and are coming from a source who I know very little about.