That would not be true at our nursery. We have our clients pick out the plants they desire and those are the plants we install. I'm quite sure your nursery would do the same.

I'm not sure how information like this gets spread, as it is a generalization of the basest kind. Not all retail nurseries or garden centers operate in the same manner, nor do all offer landscape design services, so it is preposterous to make a blanket statement that all will produce work or material that will be second-rate. And it's hardly likely that any independent nursery that wants to stay in business very long in this day and age is going to pass off cut-rate, unwanted merchandise or shoddy design services. The competition is just too intense.

Sure, you may run the risk of encountering a bad apple - no one is perfect and mistakes and misunderstandings do happen - but as the consumer paying the bill, you ALWAYS have the last word - if you don't like it, don't pay for it. (A word to the wise here - NEVER prepay anything other than a modest initial deposit for work that is yet to be done - full payment should be due at completion to your satisfaction, not earlier). As with hiring or contracting with any other design professional, ask to see examples of completed work and ask for references from satisfied customers. Then make an informed decision, rather than one based on some of the nonsense that gets spread on GW.

But for some mysterious someone to tar all nursery-related landscaping services with the same bad brush because they may have had an unfortunate experience is irresponsible and uninformed.

It is just like society in general. There are good people and there are bad people. There are people who want to do good things, but are less capable. There are people who are capable, but cut corners to make more money. There are people who are much more in to making beautiful gardens than making money. There are people who are much more into making money.

It cuts the same way when it comes to consumers as well. There are some who are willing to seek out quality materials, aesthetic talents, and good craftsmanship, then find a way to pay for them. There are those who will seek out the lowest cost and then demand quality materials, aesthetic talents, and good craftsmanship from those ill equiped to deliver the goods (because of the lack of financial resources or the ability or both).

It is work to find what you are looking for. You have to talk to people who have direct experience with your prospective designer or have had a good experience and can put you in touch with such a person. Asking questions on the web is not going to get you there.

Thanks guys for responses. Good to know it's not the norm.

Anyway, the guy is coming over to my house this Friday to do a design...in my very small yard. He will charge 50.00. Do I just need to go ahead now and call the nursery for references on this guy?

Generally, references are checked prior to contracting with someone for services. Best done sooner as opposed to later, when it could be apparent that this is not the right fit.

FYI, $50 is a bargain for a design of any description or size. At that fee rate, you may not be getting a very skilled designer; rather just a nurseryperson with some experience siting plants. Many nurseries with landscaping services do absorb the cost of the design (which can't help to be more than $50, in just labor hours drafting) in favor of the sale of plants and other materials. At my nursery, $50 wouldn't even get you an onsite consultation, let alone a full design (which we don't do).

Caveat emptor - let the buyer beware. You get what you pay for.

Thanks Gardengal, I'm in SC, so don't know if that makes a difference in what I'm paying. I would imagine NY, CA, IL might be a lot higher. Just calling around different places, I've found this to be the norm.

Actually, I didn't really think I needed a design. The major thing I wanted was for someone that knows plants to plant me a privacy fence (natural style) on one side of my yard. I honestly didn't even see a need for a design....just someone who would know what would go there and then to just plant them. It seemed like a no brainer to me for a landscaper.

I will call nursery today for references just so I feel better about guy they are sending. Thanks!

Ok, since I'm new at hiring this type service, when I get references, do I just get their customers phone number and call them to see how they liked the guy's services? Do I get addresses and go run by their house to see if I like what they did? I don't know if someone did my yard, if I'd want people calling me for references..but is that how it works? Thanks!!!

If you drive past the addresses given you should get a good idea whether the work is to your taste or not. I am constantly amazed at how trusting people are and how they seem to assume that a business is reputable/competant without doing any homework. I met with a new client today....after only a brief conversation (and never asking for references) they are entrusting me to do a large, complex plan for their property (for which I am being paid well) and the contractor I brought with me to install it to the tune of an $80,000 budget!

References are just one thing to use in helping you make a selection. Look for other indicators of whether you want to work with someone. If they do not show up, or cancel at the last minute before the sale, how much do you want to deal with them after the sale.

