I can’t pass a Drake’s landscaping truck or see a Google ad for the company without feeling my stomach drop and my body tense. I put off writing this review, hoping for some resolution, but without any closure to the situation, I hope that sharing my story will help me to move on and help others be aware when entering into a relationship with the company. My husband and I reached out to a few different landscape designers when we decided we needed professional help designing our new house’s yard. We were very upfront from the very beginning that we were primarily seeking a design only – something which we could execute over the long-term (like, 5-10 years) as our budget didn’t position us to do a complete makeover all at once. Drake’s 7 Dees seemed the most promising, and after meeting with a designer, we signed a contract for a landscape design, stipulating that the process would include a meeting to discuss our preferences, a site evaluation, an initial concept presentation, the chance to offer feedback, a design revision incorporating our feedback, and then a final plan. The form we filled out included our expected budget for the future installation, which was modest. We paid a deposit equal to half of the total price, which was several hundred dollars, and were excited to move forward. We thought the designer was a good match and we enjoyed working with him. I was pregnant at the time, and our meeting to see the initial concept was just a few weeks before the baby (our first) was due. The initial design focused on the backyard, which was our priority, and had some rough outlines for the front yard. Some of the designer’s ideas didn’t quite line up with what we had in mind, so we talked about some changes to the plan, and our designer said he would work on the next version, including filling in more of the plan for the front yard. We left the meeting feeling positive. This was in July 2017. That was the last we heard from the designer for a very long time. After giving birth to my son and facing some unforeseen medical concerns, the landscape design fell down our priority list, so we didn’t follow up immediately. After hearing nothing, I reached out to our designer via email in the spring (the following May, 2018) to check on the status of our contract. He wrote back, and seemed unclear on where we were in the process and asked for a budget (which we had already provided in the initial paperwork). He also offered to meet the following week (in May). I replied with a date to meet. Then he didn’t respond, and the week passed. I emailed again, asking when he was available to meet. The response I received was a shock: “I apologize but we are very busy. As of 2018 we've implemented a minimum project budget of $20K which is not inline with the landscape planning questionnaire that you've provided to me. Also, I have used all of my 12 design hours for your project. At this point I can refer you to a division of our company called greenstart. They do bid only work. How does this sound? We are also booked out for installations to August now. Right now I am fully booked for the 2018 season.” At our last meeting, our designer had talked about moving forward on the next stage of the design (incorporating our feedback for a second draft) and gave absolutely no indication that he had used up the time he had estimated the project would take. It was a friendly meeting, where he greeted our dog and wished us well with the baby’s arrival. Now, he was tersely telling us that he was done working with us, despite not completing the design that we had begun together and without any prior warning. If it hadn’t been for the months of radio silence on Drake’s end, we would have been more blindsided. We had already had a sinking feeling that something was wrong when we heard no word from the designer for months, but this confirmation still hit us hard. I cc’d the owner, Drake Snodgrass, on our next email and requested a refund of the deposit we’d paid on the project, considering it wasn’t completed and we had nothing useable, but were denied. I then asked for a termination of the contract in writing. Our designer promised to send a termination of contract in writing. That was now ten months ago and I never received it. In his final communication to me, he (our designer) said that if I needed to discuss this further, phone was best. Since that time I have called, but his voicemail box was full so I couldn’t leave a message. I sent a text, which went unanswered. I can’t count the minutes I have wasted reflecting on every exchange and every communication between us and our designer, trying to identify where the miscommunication was or why things ended so abruptly. I’ve come up with nothing. The only conclusions I can draw are that the designer misbudgeted his hours and prematurely used up the time allotted, and that the company ultimately did not value us as clients because of our modest budget and chose to discard us. The latter point is probably what makes me feel the most sick whenever I see the company’s name. We did everything we could to have an honest, transparent, respectful, and successful relationship with Drake’s 7 Dees. But at the end of the day, the abrupt and utter lack of basic customer service made us feel that they see no value in our business at present, or in the future.