Springwood Gardens Landscape

Joe Gibbs and Mulberry Landscaping Company earned the A from me. While scheduling was a bit dicey at first, they came on a Saturday to do all of my landscaping work. Joe personally came to speak to me about some landscaping ideas he had for my garden and back patio. Holding a horticulture degree, he knew his plants. Like many small business owners who give coupons on Angie's List he was overwhelmed when many people bought the $199 for $400 worth of landscaping coupon. Joe honored the coupon and did not try to "nickel and dime" me which I truly appreciated.

In early April I used Angie's List to research a company to help clean up our lawn and garden. At the time, Mulberry Bush had what I was looking for: an "A" rating, "green" options, and located relatively close (Silver Spring) to our home (Bethesda). When I called, I leanred they happened to be participating in an Angie's List "deal" where they would work for $50 and hour, rather than the usual $100 rate, said owner Job Gibbs. The deal also offered a free consultation. I purchased the Angie's List deal. On Saturday April 7, Joe and his wife Silvia (who is a plant expert) both came out and spent a very generous two hours walking around our property and sharing what we could do to improve the health and appearance of our lawn and garden. Because of budget limitations, we narrowed the discussion to the items that made most sense to pay them to do--based on urgency and ability to do ourselves or pay someone else to do more cheaply. We agreed that after discussing further, my husband and I would make a list of exactly what we wanted them to do. One item, transplanting a Crepe Myrtle, the crew even began doing that day. The crew returned the following week to finish the transplant and then left. After that it was like pulling teeth to get their crews over to do any work. Long story short, two months later the list (of about a half-dozen items) was finally not complete and I was tired of calling, calling, calling and having things promised but not delivered. So on Friday, June 1 we cut them loose. I called Joe and we agreed that I would send them a check for $300, which on top of the $199 Angie's List deal, covered the 10 man-hours of work that had been performed. To their credit, Mulberry Bush did resolve things without a fight. And they continually apologized for being so behind--because they hadn't expected response to the Angie's List Deal to be as immense as it apparently was.

Their work was done quickly and they were able to complete what I wanted done in the 4 hours. They even worked after the 4 hours to make sure that I was satisfied. Joe Gibbs is very knowledgeable about pruning trees and shrubs and fixed dome pruning my husband had done. He offered to do this at no cost which I appreciated. Regarding the extra charge for hauling, I will know better next time to ask what the charge includes and doesn't include before I purchase service.

Initial consult went fine but we were not able to get him out after that. They were not responsive to phone calls After which, we decided to,process a refund

Joe came out first to look over the job and I explained that I hadn't intended to have a spring cleanup this year because I didn't feel I could afford it, but that his offer of 4 man hours for $199 had been too good to pass up. I let him know what was important to me, in order of importance, and that I didn't want to go over the $199 -- except for the cost of mulch. Upon looking over what I had, Joe reassured me that the job would require little or no mulch because I really had too much. He showed me how they could break up the existing mulch, kind of fluff it up, and it would do the job for another season. I gave Joe the OK to come back with his workers when I was not at home and several days later he called to let me know they would be there that morning. I came home from work to find everything neatly weeded, the mulch "fluffed up" as promised, and my entire property looking fresh and ready for spring.

He told me that he would do the work the following week. He never called me back, I then called him several times and he never returned my calls. When I finally was able to talk to him he told me that he did not have time for this and explained Angie’s List would be able to refund the Big Deal for me. Over this whole time, he kept telling me that his truck was broken down.

They did an excellent job. The advice we received was excellent. We hadn't even realized that some of our trees and bushes needed to be trimmed in the way that they recommended, and a couple of months later the plants are thriving as promised. Since we had a lot of work to do, they negotiated with us on price and came to a figure we felt was fair. A very professional and knowledgeable company.

Overall, this company eventually completed the work that was required.

