Pacific Outdoor Living

It was an Angie's List Big Deal that I purchased. He did a really good job. We still have the landscape plans, 4:42-4:46 so you can't really fault him for trying to upsell and so he really did do a good job and he said he would come back. We didn't finish the project but he said he would come back and help us, he was really helpful. I had to look at some plants and decided exactly what we wanted to do about it, he said he would come back after I did that but I didn't do it. I'm not really ready to do services sometimes when I ask for them and then I don't get my full value out of them so that's just me but overall, they did a good job. He was very personable, and he's a memorable person, I still remember his name.

I have them came out last spring of this year around February. The designer came out and she looked at our front yard which we wanted to redo on our landscaping and then update and redo. Then she showed us pictures of various types of flowers and plants then came up with a plan and then she send it to us and I have her some feedback on it. She made some adjustment and then she sent us out a final copy. The service that they provided us was good.

Pacific Pavingstone was good and gave me a really good quote. They were on time and they were great. They were super nice, they showed up on time and did everything they said they were going to do, and they are really good. Their price was very reasonable and they gave me a discount for being a member of Angie's List.

The design process was great. We got everything we needed. We haven't gone ahead with the project but the design was exactly what I was looking for when I got the Angie's List coupon. So far the price seems reasonable. I haven't gotten competing bids but I think it is very reasonable for what they are doing.

The good: Punctual and efficient. They are clearly pros and their crew is well trained. The bad: Very expensive. They used normal sand to fill in the space between the pavers. This is bad for 2 reasons: the first is weeds will grow in between and are a pain to get rid of. The second reason is that when you hose down your patio, you will hose out the sand...which results in more weeds. The very bad: The crew decided to use part of the back yard as their toilet. The smell was horrible for several months until we could get the area refilled with new dirt.

Excellent workmanship and decorative design.

All Star Garage Doors, Just wanted to let you know I love my new doors! David and his crew were on time, organized, worked diligently and clean. Upon my inspection of the finished project, they took the extra time to touch up a few manufacturer scrapes on the doors. Down to earth salesman, great crew, best price (competitive-got 4 estimates) and the doors make my home look richer, cleaner and newer! Thank you All Star. I will recommend you to all my friends. And thank you Angie's List. Next, 23 windows! Gerri T.

Pacific Pavingstone. What we purchased it's typical and I hate when this happens, but we purchased a design for the yard. That's all we wanted. We have somebody else to execute it. We just wanted the design so the price was really wonderful. And they did a great job on the design. Then you get the sales pitch that they want to do the work. But the design was great and that's all we used them for. When ever we bought the deal we had it done right then. It was last March. We spent the $339 in the big deal. They were very professional, they were wonderful. We used them only for design. And the design was good, they did a good job, they listened for what we asked them for. And then they executed the plan. What we asked for they did a marvelous job.

They refunded the many quickly and apologized for the mistake that was made by Angie NOT them!

The designer/sales rep was Kathy Yaude. Very nice, friendly person to deal with and seeing photos of actual gardens tells you she definitely has an eye for design. On her first visit we discussed the situation at length and she took a lot of measurements. She showed me brochures with different paver styles. A few weeks later she came up with a preliminary design and we scheduled a follow up visit to review it. She provided a cost estimate for installation around $30k, while our initial budget was half that. Both visits lasted about 2 hours plus her time spent working on the design. Because construction of our home addition was running behind schedule, we weren't ready to start landscaping in April. It wasn't until late July that we started contacting landscapers to get bids. I try contacting Pacific to follow up regarding their bid, but I didn't hear back. I figured by that time they were fully booked for the busy summer season much like other landscaping companies I called.

We had a wonderful experience with them. Every single individual we dealt with was prompt, friendly and professional. They were very attentive to our needs and questions. As soon as a concern arose, no matter how small, they addressed promptly. They cleaned up thoroughly after each day, and, if something was left out, they let us know in advance the reason for it. I have already recommended them highly to several friends.

They said it would take several days to complete, but the job was done all in one day!

Pacific appears to do very high quality work from the pics on their site. However, as a consulting / design service, we were left extremely unsatisfied as customers. Let's assume that we paid the full $1500 for our plans- the ad doesn't say that you are getting a scaled-down version of their product because it's on sale. We were provided with a hand-sketched, not to scale "Plan" of our yard, that did not include any specific materials, sizes, plants, trees, etc., and were told that we would need to sign off on a contract for PP to do the construction work, before they would give us any further details. This was certainly not mentioned in the contract- Why on earth would anyone pay $1500 for someone to make a rough drawing of their yard that contained ZERO useful information. There is no text anywhere stating that you must sign up for their contractor services as well before they "reveal" the rest of the plans to you. Furthermore, we were very clear about out budget for the entire yard being a MAXIMUM of $50,000. Merrill, our designer, came back with the "rough plans" after her initial walk thru, and told us that we would need to spend in between $100-150,00 to get any of the work done. Now, even if those numbers were accurate ( they are not, I hire contractors all the time, and could easily build everything on her "plans" for $20k or less), it is extremely disrespectful to triple someones budget with no consultation, and then get pushy about us signing off on a "work order" to commit to PP doing the work for us. Very clearly, this promotion was aimed at bringing construction business to their company, which it would have, if they had come even close to providing a feasible budget or plans that justified the incredible price tag. After dealing with merrill, I contacted the company to express my displeasure. They told me that at the bare minimum, they would get a planting list from Merrill, so we could at least get an idea of what she was talking about, as she refused to give us any of this info before we signed a construction contract. It took me 3 more calls and weeks to get the "list", which consisted of a photocopied page out of a California Landscape book. I'm sure that my experience is not a typical one for this company, but it was a terrible one. You would be well advised to seek out a smaller, independent company that is more concerned with customer satisfaction that squeezing every penny out of their clients. Again, we were prepared to spend a very large sum of money to have PP design and build our yard. They have no one to blame for the loss of business except themselves. Hopefully someone at the company will read this and make changes accordingly. People are very sensitive to being taken advantage of, and we were made to feel just that.

