PLANTER'S PALETTE

The first time I went there was 1996. I went in there and I was on break and I spent a lot of money. I got a lot of annuals and other stuff.

The have some of the best perennials and annuals in the western suburbs and they have some weird ones up there too. They also have some things that you can’t get anywhere else. They are spectacular and they are a nice place to walk through. They have a goat.

Such a BAD experience. I had to threaten a lawsuit to even get part of the work done. Strongly not recommended.
There are so many things wrong, let's just give you a partial list:

• They failed to make ANY May dates. The first installation was actually at the very end of June and that's honestly only because we were having my son's engagement party at the house and I threatened everything i could think of to get any work done at all.
• They repeatedly lied about when the work was going to be done. You would email or call, and they would tell you, tomorrow, or then next day, even though they knew it wasn't going to happen. And my husband stayed home repeatedly and rearranged his plans based on those lies.
• They overcharged us for the work.They forced us to pay for plants that they never installed and then forced us to pay for them yet again.
• They kept postponing the work and lying about when they were going to show up. So in June, they kept saying next week. Then at the end of June, they called to say it would be August (for Phase 1).
• Their "designer" would regularly say I'll call you back and then forget to call. She didn't answer email either (though she said she ALWAYS answers her email). It was clear that she was overwhelmed and just saying anything to get off the phone. 
• They then charged us for all the materials for phase 2 (and had my husband pay them for it) even though there's NO schedule at all for Phase 2. So we prepaid 20K just to get the first phase done.
• When they finallyinstalled phase 1, they did NOT install any weed barrier, though it had been discussed and agreed to. Later on, the "designer" said "we'll be happy to put you on a regular maintenance crew." So it was clear that they didn't put in the weed barrier so that they would have ongoing revenue and could sell you their landscaping service. So my husband now has to take care of weeding this big garden every week.
• Because the plants were put in so late, many of them didn't survive so we've had to have another landscape company come in and actually redo the work. 
• They claimed their "strength" was design. But they didn't provide the plan in a usable way and they didn't actually layout the plants according to the design. When they finally did installation, loads of plants were missing and the look was pretty empty.

I was excited to hire a landscaping company. Planter's Palette tells you that their lead guy worked at the Morton Arboreteum for years and they have all this great experience. But that's not what we got. We got an assistant designer who continuously lied about work delivery dates, provided badly treated plants, misrepresented the work we would be getting and just worked to optimize their payments. It was a terrible experience. We plan to actually hire a good landscape company next year. I strongly urge you to read any contract with them carefully and to not believe anything that they say.

I have never found a better quality nursery for annuals or perenials in the Chicago area.

They provided a time of 8-12 saying there was 1 delivery ahead of us. After not hearing anything from them by 12:30 we called only to find out they are  running behind and needed another 2 hours.
They have to be completely incompetent or complete liars to misrepresent delivery by that much of a time frame. This might even have been excusable if they had bothered calling and explaining they may be delayed allowing me to at least make some use of the day instead of losing an entire Saturday.
If you plan on having them delivery I would not bother waking up early and make sure you can afford to be home all day.

That being said:

Once they showed up the work was completed quickly and well. The individual was extremely knowledgeable and provided a very good experience when finally onsite.

They came out and they said that the work would be done in two weeks. After six weeks, I finally got a plan. She didn?t listen to what I told her. Other than that, they were great. I was concerned about the front yard, but she went ahead and designed for the backyard. She was a little busy as she had friends from Europe in town. She shouldn?t have told me that the work would be done in two weeks. I had to call them 2-3 times, to get them to call me back. I had shopped there earlier and I had got some great things. However, their customer service needs to be improved. They lacked followup and they did not listen. The wrong design cost me $150. I will never use them again in the future.

I went to their location in West Chicago to see what they had. I registered for a Garden Coach which would have cost $60. I got a call on 4/28/07 from them explaining that they would be willing to do the garden coaching but not the installation due to my location in Streamwood.

Gary, the Garden Coach, came to the site to suggest ways to improve our curb appeal. After the initial planning appointment, he came back another day, to do the work described. There was some confusion about when they would come, because another employee who was supposed to do part of the work was not at work at the scheduled time, so the work was rescheduled.

GREAT. OUTSTANDING LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT. EXTREMELY KNOWLEDGEABLE, FRIENDLY, AND COMPETENT.