I've really struggled with what grade to give Mulberry Bush Landscaping. I finally came down on the side of an overall "A" because the outcome--the actual "look and feel" of the garden--is better than I ever could have imagined and I guess that's the most important thing. However, the process of getting the work done and the communication/timeliness was/is REALLY bad. I never could get from them a firm, printed out garden design with a plant material list and itemized costs of the hardscape items. The contract notes the hardscape items (although in a sketchy way), but saying " Garden Makeover as per Discussion" was NOT the way to go--and in fact, we're STILL having some "discussion" 6 months later as to what some of the makeover elements were supposed to include--and the rear garden is still not complete. If you hire Mulberry, be mindful that sometimes the co-owners (designer and crew chief) don't have the best of communications even with each other. The designer showed up one day with a crew and several hundred pounds of slab stone to cut into the slope of my yard as steps leading down to the garage apron. She said "do you like them?" and I said "yes"--they were gorgeous! But I have no idea what things cost and there was no mention that the stone steps were beyond the scope of my original project. The co-owner/crew chief was shocked when he came on site (as they were being installed by his crew), telling me incredulously "That's $2,000 worth of stone!!" He has allowed me to pay off this unexpected upgrade in installments--but a "surprise" $2,000 item (13% overrun to the original contract) was pretty outrageous. There was another near debacle with trying to coordinate an electrician's work for power to a garden fountain and Mulberry committing to doing the trenching but dropping the ball and having to scramble to get the digging done...plants that died in the heat because commitments about a timed watering system weren't met, and on and on. The bottom line on Mulberry Bush--beautiful esthetic sense and execution but BEWARE: Terrible project management, logistics, timeliness, communication and follow-through. I've had several heart-to-heart discussions about this with co-owner/crew chief Joe Gibbs; particularly irksome is when he verbally commits to specific work on a specific date--or offers some service you didn't even request--and then fails to show, fails to call. He's contrite while you're complaining and will jump right on some aspect of the project soon after, but the slippage begins again almost immediately. SO: My advice would be to insist upon a detailed, itemized contract and just abandon any expectation of your project moving toward completion in a logical and prompt manner. Do expect to have to call and nudge a LOT.

We were looking to replace lawn maintenance service for our .4 acre lot, get some spring replanting done, and potentially hire this company for future landscape redesign/hardscape redesign. Bought the deal as a trial. Although Mr. Gibbs did come to the house soon after our first call, we processed a refund on 4/16, because he was a no show/no call/no follow up for the SECOND time. During our initial visit, we discussed a one time clean up of the lawn, along with shrub replantings and the scope of major landscaping that we were interested in doing in phases with the company. This was a missed opportunity for this company. We went from not knowing this company at all, and having no opinion of their service, to having the worst opinion of their service capabilities. The company should definitely respond with their side of the story, but I will share a quote from Mr. Gibbs when I had to call him to reschedule work to be completed after his first no show ( AND I waited a week after first no show to give them time to reschedule). He stated "these deals are more trouble than they are worth" along with a few other negative comments to me about "other customers" while he was on the telephone. I finally had to interrupt and remind him that I WAS one of his customers and had been waiting for several weeks to simply get someone to come out to our home! He picked the date and time for his reschedule which was to be on 4/16. After the second no show/no call/no follow up, we processed a refund!

I was desperate after bombing out on 2 gardeners. My 2 small enclosed gardens were overgrown and neglected. Mulberry Bush went the extra mile to clean up the disaster, use existing plantings where possible, and add plantings and hardscape to make them truly beautiful. I had the joy of a beautiful vista of my gardens all winter and into the following spring. Can't wait to go the next round!