Never forget that it is a two way street. The person performing the work wants to deal with clients that they are comfortable with as well. Discomfort comes when we see a person who gives us indications that (s)he may not pay in a timely manner (from being short on money, or by finding excuses to delay), does not seem to be focused on the conversation, or has an abrassive personality. It is exactly the same as your concerns. Will the landscaper deliver the goods in a timely manner, is (s)he focused on what you want to have done, and is this a person who I want to deal with?

As easily as you might reject a landscaper, (s)he might reject you. It is called "prescreening". Time is limited and time not being billed has to be spent very carefully. A contractor can only do so much work in a season and must apply that work in the most efficient way as possible.

Your potential job is valued against other potential jobs that are being considered at the same time. A twenty thousand dollar profit that is mostly on labor vs. a twenty thousand dollar profit that is mostly on material is going to take longer. That displaces another job.

When faced with three prospects and only having time to meet with one or two, the contractor has to guestimate which is the most important one to go too. A potential client that says "Joe Smith recommended you..." vs. "I saw your ad ...." or worse yet "I'm calling three designers over to compete for my work ..." is definitely a better lead. A landscaper recommended to you by someone having a good experience should be a hotter prospect for you rather than someone who left a door hanger explaining his services on every house in your neighborhood.

A 50 dollar design from a nursery is normally just a quick sketch or maybe some other kind of low cost presentation to help you decide to buy plants from that nursery. It's a sales tool for a plant seller. If you want something more you will want to contact and retain a garden consultant, landscape designer or landscape architect. Expect to pay much more.

Thanks guys. Actually the guy finally did call and was very apologetic. He came over and his charge was 75.00. He was going to draw something up for me and call to let me know when I could go look at it and see the plants he had in mind. Even without me saying anything, he suggested just what I was wanting....hodgepodge of shrubs/trees lining the side of the yard so it didn't look like a fence, but provided privacy and had some nice scented trees/fast growing and pretty/green all year. He's also doing a few other things and designing a flower bed with shrubs/flowers. There's herbs planted there now and I hate those so he's going to freshen it up with things I like. I can't wait to see the results. He loved my yard already and assumed I loved yard work. I love it.

He also asked me about the money I was wanting to spend and I told him my ceiling. He said he could work with that.

The charge is a consultation fee and doesn't go toward plants. I told him what I was looking for and he had some good ideas and really knew his plants. I was quite impressed and think he'll do a great job. He was already talking to me about how I'll have to maintain....watering during the hot summer, etc.

I didn't really need a design. What I wanted isn't all that complicated to go to the trouble. A sketch is fine and I think he'll do just fine. I'll have to post pics when he gets done.

Thanks again everyone.

That is great example of a person matching needs with the right service to get the job done. Just how much better is it to have someone who you are comfortable with? Its far and away the biggest factor in selling design services. Keep us posted.

I think the arguement of $50 being too cheap for a design would have to depend on where you are.

I work in a part of missouri that isn't big city life, and we charge $50 for our landscape plans (the drawing,plant list, consultation & estimate). You can pay the $50 and do the work yourself, or if you decide to have us do the work, we credit you $50 on your bill after all the work is done. That is pretty much the going rate around here.
And btw, we don't do our jobs based on who is going to end up paying us more either, we have a list and go down it on a first come, first served basis. If the lady with the $400 job contacts us first, she is going to get priority over the business with the $20K job, because she was "in line" first.

I'd be curious, autumnmoon, on those $50 design deals where the client does all the rest of the work themselves, just how much that works out to be for you at an hourly rate? Unless you can whip out a drafted, scaled design plan (something creative wouldn't hurt), plant list, estimate, AND include the intial site visit, consultation, measuring, etc. in only a couple of hours, I sincerely believe you are shooting yourself in the foot and have seriously undervalued your time.

I'm not sure that location has that much effect - or should have - on the cost of the design. What you should be selling is a service and skill set that the client is unable to achieve on their own and that should have a value that is not entirely related to location. You will have to go much further in your explanation to convince me that a $50 design is a good value - at least to the designer - anywhere in this country.

