McKay Nursery Company

Complaint filed 5/7/25 with BBB of Wisconsin. This is a HORRIBLE company who just blow off customer complaints who have legitimate concerns on plants that are ordered online and do not survive the year. They cover up reviews left on their site and on Facebook! My reviews were quickly deleted and none were posted to their online site! This company has had problems dating back to 1972 in a court case that’s public knowledge!

unknown

unknown

unknown

The trees were delivered and planted in fall 2014.  Unfortunately approximately 1/3 of the white pines didn't survive the winter.   Many of the others are half dead.
To be fair,  the Austrian pines were fine. and the lilacs appear to be doing well. 
I reached out to McKay to see if they would replace the trees.  The company's response was that there is no guarantee on wholesale sales.  
My issue with their response is that the trees were planted in the fall only after McKay's assurance that it shouldn't be a problem.  As they were professionally planted in a viable location they should have been fine, but apparently not.   The trees were planted on a ridgeline. 
After hearing from McKay I offered a compromise to the company.   We can't be sure why the trees died.  I wouldn't have planted in the fall if I hadn't been assured by McKay it should be fine.  Was it the fall planting that was the problem?   Was there something about where the trees were planted that contributed to their death?  I can't know.   I However, everything else had done well and only the McKay white pines died.   I planted in a pasture where everything grows like weeds, so it seemed a good location for the pines. 
My thought is, given the circumstances, we would share the pain.   McKay would sell me trees to replace the dead ones at 50% off;  I would even come and get them to eliminate any cost associated with delivery.  
Unfortunately, my compromise was not acceptable to McKay.  They offered me a discount on the replacement trees, but given the fact I feel I have been bending over backwards to be reasonable, I felt their offer was insufficient. 
McKay has a very good reputation as evidenced by their ratings on Angie's List.   All I can say is my experience has not lived up to their stellar reputation.  

We implemented the front yard plan this year, and are very pleased with the installation. We will use them again for at least the grass-digging around the rest of the yard, but the planting we will likely do ourselves, since there are far fewer large trees to go in. McKay nursery provided the plants and landscape design, and the landscaper works with a contractor to do the physical labor of the landscaping. We have gotten many compliments of the work by neighbors.
We are currently carefully watering according to the instructions provided us, and all the plants appear to be thriving after their transport and transplanting. The trees and large shrub we ordered were in good shape, large and vigorous.
The only thing I was somewhat mildly disappointed in was the final bill was not accurate. There was no problem in fixing it, it's just it would have been nice if it was correct in the first place. 
For all the work that was done and the quality of the landscaping and plants, I think the price was quite fair, and the plants worth their cost.

Great. Donna was excellent. Great plan. Plants were good quality. Love my new yard

Everything turned out well. The designer with whom I dealt was very knowledgeable and informative, and I liked her recommendations. Furthermore, she finished the designs in a timely fashion, and the designs were free since I purchased plants from the company.

unknown

The process was seamless--we made a few tweaks to the plan that Curtis had presented and we ordered the plants for the front section of the home. The plants were delivered on time and have been good quality plants since we received them.

The trees and plants were healthy, the work was timely and professional with follow-up questions answered.

Delivery to my desired location, on time and as scheduled. The plants are hardy and grow well.

They did an outstanding job. Extremely professional and the results are stunning.

A representive from McKay Nursery, Keith Rudolph, came to our home on 05/09/13. He listened to our thoughts and concerns concerning landscaping that we wanted for the home that we had just purchased last summer. He returned on 05/20/13 with a and quot;blueprintand quot; of recommended plantings. We really liked his ideas. We decided to hire McKay to install the landscaping to our back yard. The work was done on June 6th. A crew of four arrived around noon and it took them about four hours to get the job done. We are very happy with the outcome.

Colleen, from McKay, came to our house and sat down with my husband and I asking what we wanted and how much work we wanted to do in the maintenance of the project. We made our likes and dislikes known to her. She came back in about a week and showed us a plan and the cost of her plan. We asked for a few changes and they were made. About 2-3 weeks later our project was done.

I had an unpleasant experience. They were professional and did very good work, but then we had very heavy rain the day after they did the work and some of the pathway was washed out. It was pretty expensive damage. They said they were not responsible and they wouldn't help even though the walkway they put in pretty much washed away. It was on a hillside. So, I felt they did not provide any follow up or support. They didn't really stand by their work. So, I was very disappointed because they are a well known company and I thought they would be willing to take the responsibility to back up their work and they didn't, they just refused to do anything. They were expensive.

I was very happy with their services, and they did a beautiful job with the patio.

We are very happy with his design but we haven't planted anything yet. Not until the spring. Larry Berg is the person we work with. Very reliable always on time. We have recommended him to others.

We were very satisfied. They were very good and very accommodating. If we didn't care for something or wanted to change something they were very accommodating. We couldn't fault them for anything. They have a two year warranty on the plants and 4 years on the pavers. He is supposed to come back next year to see how things survived the winter.

From our experience with him, Scott Matsen was an excellent representative of this well-known company in this area. And the products and result were great! Scott met with us at our house to create a landscape plan for around our new home. He asked our wishes, discussed ideas and suggestions with us, took detailed measurements, and in a few days brought back a landscape plan drawing showing the name and location of plants all around the house, to scale. The sketch also included an attractive placing of the edging material. In the day after he left the plan, we further studied in detail the sizes, growing ranges, colors and blooming seasons of every plant, and we couldn't have been happier. We compared Scott's plan with another similar proposal we had received from another company. The other company used plants that were less suited to our southern Wisconsin climate, and that didn't reflect our wishes for color and texture as well, and we decided to go with Scott. For installation, everything arrived on schedule, a very skilled and personable crew arrived, and they installed the edging and the plants in one day. Scott also lined us up with mulch which we chose to install ourselves to save some installation costs, and it was something we knew we could do correctly. We weren't the most experienced landscaping customers, and throughout Scott thoughtfully explained and answered our many questions. Scott checked in with after installation, and came out recently to look at the results, and to replace at no charge 3 small plants out of 124 that didn't survive. The installation was done in late May 2011 and this is late September as I write this. Everything has looked great and thrived, and we have greatly enjoyed our new landscaping, and we were very happy with Scott Matsen and McKay Nursery.

I just had the privilege of working with Donna Stubler, who is an independent representative of  McKay Nursery Company, Waterloo, WI and is responsible for handling the design/sales of that company in our area.  Donna lives and is based in Milwaukee but her territory extends far beyond.    I recently hired Rodriquez Landscape Company in Milwaukee and started working with their Estimator, Dave, in putting together a new face lift for the front of my home while saving money on the back side by keeping my old landscaping around the rest of the home, with a couple modifications.  Through Dave I learned that Donna often works with him and his company in designing landscaping layouts that include plantings for McKay.  This was exactly what I was looking for!!  Donna came to my home and I was VERY impressed with her.  She’s GREAT TO WORK WITH and full of practical ideas.  She’s been doing this type designing for many years and she carefully helped me select the plantings that I liked, colorwise and otherwise, that require minimum care and would look good and thrive in the shade at the front of my home.  Thus, through some changes and upgrades to Dave’s original proposal, the three of us came up with a plan that totally changed and really upgraded the outside appearance of my home.  So good, in fact, that I ended up creating a complete new perimeter with plantings all around my home.  Donna and Dave work together like a finely-tuned instrument.  Both are creative, flexible, easy going, patient, articulate and quality-driven to create the best look possible at the most economical price.  The plantings from McKay Nursery in Waterloo are OUTSTANDING, so big and beautiful – and I couldn’t be happier with the end result – I now have a “born-again” home, at least on the outside.