I purchased the Big Deal for 4 man hours of lawn and yard work/clean-up for $199. I called Mulberry Bush Landscapes on Monday, March 26 and spoke with Sylvia to let her know I had purchased the Big Deal and to set up a time for them to do the work. I explained that I wanted weeding and a general clean-up of my yard. Sylvia asked if I wanted mulching and told her that they would have to give me a quote first before I agreed to pay for extra services or products. I made it very clear that I did not want to waste her time or my time. Sylvia was very nice and she said that either she or her partner, Joe Gibbs, would call me in the "next day or so" after one of them had taken a look at my yard to see what would need to be done. I told him I did not need to be present at the house when one of them stopped by to look at the yard. By Wednesday afternoon, Joe had not called me, so I called Mulberry Bush Landscapes again on the late afternoon/early evening of Wednesday, March 29 and left a voicemail message asking them to get back to me. I received a call on the morning of Thursday, March 30, from Joe Gibbs. He said he would stop by my place "in the next day or so" to take a look at my yard. I reminded him I did not need to be present at the house when he stopped by to look at the yard. Joe did not stop by my house "in the next day or so" to look at my yard. On the morning of Sunday, April 1, I received another call from Joe Gibbs. He said that he had not forgotten about the work and he went over the list of work I wanted done to the yard. Since the work was not that extensive he said that his guys would just be by my place in the beginning of the week to get the work done. This included weeding, edging and removal of debris. He said he would mow my lawn if there was time. I later called back on Sunday and spoke with Sylvia to ask her to relay the message to Joe that I would also like his worker to trim the bushes on the side of my house if there was time. She said she would relay the message to Joe. When I came home from work in the early evening of Tuesday, April 3, no work had been done to my lawn or yard. This was the third strike for me and I was tired of calling them back to ask them to do what they said they were going to do. So I called Mulberry Bush Landscapes and left a message for Sylvia and Joe to say that they did not need to do any work because I was going to request a refund from Angie's List. I explained on the voicemail that each time that they told me they were going to do something they never followed through. I reminded them that they said they were going to do the work at the "beginning of week," and since no work had been done by Tuesday evening I wasn't going to proceed with having them do work for me. I then requested a refund from Angie's List and they said that it would be processed in the next few days. The asked me to write of review of this experience. Later, I received a call from Joe Gibbs in response to my latest voicemail. He said that he had been out to my house to look at my yard that day (Tuesday) and that he had tried to call me. I reminded him that he had told me on Sunday that he was going to have his workers do the work "at the beginning of the week." He then said that he had been working on a lot of jobs with the Big Deal. I took that to mean that they had over-extended themselves with this promotion. I thanked him for calling me back but told him that I was not interested in having them work on my yard/lawn. We left it at that. I rated this overall experience as a D (Bad) because it was a waste of my time. I rated the price and quality of the work as N/A because no work was performed and I can't provide a review for their actual work. I rated their responsiveness as a C (Fair) because they did return my calls when I followed-up with them and they did call me on Sunday to say they hadn't forgotten the work. (I would have appreciated a call earlier in the week day on Friday.) I rated their punctuality as F (Lousy) because they never did the things they said they would do within the time frame that they said they would do it. I rated their professionalism as D(Bad) because although Sylvia and Joe were courteous and seemed knowledgeable about their profession, they should have been upfront with me from the beginning to say that they had a lot of jobs with the Big Deal and that I would likely have to wait before they did the job. Instead, they made commitments to do something (and created expectations) when they couldn't actually follow through. "It's not the job you do, it's how you do the job."

A crew of 4 arrived and edged all my beds and weeded as needed. Very responsive and got what I neeeded done in allotted time. A satisfied customer!

We called the owner of Mulberry Bush to arrange for a garden area behind our house to be cleared of all bushes and weeds. We had a lot of trouble arranging a time for the company to come out. The first time we had arranged for a visit, I took the morning off from work to meet them and go over the work that we wanted to have done. They failed to show up, and called later in the day to say that they had gotten stuck at another job and would try to come later that day. They still did not show and said that they would come out the next weekend. They did not show during that time either. However, the next weekend, they called and said they could come, but I told them that we couldn't be around. I tried to explain what areas I wanted cleaned. When we arrived home, we found that they had thoroughly weeded a bed directly adjacent to the house, and had trimmed flower bushes next to the house. They did a very good job at the weeding, but I'm concerned about the trimming, as the bushes do not seem to be sprouting any new leaves yet this spring. We've never trimmed the bushes to the extent that they were trimmed by the company. They also took away all of the debris, which was a nice bonus that they hadn't said they would do. I called the owner to explain that the wrong area had been cleaned and I was concerned about the over-trimming of the bushes. He told me that the bushes were trimmed to standard specifications (even though we had not asked that anything be trimmed), and that he was very sorry that they had done the wrong area. He offered to send a team out to do the work we had agreed on, and offered to do the work at the deal price. However, I've left 2 messages since then, and he has not returned any calls to come back out and do the work that we had agreed on. I'm overall disappointed with the lack of communication with this company. The work that they did on the weeding of the area was very good, but it was not what we wanted.

The overall experience was great. Joe and Sylvia came out to survey the project and discussed some options before giving us an estimate. They were very mindful of our budget and were able to make suggestions for keeping us within that budget. And when we made choice that were not in the original scope of the project were very clear about the change to the budget from a monetary perspective and from a time perspective. Sylvia was very clear in her description of various plant materials and the advantages/disadvantages they might have for our particular yard and lifestyle. In the instances where the reality did not match the vision, they were very good about making the necessary adjustments. As a team and individually they show great care for their work product. Not just from a style perspective, but for functionality and safety as well. We were extremely pleased with the end result. Our only regret is that we didn't have the front yard done as well.