We were delighted with all of the work performed, from our first meeting with the landscape designer to the last time we waved goodbye to the crew. Landscape designer was warm, friendly, and willing to listen to our ideas. She spent the necessary amount of time with us and took lots of pictures and measurements. When she returned with the final design, it was right on target. She also provided online links to the nursery so we could see all the plants -- and learn how to take care of them properly. We scheduled for the work to be done and it was completed in 5 days! The crew was one of the best I've ever worked with: bright, hardworking and very friendly. Pacific sent the right amount of people to do the job within the 5 days as promised and these men really worked hard. No laborers off a street corner! The team worked together all the time and worked very smoothly together. Brian, the manager, was in attendance enough that we could talk with him and we even added some extra work to the project. We missed all of them after they left -- a pleasure to have them around.

The service was ok. They did provide exactly what they said they would which was a plan and a bid. The woman that came out was also very nice. However, I feel that maybe this type of job was a bit above her area of expertise. I wasn't too impressed by her design.

Of the company quoting the job they were in the middle. But they were the only company to have paver for us to look at. They gave us two bid dependant on the paver we choose. After selecting this vender they brought out a small sample (8 paver each) of the two type in multiple colors so we could better pick what we wanted. We actually went with the more expensive paver as we like the sizing and colors better. Some minor hiccup occur as can be expected of any project, the city inspector wanting us to double the size of the apron, the type of soil below the original driveway, the replacement of the out going sewer pipe. But the resulting work is beautiful, with the project being finished on time. Thanks and will use again.

They were okay. It was pretty good. There were some issues but not too bad. We had some difficulties with communication with the seller who wrote the contract, he did not communicate well with us and everything up to the supervisor of the job which was two different people entirely. I feel that they did not treat him fairly in the whole affair. I think that they put a situation on him that he was not capable of dealing with and yet because of his own creativity, he did deal with it. So, I would say would I use him again? Well probably. But, I would be far more careful with delineating very very carefully what it was I wanted and expected. The final end result is just fine but it wasn't a breeze.\ I took them because they did such a wonderful job building my daughter's barbeque. She didn't have any issues, everything went with for her very smoothly. But then our job was somewhat more complicated too. I would say they were probably in the medium ballpark. Quality was just fine. He was a very conscientious person and I feel they were very lucky to have him and I don't think they have realized it. I am not really particularly anxious to get in the middle of their internal corporate workings. They were very polite and clean when they showed up. They got dirty doing the job. They didn't leave a mess behind. They cleaned up after themselves.

The process has been solid. My designer, Merrill, has been very insightful with her knowledge of what will and won't work and her suggestions have been really helpful. I'm very close to getting my final draft of the design and really happy with the results.

Overall, the appointment, consultation and given drafts were fine. I originally thought my final plans would have been to scle so that I may get competitive bids for the job.

She came out on the right day and the right time. I told her what my needs were and she said no problem. She walked around and looked at some things. She was here for about an hour and said she would email me the design. After that everything seemed to fall apart. I finally got the plan and it was hand written and unreadable. I made the design as big as I could on the computer and I still couldn't read it. i have called her several times and she hasn't called me back. I finally got a response from her via email, and she told me to check out these plants on the intranet instead of telling me herself.

A landscaping plan was drawn up as per our "Big Deal" coupon from Angie's List. The designer was very polite, very personable, always on time and responsive to all questions asked. The plan she gave us was definitely worth considering. However, until she came out to our house, neither the the Big Deal nor the company informed us that there was a $10,000 minimum before they would do any installation. With that information, we decided to go ahead and get the written plan for which we had prepaid. However, since the company had never disclosed the information about the $10,000 minimum, it did plant a seed (no pun intended) in our mind that the plans might be written to arrive at no less than the minimum. When the company called for a follow-up survey, I reiterated what happened. I was told that irrespective of what the designer had said, they would do the job without any concern about a minimum. Having the designer say one thing and the company tell us another, only made the situation worse. We decided not to use this company for installation.

They gave us a bid and we agreed, however they said that they had their own crew of 60 men, and would not use sub contractors. Guess what, not only they used subcontractor, they cut corners in every which way they could. It was dreadful so we had to fire them and the new person changed every thing that they did bad.

The entire process from planning to construction to functioning went very well. The pond is very attractive in appearance and is the centrepiece of our garden. There were three problems that arose in the first few months - the drainage hole was set too high so that excess water could not drain from the pond; one rock came loose; and the pond lights failed. They quickly reponded and made the necessary repairs and replaced the lights.

SEE COMPLETE REVIEW UNDER "PACIFIC PAVINGSTONE"

Professional from start to finish. They actually wanted to begin the work before we were ready so we had to put them off for the start. They began the demo of the sidewalk, driveway and patio on a Monday and completed everything, including landscaping on Wednesday of the week after. Workers cleaned up everything at the end of each day.