Premium Lawn & Landscape

Description of Work: To accurately reflect their service and our experience it would be better to have two reports: one for the lawn work and one for the paver work--I can only check one box but I have two answers for each question. | |They prepped some flower beds for us, installed about 3,000 sq/ft of sod, installed a few stepping stones where our hoses live, installed pavers along an extension of our driveway (about 300 sq/ft), and installed a concrete pad for our A/C unit (about 4'x6'). | |The pavers all look very nice, we made some additions to the original contract, which they also did--the paver work all looks beautiful, the curb is nicely set, it has a drainage gutter underneath it, the stones are nicely cut and placed tightly. Grade A for that part. | |The concrete pad is fine--it is flat and level and the size we specified--but some details were a bit underwhelming. Where there had been cinder blocks that were tightly placed along the edge between our brick house and the previous concrete pad, there is now a 2" gap that collects crud, and a small amount of concrete overage outside the pad itself that just looks sloppy. But this is behind the A/C unit so aside from my wife and me no one will probably notice. | |The flower bed prep and stepping stones are also fine. Generally speaking they look very nice. Again, some of the details were a bit surprising. I had spoken to the rep who came out to spec the job, outlined sweeping curves along the edge that could be mowed by our drive mower, wanted a clean slope away from the house to provide positive drainage during rainstorms. Those two things ended up pretty close, but not quite right--not enough that I asked them to come back and change it though, so I acknowledge that they were not given the opportunity to redo this part of the work at our request. The drainage slope in most areas is fine, one area came out basically flat which ended up mounded when mulch was then put on top, so there is just a small area that doesn't drain away from the concrete foundation (about 3' x 20' or so). As mentioned, a small enough problem that I didn't ask them to come back and redo the whole area that would have been required to fix it (about 10-15' x 20' or so). In both of two areas where they installed the stepping stones, I presume the installer made the judgment call to place the stones so one corner protruded slightly into the grass area where it curved, maybe thinking this would be a nice visual detail. My wife liked it fine, I immediately thought that the mower would have trouble with those corners that were in the grass and were set higher than the soil the grass grew from. Indeed, when my wife drove the mower along one of those corners (she's a very modern woman and runs the mower quite happily and skillfully!), the blade at its highest setting caught the corner and bevelled the slate stone (and bevelled that part of one of the mower blades). I have since reshaped those corners and fixed it to both of our satisfaction. These were both minor details that I would not hold against them in and of themselves, but worth mentioning in my opinion. | |The bigger problem and why I balk at recommending them is the lawn installation and results. We opted for the extra cost of sod as we were coming into summer and wanted to have it nice right away instead of working through the summer to nurse along seed. When first installed it looked great, they did a good job of laying it out--all of their work looked really good when the job was first completed. We strictly followed their watering schedule (daily for two weeks, every couple of days for another couple of weeks, and regularly with the rains throughout the summer). But pretty quickly we had a fungus sprouting up through it--they had completely wiped our back yard and put down a fungicide so that should have been prevented. So large areas started to blanch with the fungus and the fungus itself looked like weeds strewn throughout the lawn. Other areas then didn't hold up on what I would call a gentle slope and bald spots started to appear. They came back several times to apply fungicide, add seed, add some soil in the bald spots. We finally tired of trying to make it work when it clearly was not and they did not show signs of being serious about making it look right. So by a couple of months later it looked like a patchy, scraggly lawn. Some parts get more sun than others, we had been told that the sod they recommended would handle the conditions when he was there with us looking the whole scene over. We're not grass experts so we took him at his word. | |So for the first installation they were good about scheduling, prompt about showing up and doing the work. There were a couple of little problems where damage happened--a gate closure, a broken corner board of our brand new deck. They handled both of those problems just great, either replaced it or paid for our previous deck company to fix the corner. Full credit for that. And still very happy with the pavers, they look wonderful. | |But our lawn looks crappy and we're practically starting over this spring with someone else. Just tonight (5/4/14) I pulled out another couple of handfuls of the plastic netting that was the base for the sod, where it is now bare earth, before the netting gets sucked up into our mower blades and becomes another problem of its own. The netting is showing in large patches here and there on about 50-60% of the lawn and we're hoping to get some grass in there to hide it again. We have lots of photos of all this if anyone wants more visual detail than my description can provide. | |With a name like Premium Lawn and Landscape, we paid a higher price--over $10K for this whole job--than some other estimates and we expected good results. But we ended up feeling like our job wasn't that important to them and that we would have to keep squeaking to get anything done about it. I've got better things to do and I hate having to squeak to get someone to do the work right.

Description of Work: Over pruned landscape beds.

Description of Work: We contracted with Premium to install a patio. Premium did a wonderful job. We couldn't be happier with the way it turned out.

Description of Work: Premium is a well run lawn service. They are on time, and do a good job. The biggest thing I like about them is that they are reliable, always show up on time, and get the job done. They are not particularly creative, or have much personality. But the yard service business is full of small time guys who don't know how to act like a business and/or professionally.

Description of Work: We have a townhouse and were looking for a simple job, under $2k, for our small front yard and were open to ideas. Our only criterion was to remove the large, ugly hedge in front of our bay window. I thought that this was a simple enough request, but after receiving estimates from two other companies, I did not have high hopes for my consultation with Premier. I could not have been more wrong! We received exactly what we were looking for and couldn't have been happier. The job was performed while we were at work, and everything looked perfect when we arrived at home.

Description of Work: He trimmed my trees.

Description of Work: I received only an estimate from this company. I had to contact the estimator to get the estimate. Once I got it a part of the job was missing. I emailed him, and he sent it back by email. I needed to have more details since the estimate was not even a page with minimal description of the job. I call the company for this estimator to call me by phone. He never did! So this company never got the job! I chose somebody who answers phone calls and is willing to talk to me about the details of the job. Anyway this confirms that smaller companies such as the owner comes and evaluates the job to be done himself are the best as opposed to some employees from a large company. The larger companies are better suited to landscape large development than one household backyard!

Description of Work: Lawn mowing and edging

Description of Work: I hired them to do landscaping and hardscaping.