Vertumni Fine Landscaping and Gardening

The whole team was wonderful! We hired them in summer 2020 but they weren't available until fall 2020 (I guess everyone had the same idea to spruce up their outdoor living space during the pandemic.) We had an ugly concrete path and lawn, they removed those and leveled the area, prepped the site and did the entire installation in just about 3 days, which is what they told us it would take. The team of guys worked really fast but did an excellent job, I enjoyed seeing them choose rocks for the best fit and then cutting the edges so that it was rounded. They made the way the lawn meets the patio into a smooth slope. They didn't leave a mess during or after the work. I would 100% recommend them.

I found Bruce to be very personable and in spite of being the most expensive of 4 bids, we decided to work with him because we liked his initial thoughts and considerations. None of the individual issues were problems in and of themselves, but when put together, we were disappointed with our experience. Concerns: 1. Our project got pushed out about 3 weeks past the initial expected date 2. When our work was completed and we got our invoice, our costs were $1500 over our estimate and we had never been informed of this in the process. When I brought this up, Bruce apologized and asked how I felt it should be handled. As a gesture of good faith, thinking we wanted to continue working with him, I offered to split the overage. 3. Bruce planted 5 beautiful hydrangeas ? not too long after, they started getting absolutely fried. It soon became clear that their sun exposure had been miscalculated/not considered. We?ve since paid to have them moved because the leaves were literally getting charred. 4. I had a pruning question that took 3 weeks for a response. 5. Limited warranty: This spring, we had one plant not come back at all and three other plants that were about 1/10 th the size of their same-plant neighbors. After emailing, we were told that these were not instances of failure to thrive and the limited warranty would not apply. 6. ?Design on the fly? meant plant decisions were made the day the project started. Retrospectively, this was not the best way to go since the garden was not at all attractive during the winter months (we?d discussed adding things so it had ?something? all year), and the hydrangeas were very ill-placed. It also meant that we had no concept of what ?finished? would look like until it was done. The pros: 1. Bruce was personable and initially seemed invested and thorough. 2. The landscaping colors go very well together and look great in spring/summer months. 3. Bruce was able to connect us with someone for irrigation and stump removal needs. 4. Aside from one email experience, all emails were responded to promptly. We opted to divide our landscaping into several phases, so our initial phase was around $5000 ($6500 with overages) ? perhaps it was ?too small? of a project to merit full attention. Regardless, we spent more than we initially planned on spending and are paying to have portions of the initial work re-done.

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They do a good job and are very courteous. They do what they say going and are helpful.

Bruce (owner) and his crew did an amazing job creating our urban garden! From the initial consult, design review, excavation, construction, through the final results, we could not have asked for a better team to work with. Changes made during construction were throughly communicated by both parties which was greatly appreciated. Vertumni takes extreme pride in their workmanship all while caring for your home and the sourounding environment. Thanks Vertumni for giving us our ultimate garden oasis

We rated Vertumni overall with a D because of our frustration with specific details of the project which were important to us and which affected our bill. We gave them a C for price simply because we don't have much experience with this work, and the fact that there seemed to be an unfair mark up which we were able to discover before final payment. Parts of their work were satisfactory, but the following details will show our general displeasure with the how they did business with us. After the lawn renewal, we discovered that they had used a chemical fertilizer. Their proposal (contract), written and verbal, stated that they would use an organic fertilizer, which we had specifically asked for. We based our decision to hire them partially on this issue. When we questioned them on this change, they told us that there had been a problem in writing the proposal and they had determined that chemical fertilizer would be best for our project. We wondered why they didn't inform us of the change and their reasons for using chemical fertilizer, and give us a chance to decide for ourselves what was best for our project. We also wondered why they didn't apologize for changing the terms of the proposal with out informing us. Their final bill did change the price of the fertilizer, which was cheaper than the organic one we had wanted. The second issue arose when they spread the bark mulch. A worker handed us an invoice for the cost of the load of bark. The invoice was supposed to go to Vertumni, not to us as their client. But it did give us information that otherwise would not have been available to us. The bark cost was approximately $620. We checked the proposal and found that they were charging us $1,250 for the bark. The labor costs were listed separately, so this meant there was a !00% mark up for the bark. We certainly expected some mark up, but not 100%. When our property manager (who by now was handling these issues) questioned Vertumni, they admitted that they had been given a sale price for the bark. Once again, there was no apology. And we doubt if we would ever have known about this overpricing if we hadn't received the bark invoice in error. Vertumni lowered the final bill for bark by $375. We don't recommend doing business with Vertumni.

Very responsive, very personable, quality work. Considerate about scheduling.

He did a nice job. However some of his plant suggestions we not good because he did not do his homework and figure out how much sun my yard got. I had to move a handful of the plants because they could not handle the sun. I felt like I was a little put off for the start time of the project because he had a much larger project he was working on. I felt very much like second fiddle. His men work hard but he pays them top dollar and so his prices are not cheap.

The original design project was just wonderful. He took great time and care to get to know me and my preferences and together we came up with a plan for my and quot;Wild Graceand quot; garden. Over the years it has changed, with some things growing and filling in, and we've made a few adjustments as needed. It continues to be a source of joy and peace in my life. I'm getting older and more arthritic, so I'm not able to keep up with it all. I do what I can, and then once, sometimes twice, each year one of his crews comes out for a day and boy, do they get a whole lot done! They are always on time, professional, and such hard workers. I am always amazed to come home after they've been here working all day and see the transformation. Bruce and his helpers are very knowledgeable, very friendly, and I totally trust them. Not the cheapest, but I do believe in most cases, and certainly this one, you get what you pay for. I'm gearing up to call them to come do this year's fall clean up soon. I really cannot recommend Vertumni any more heartily. They are terrific!

We have been very happy with them. They have been professional from the beginning and they continue to respond well to any suggestions. We also have appreciated their rate reduction which allowed us to keep their services.