Marlon's Lawn Service

Marlon's Lawn Service started fertilizing and treating my lawn for weeds in early summer 2012 after a few months of missed treatments by another company. At first, the lawn didn't seem as if was responding to the fertilizer or weed treatments. After about five treatments, I had the greenest lawn in the neighborhood! Unfortunately, it was January 2013, and my lawn should have been dormant and brown, like all of my neighbors' lawns. Unlike my neighbors' lawns, my lawn was full of weeds. Being a patient person, I decided to stick it out with Marlon's Lawn Service to make sure I gave them a fair chance to get my lawn under control. In the spring of 2013, Marlon's treated my lawn for all of the winter weeds. The result was my lawn having large patches of brown, dead spots for the next couple of months. By summer of 2013, my lawn seemed to recover, however in August 2013, two days after another treatment, a large portion of my lawn started turning brown. I spoke with Marlon's Lawn Service about the situation and was told that a large amount of weed killer was used to treat my lawn for weeds. I pressed Marlon about the source of the weeds since none of my neighbors' lawns showed signs of weeds. During that conversation, I decided to pursue a different service company for my lawn treatments. As for the other two quotes, Marlon installed a crushed limestone parking pad for me in early fall 2012. Marlon agreed to remove the top layer of sod; grade the area; apply an herbicide; lay a weed barrier; and apply two to three inches of crushed limestone. Most of the work was done as agreed except for the thickness of the limestone. Instead of applying two to three inches, I was lucky to get two inches of thickness in a few spots. After I explained to Marlon my concern about the thickness, he explained that he needed to follow the grade of the land and that the grade would suffer if he applied too much limestone. I questioned his explanation since it was within the scope of the project to remove enough soil so that a proper thickness of limestone could be applied. A few days later after another call, Marlon agreed to apply more limestone. Afterwards, many spots had one and a half to two inches of thickness, but many spots still were still one inch or less. One year after the installation, the weed barrier that was applied underneath the limestone is showing in a few places. For the second quote in summer 2013, Marlon's quoted weeding and mulching my flower beds. The quote was over twice the amount expected. After weighing my experiences with my lawn and limestone pad, I ended up using another service for a quarter of the price. In summary and retrospect, I feel Marlon's Lawn Service over-promised and under-delivered in all aspects. The price for lawn treatment was good, but the quoted price for the two other projects were high for the scope of work quoted/completed.