BERNHARD LANDSCAPE MAINT

We utilized Bernhard Landscape Maintenance (BLM) from 4/2015 till 6/2016. Although we were initially content with the services provided and appreciative of Mr. Bernhard’s educational background, we soon discovered that continued and significant poor communication from him resulted in a degradation of the health and appearance of our lawn. We have a fairly simple lot composed of a grassy front-side yard, small apposing side yard, and small backyard, and flower beds along two borders of the house and a bed along the front yard/sidewalk. We felt Mr. Bernhard had poor communication skills, which often led to confusion regarding dates for completing of regular service, work to be performed, completion dates for additional services, and mismanagement of funds and materials. His hedge trimming skills were sadly lacking, as he cut back a number of boxwoods and other bushes so much that the inner branches were visible on the outside of the hedges (facing the street for all to see) or in uneven shapes. He indicated that he would take care of weeds in the lawn, which he never did, and the lawn became populated by innumerable dandelions and overgrown by clover (controversially considered a weed). His work ethic slowly deteriorated and became subpar. We always offered him additional compensation for any additional service that he felt was out of scope of our original arrangement. When he did ask for additional compensation or reimbursement, he overcharged us significantly. He threw a heavy garden hose (commercial/professional strength) and sprinkler into a delicate tree/shrub, breaking many of the trunks and branches. On multiple occasions, he pulled the same heavy hose through flower beds despite numerous hose guides placed throughout the property to prevent damage to plants. He left dirt and mud on the sidewalk and our driveway. He offered and was paid to fill a hole in the lawn along the driveway and instead dug up 75% of the backyard to level it. Due to this, we could no longer use the stairs from the back deck to access the driveway, as we did not want to walk through dirt and mud and trample the young grass. The description of the work he planned to perform was significantly less imposing than what he ended up doing. When using his blower after rejuvenating the lawn, he blew a layer of dirt onto the front porch and left it there for us to sweep. (As a contrast, our neighbor’s gardener uses his blower to clear our walkways and front porch and the sidewalks each time he mows and edges the neighbor’s lawn, even though he creates no mess on our property.) He overcharged us a number of times, including apparently purchasing a 25-lb bag of grass seed (enough seed for 8,000-9,000 sq. ft.; our entire lot including structures is only 5,000 sq. ft.) and a significant amount of grass clipping mulch to spot re-seed our lawn. Although these materials may have cost as much as he charged us, he significantly overbought, and we questioned his intentions for doing so when he clearly intended to keep the leftover materials. He often requested advanced payment for extra services, which is understandable; however, he would not perform these extra services for weeks to months after receiving advanced payment. Overall we believe his poor communication skills, disregard for our property, and overcharging led to poor care of the landscape despite our repeated inquiries regarding proper watering and care and offers to compensate him for additional services. In the end, we were sadly disappointed that a once attractive landscape began to look like an untended vacant lot.

Phil is very personable and soft-spoken. We had a little trouble scheduling and communicating about exactly when he'd come do the work, but we ironed it out by phone and all the work was performed quickly and with great skill and professionalism. Phil completely removed all traces of the unwanted lawn grass, weeded an existing flower bed, and delivered and spread 2 cubic yards of fresh wood compost as mulch. He worked on the hottest day of the year so far, when highs were close to 100 F. I gave him the option not to work that day, but he said he'd do it as planned, and it was done well and thoroughly. Phil is a family man with the right tools for almost any garden task and a lot of well-honed garden skills. He is old-school in that he doesn't use email and doesn't advertise online, so he is not as busy as some gardeners of equal skill. He's a great worker and I hope he gets a lot more business from Angie's List users.

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We have been very fortunate to have Phil doing yard maintenance at our home for the last 10 years. Before we started using Phil, we had several different yard services, and we were never quite satisfied. Phil is easy to communicate with, and he readily understand what we want done with the yard. He is reliable -- if we are gone for several months, we never need to worry about whether the yard is being taken care of in our absence. If we disagree about what needs to be done in regard to pruning of shrubs, Phil understands where the disagreement lies and after a friendly discussion, he either convinces us to follow his advice or he does as we request. Phil does know the growth habits of plants and when and how they should be pruned.

Extremely well -- we've very happy with them. All of the work has been high quality. Phil Bernhard has had a number of innovative ideas for ways to improve our land and is happy to talk projects over with me. On the few times that we've had emergencies, he's responded immediately. For instance, fallen trees have completely blocked our driveway on three occasions. Each time, Phil was able to get here and get us out on the same day -- usually arriving within an hour or two. We've worked with him every month for ten years, and we've never been unhappy with one of his projects.