Gardengal,
Autumnmoon is referring to the other half of the world, which we talked about in a different thread. That's the world we live too. Not everyone is willing to pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for just the design. Most likely the design Autumnmoon is referring to is just one or two beds not an entire house/yard make over with stone walls, irrigation and the full nine yards. Some folks just want a new bed for a couple hundred bucks and nothing more. I know this is not your type of client and that's great but there's tons of single bed installations out there.
We also charge a similar fee for single designs. But we also will charge per hour for more intense work. That doesnt make the quality of the design better or worse then others.

And most likely s/he works for a nursery or landscaper and that $50.00 goes to them and not s/he.. But who knows.

A typical residential landscape plan takes me between 20 and 40 hours to complete. Notice that I said plan. I did not say details and specifications. I did not say tag the plants in the nursery or anything else. The plan is to scale and considers grading, walkways, patios, often driveway, plants, etc,... It also means that a good amount of time was spent measuring things on the site.

I have to conclude that I either work considerably slower, or that my idea of a plan is different, or that people can make a living at $1.40-$2.50 an hour in other regions of the country. My best guess is that a plan means a different thing to different people.

mylu, you seem to have a knack for over-generalizing. I seriously doubt that "half the world" of landscape designers can subsist on $50 designs. There is a certain amount of time and effort that goes into any design regardless of size, even a single bed design. For this reason, I have a minimum design fee that takes into account my travel and consult time, even the most simple and basic of measuring activities, plus the time drafting and preparing the plan. At the very least we are looking at 5-8 hours for the smallest jobs - more like 10 hours with site visit incorporated - disregarding any of the peripheral activities as laag mentioned - accessing or tagging plants, writing specs or details. Heck, even printing costs have gone up and printing out the plan is now upto nearly $10 a sheet.

I know that the cost of living varies from area to area, but with even the price of gas the way it is today, can you profitably do business at less than $10 an hour? I can't and I don't know anyone else that can. I'll have to go along with laag and assume we are talking about vastly different design processes and output.

FWIW, $50 won't even get you a professional onsite consultation here, let alone anything resembling a drafted design.

You are both correct we are talking about 2 different processes here. That's what I was trying to say. Not everyone needs the full blown details, nor is willing to pay for them. But they to still can get help and pay for that service. As the original poster stated the fee for what they want done is $75.00. That $75.00 goes to his employer and he gets a hourly rate from that employer. There is nothing wrong with that if the "design" is what the customer is looking for. The other half of the world was just a cliché and meant to be generalized. You gotta have a knack at something you know!

Well, since I posted here and y'all gave good insight and advice, I wanted to post the results and share some pics.

I got the guy from the nursery. He is a landscape architect and really knew his plants. He actually did the drawing and picked out the plants/shrubs/trees for a fee of 75.00. He brought the plants to the house and laid them out where they were to go and another guy came to plant them. Then the other guy came to check on them to make sure everything ok and he'll come back in a week or two to check and see how they are doing.

I got the shrubs/trees for the natural privacy fence (3 tea olives, 3 ligustrums, 3 burford hollies and a leyland cypress). He also replace a dead shrub on other side of yard and added 2 more to the group. He made me a flower bed and planted perrinials where I had weeds and herbs. I also had a bad hostas burning problem in front yard and he suggested that I put a tree to provide shade so they would not burn so he also planted a Zelkova tree in the front.

All in all I thought he did a great job and I am happy with what all he did. End cost was 2,600 so I thought I got a good deal.

Here's some pictures:

Hostas in front yard that were burning. Zelcova tree planted to provide shade.

Here are some pics of my new natural privacy fence:

Here is pics of flower bed he planted for me. This area used to be herbs and weeds. I don't cook so wasn't excited about herbs. Now it's a bunch of perinnials.

Pic of new shrubs. Line of shrubs is on opposite side of yard as where new hollies, tea olives, and ligustrum planted.

Miscellaneous other pics of back yard. Leylands line the back for privacy.