Queen condition upon arrival from producers varies a bit. I would say most often our queens arrive in very good condition. 
Most often the queens are banked and if they are banked for a short time properly, it's ok.
We usually get our queens overnight, UPS, across the country.
We just received 100 queens that took 3 days from Hawaii for early gulf coast splits, in a battery box with a wet sponge and candy. Nice shape. The splits were completely done and we installed the queens. Only one dead. I like battery boxes that share the caretaker worker bees. 
I don't think most producers let the queens stay in the mating nuc long enough, though. 
One other thing.....they certainly have to work hard to earn their money. It's not easy to raise good queens, consistently. 

 Kirk Jones

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