Matt, have you checked the dead ones for root size?  It's very common for two or three plants that have been growing in teeny tiny starter pots to be placed into one larger pot so they appear to be a single large plant.  Often they haven't even sent out roots past the their little spongy block of growing medium.

I've had the same problem as you, and won't buy poinsettias anymore unless I know they're a single, mature plant (6" pot at the smallest) that can adapt to something other than a hothouse environment.   What you find mostly today are intended to be throw-away plants. 

Poinsettias will grow happily outdoors in my area with a bit of protection from frost, but you have to start with a plant that has a decent sized, healthy root system.  My friend has three of them going now, two in pots and one in the ground, and they are thriving.  He planted them a year ago.  My great aunt had a big one in her front yard.  When I lived in Santa Monica, a poinsettia from the adjacent property was taller than my second floor apartment balcony, and huge blooming branches were resting against the top of the balcony railing. 

These plants are not hard to grow, and they grow fast, but when you consider they may have a root system the size of a 2" pot, once plants like that are out of a hot house with perfect growing conditions, all bets are off.

I have never known there was any other species than suicidal.   Hoping against hope, I've bought them time and again only to have two brown leaves left by Christmas.   I love the flower, especially when they are BIG or smaller in big numbers.  

Many years ago, my sis worked for an indoor green-scaping company.  They had the contract for the newest and largest of shopping malls and tended to the poinsettias at the holidays.  They'd throw out a couple dozen a day that had passed.  Some were murdered by patrons, but most just withered and got whisked away.  

The bigger the plant, the bigger the blooms, usually.  The tall one outside my Santa Monica apartment had big, dense, puffy, way-beyond-triple blooms that measured nearly a foot across.

I think letting these get established in the ground is the best option where winter frosts are light, or under an eave, overhang or patio cover in slightly colder zones.  Pot culture seems to be tricky as a rule.  The linked article seems to agree with me, and its advice can be applied to hospitable areas outside of Florida.  I agree with the advice that in the ground, poinsettias want little care.  Plants about the size of the one pictured in the article, or even a bit larger, used to be seen in the landscape around here.  I think many were lost in the Xmas freeze of 1990 and were never replaced. 

As others have suggested, plant or locate your pot in an area shaded from the hottest mid-day sun.  An east or south facing wall would be best.

Well, I guess between this thread and a sighting just a little while ago, the cosmos wants me to try my luck with a couple of plants.

I just found a pile of discarded ones in the street awaiting the scooper that will come by on Monday.  There were various sizes and one or two of the plants were the lighter pinkish-coral color.  I got two nice 6" pot size standard types, and another larger round leaf variety.  The tiny block of growing medium was visible on the 6" ones, but since they were out of their pots I could see real roots around the exposed edges of their soil.  Brought them home and put them in pots just as they were.

The round leaf one is interesting.  That one is three separate plants that had been in a larger bowl-shaped pot that would typically be used for a hanging plant.  Roots all around the bottom edge.  It fit right into a plastic hanging pot of mine that lost its hanger.  I'm offering that one to my friend.  He likes the unusual.

All plants are in the back of the '50 GMC where they're under cover, out of the rain, and will get some brief early afternoon sun.  I'm looking at spots on the back wall of the house (east facing) where the two I'm keeping can go into the ground, assuming they don't go suicidal on me over the course of the winter.

I like that white one Matt.

Don't worry about the grapefruit not blooming.  It already has two other strikes against it.  Since it was planted from a seed, there's no telling whether its fruit would be worthwhile anyway.   Citrus varieties sold for agricultural or home garden applications are always grafted onto a more vigorous type of root stock (mainly sour orange).  Grapefruit also requires intense heat to achieve tolerable sweetness, which is why most U.S. commercial crops are grown in Arizona and Texas, so even if yours bore fruit it would likely be bitter and as sour as a lemon.

What's interesting is that for as long as I can remember, around here most stores put their poinsettias outside -- in the garden department if they had one, or just out in front of the store if they didn't.  There they were, getting blown around on a cold December day when the wind chill could be near freezing, and they looked no worse for wear by the time the holidays were over and they were being sold cheap.  Go figure.

I'm relying on this procedure for the discards I just picked up over the weekend.  If we get a cold snap where overnight temps get down near freezing, then I'll bring them into the basement until that spell is over, otherwise they'll be getting acclimated on the back of the Jimmy until it's planting time

At least not when you're talking about poinsettias.

I thought I'd revive this thread even though it's not even Thanksgiving yet, so I'm violating one of my hard and fast rules, as dictated by one of the poinsettias I rescued from the gutter in early January (see pictures above) that not only survived, but has started to bloom!  The others failed in fairly short order (the standard type one) or suddenly over the past summer (the round leaf one).

This plant had been outdoors in the same plastic pot I had it in originally, by the back wall of the house with an eastern exposure.  I watered it sparingly and fed it once in a while and recently decided it deserved a larger clay pot.  About a month and a half ago, I gave it a dose of bloom food but doubted it would have any effect.  About three weeks ago, the newest leaves started to turn a bronze color which has since developed into a bright red.  The picture doesn't do it justice.

Needless to say, I'm surprised and amazed.  Even my buddy's poinsettias, which are older, much more developed and bushy and have been outside in larger pots, are not showing any color change -- at least not yet.

I intend to plant this one in the ground where it's currently located.  It's clear that it's happy in that spot.  Maybe in the spring depending on how well it does over the winter.

I'll post another shot if/when it hits its peak bloom.

Tom, I did rescue one cutting from a section of the plant pictured above that somehow was broken off.  I had it in water over the summer, where it remained in a sort of suspended state, not producing roots or any new growth.  Just hanging out and not looking any better or worse.

I finally decided it wanted to live, so I dipped it in rooting hormone and stuck it in a small pot.  It has grown very slowly, but that's progress.  I'll be bringing it inside when overnight temps drop consistently below 45.  With any luck, it will take off outside next year but will remain in a container for at least a season or two, I'm sure.

I'll try to remember to snap a picture to post here.

Here's the cutting I took from the broken piece.   Propane canister placed for scale purposes.  It will be interesting to see what it looks like a year from now, if it doesn't decide to check out before then.

Sorry, the transition from IOS to AWO ran into the usual automatic re-orienting issue with this particular shot.

Tom, except for small tips of leaves that existed when the cutting was in a suspended state while in water for a couple of months, all of the growth you see in that picture developed after I potted it up.   If anything, presuming it survives under a timed grow light in the basement until spring, I will pinch it back when I put it outside again next year.  The pot got knocked over by a squirrel but it didn't faze the cutting.  It's been a trooper so I have high hopes for it.

Matt, I think if they can survive past the holidays, even if they go into shock after being in an ideal environment at the grower's facility, they'll become acclimated like yours and mine from last year did. 

My buddy gave me a huge plant -- really three of them in one large pot -- before Thanksgiving and it's doing fine in a west facing window that up until last week was having its blinds almost completely closed on sunny afternoons.  I've only watered it sparingly, like two or three times, and barely a cup full each time.

Even my little cutting has some small leaves at the top that are turning red.  It's in the basement under a grow light with other tender plants, likely for the next few months.