I had called Joe Gibbs originally because of the deal from Angies List to have yard cleaning for 199. Joe immediately responded to me and came out soon after the phone call to check out the yard. While he was there, I started discussing my front yard and what a mess it was with overgrown bushes, broken sunken walkway to front porch and generally a lack of any functional or nice curb appeal. Joe was very helpful in making a lot of suggestions in what I could do to the yard and what the cost would be. I decided to follow his suggestions. Sylvia, who does the design portion, came out soon after and drew up a very nice design of how it would look. I decided to do the work and Joe had his men out there very soon to start with the walkway and then progressed to other things. Joe was always involved and checking in to see how things were going. Meanwhile, Sylvia had tackled some very overgrown Juniper bushes on the side of my house and turned them into beautiful works of art. What was an overgrown bush is now a gorgeous big Bonsai tree with boulders strew about to give it a Japanese garden appeal. There were 4 trees in total and it was alot of work but it turned out great. Joe also threw in some extras like cutting down some tree limbs, and coming back in the spring to seed and aerate my front lawn. It was an absolute pleasure working with them and they had a great team of guys who did a beautiful job on my walkway. Everything looks so pretty and I love coming home and seeing how gorgeous my front yard looks. People walking by my house have made various comments on how nice it looks. I can't wait till it gets a bit warmer so I can put some more warm season flowers around the porch and in the beds. I am so impressed with their knowledge of plants and materials that I know I will be using them in the future. I am thinking of putting a water feature in my back yard and will be discussing that with them at a later date. I couldn't be more pleased and I am a hard one to please!

Julio, and his crew showed up on time, and did a great job, then Randy, and Gregg came later in the day to haul everything away, and also did a great cleanup job.

He was going to charge me $1500 to do what I requested. We agreed on what he was supposed to do - I thought. I gave him a $750 down payment. When he said he did the trimming of the bushes in the front and back yards, I saw no improvement. I did not see his people do it and I could not see any improvement. I told him as much and severed the relationship.

See above. So what I would say is be clear on communicating with them, before the job, about whether they will be carry away any bushes/trees they cut down or if you will have that stuff picked up by the city. I would definitely use this company again. As I said, they were courteous and professional and very accommodating.

Everything went very well. I appreciate their effort.

Joe was great in getting back to me, and worked with my schedule to set the appointment for my Fall cleanup. On the day of the appointment, Julio and his crew were very punctual, and went above and beyond what I had expected. I would definitely use Mulberry Bush Landscape again in the near future.

I purchased a big deal for 4 hours of work. Joe returned my phone message quickly (always a good first impression) and scheduled my appointment for the week after my call (availability is a plus!). Joe came out with a team of three men and set to work right away clearing the gutters of my two story home and clearing the last of the fallen leaves. As I requested, they took particular care to get the leaves out of the many shrubs and bushed around my house. Joe had some really good suggestions about pruning that would protect my large holly trees from being dragged over during hearvy snowstorms so I decided to have that work done as well some additional pruning of my ornamental shrubs for curb appeal. The team was pleasant and worked very efficiently. While the team worked, Joe and I walked around the property and he had some great ideas about preventing soil erosion, improving the health of my lawn, and low maintenance options for developing the flower beds. It's clear he's knowledgeable about native plants and addressing the issues with yards in our area (e.g., heavy shade). It's also clear he wants the yards he works on to look good! He showed a real interest in working with me and my budget which is very important to me. I've already decided to go with some of Joe's suggestions about the lawn and Joe and his team are scheduled to come out next week. I'll update my review after that work's done!

Joe was quick to respond to my first call. I have also found him responsive throughout the process, always answering his cell. The work took several visits and Joe did a good job of arriving near the scheduled time (or phoning me when he would be late). I had a tight budget, but Joe made it work. For example, he used existing plants whenever possible. His design partner added little extras that enhanced the overall project.

I wasn’t entirely satisfied. It was an okay price, but it didn’t seem quite like he promised. He didn’t do the work, instead his crew did the work and so the job was not as promised. It was about what I would have expected, where I felt $400 would have been more. I would probably use them again, but will be more cautious while getting the estimate.

I hired Mulberry Bush through an ANGIE'S LIST BIG DEAL. The owner, Joe Gibbs, was very responsivle throughout the scheduling process and dealing with any concerns that I had. He was willing to come out within a week, but I wanted the clean up to occur just before Thanksgiving. The crew of three did a great job at leaf blowing and edging beds. They were gentle in cleaning leaves out of my beds to protect my pansies and azaleas. I worry about my small dwarf azaleas being blown out of the ground by leaf blowers; they picked leaves out of shrubbery by hand (left by gutter cleaners that didn't clean up after themselves) and were responsive to all my requests. Thank you Mulberry Bush!