...to feel uncomfortable about paying upfront

[ohime]

Dear collective wisdom, please tell me if you would pay upfront for this? and apologies that this is a fairly boring one - it's just rather a lot of money.

I've contacted a garden designer in my area about creating a planting plan for the garden where I live. (It's not even my own garden, I'm doing it for my landlord who's also a friend, so if money is lost it will be their money but my fault - thus, perhaps, the excess of caution!) The garden designer's business model is apparently that one purchases a 'plan' that includes an evaluation and a deliverable, costed based on the size of your garden, before they do any work at all, including coming by to see the garden and discuss your needs.

I've only paid upfront for garden work once, many years ago, and that person promptly disappeared without doing the work. The garden designer seems to think I'll be comfortable paying quite a lot, sight unseen. Granted, they do seem to be legit and who they say they are, if you believe LinkedIn, and they do seem to have 30 years of gardening experience etc (LinkedIn again), and they do give their business address on their website... The only red flags are that I can't find any reviews of their work - they have a portfolio on their website, but those images could be from anywhere - and the request to pay upfront.

So... Has anyone actually used a garden designer and is this how they all work? The designer in question also offers their entire service via video, meaning you'd never meet at all, so perhaps this is simply how business is done now and I'm just being paranoid??

My local area has a local Facebook page
Do you have one for your area ?
This is whete we also find local people to help

People discuss things like

Local news
Local charities/events/clubs
Selling or giving away odd items
Lost pet
Need a local electrician/plumber/gardener/cleaner/baby sitter who can provide recommendations

Ah - yes I see. Maybe come over onto the MN gardening board if you have any questions about plants etc.

If you are going to be the person maintaining them long-term, make sure you explain that to the designer, because you would be best off with things that look after themselves and don't need a lot of pruning and fiddling about. Less is more. Perhaps go for ornamental flowering shrubs rather than a load of herbaceous perennials.

Oh never mind then, if you were local to me I could have suggested a great plant nursery.

Where we live in the US, the typical payment schedule is 1/3 when you sign the contract; 1/3 around halfway through; and final 1/3 upon completion.

Is it similar where you’re from? I’d offer that schedule perhaps,

I was once asked for 80% upfront for a job and turned them down, def. fishy to pay too much at the start.

There are online services now where you can give the measurements of the bed you are planting and pick a style you are going for. They send you the plants in numbered pots, with a numbered membrane/guide to put down. This might be something to consider as it takes some of the thinking out for you so you just do the planting. I just googled “garden by numbers” as I couldn’t remember what it was called 😂 and loads of options came up

In this area it's Nextdoor, which is full of recommendations (and naming-and-shaming - about equal numbers of each!), but I've had terrible luck with it so far as anyone who gets good recommendations will be fully booked for the next 200 years, and anyone who's free to come by to give a quote is very likely to then ghost you for reasons you'll never fathom.

Yep, that's what I'm familiar with too. In this case we've agreed on 1/3 of the price after the initial consultation - as the person will have spent at least an hour in the garden and thus will have done some of the work already - and the remaining 2/3 on delivery of the planting plan.

@LtJudyHopps Thanks for the headsup - off-the-shelf gardening, what a great idea! There's a whole front-garden area that I was going to leave out of the redesign, but this may be the way forward :)

Don't trust linked in - mine is so much embroidery about my side interests that I have been contacted by so many agencies (I am not job hunting happy where I am but it's a good way of contacting ex colleagues)

Yes, that will be almost my first question: what can I plant so that I can minimise the watering?? Although I work from home I do work, and don't really have the time to stand out in the garden for an hour and a half every day with a hose and then haul watering cans to the back bit where the hose doesn't reach. This is how ignorant I am about gardening: it just occurred to me the other day that one could perhaps purchase a sprinkler :)

We employed a garden designer during lockdown, after 10 years in our new build looking at a square of patchy lawn.

He came by to have a look and take some measurements (12m x 12m if you're interested!). He then sent us a few mood board type things with images of ideas for various styles of garden (coastal, country cottage, etc) for us to pick from. Then he said he would do a full plan for us for £750 and we take it away and DIY, or he could do the whole project - that was the first time he asked for money.

We got him to do the whole shebang which came to just under £12k. We paid £5k once all the materials had arrived on site with the remainder on completion of the job.

That included levelling the whole area out, two areas of patio approx 50m2, multiple raised planting beds from sleepers, new paths down either side of the house, new gate on the rear fence, a new lawn, all plants/bushes/trees, all the decorative gravel etc. and 2 sets of garden furniture that we bought.

@xILikeJamx What you describe is definitely more normal as a way to structure payment for this kind of job. It does make me think - along with the lack of reviews - that I may be this person's first customer.

So your guy purchased and delivered all the materials and then you reimbursed? (I won't be doing this - I'm attempting to limit costs by going with a plants-only redesign rather than building anything - but for future reference it would be good to know.)

I’d pay materials upfront labour after. No way would I pay the whole amount in advance

Hmm this sounds unusual. I’m also in the Home Counties.

Ive had some landscaping done paid after work was done. I think I paid a deposit for tree surgery but can’t remember for sure. I know we definitely paid that night or the next morning. what I find really helps on all house stuff is to find people very local to you. There’s more trust both ways.

I currently have a garden designer involved and she’s £30 an hour. I’m more than happy to pay that for design. Ended up that she ended up digging out the beds (which was a big expensive at £30 an hour rather than the £18ph I pay our gardener but he is only able to do 3 hours a week due to his other commitments and we just don’t have the time ourselves)

ready made bed designs with plants are available from the following websites:
garden on a roll
crocus
Beth chatto

(sorry on my phone and can’t link easily but do google)

I had a large bed to do so was going to pick one for sun one for shade and plant in the same bed next to each other. But I’m trying to achieve something specific so decided to employ a garden designer instead. I will probably do one of the Crocus plans in another part of the garden.

Yes - I showed him that I had the money in an instant access account ready to go, but I wasn't keen on paying up front.

The initial quote was for £10k but I added some things along the way (the whole new lawn for example) - the idea was 50% at the start and 50% on completion.

I said I'd pay 50% once the hardscaping materials had arrived so at least I'd have something of value if he did disappear. I'm guessing his cost price was a good bit less than 50% so he was happy to do that.

For completeness' sake here's how the saga ended, not at all in the way I feared: The garden designer did turn up at the appointed time and turned out to be absolutely brilliant. He actually is very experienced but has only struck out on his own quite recently, starting as a side gig while also keeping his job with a landscaping company (thus the lack of reviews). Before I'd paid anything he spent an entire afternoon here, going over every bit of the large garden and already improving it tremendously by moving things around. I believe he left with a solid idea of what's wanted and I'm pretty sure his planting plan will be great. In communications since though, he's proved to not be great at emailing. Some people aren't, which is why I'm glad I gave him a chance!

Have seen similar situation discussed on here before. can kind of understand garden designers asking for money before spending hours designing a garden, but no, I would not do this