Let’s Hear it From...
1 So what is that concept?
It’s really that we don’t take on any private work ourselves, so all our contracts come through a designer who is contracted by the client, but we come under the designer’s wing so we don’t really market ourselves to clients direct. From day one this is how we have worked and our first project came from Andy Sturgeon after I pitched him the idea of our company. He had a project in mind for us, which we took on and received a deposit – so this is what started the business and launched the company. We never borrowed from the bank as we were up and running from the beginning. Our feeling was that if clients were paying a fee to a designer they were serious about having their garden done. The designer will have given them a realistic idea of the price, which helps – we’ve worked with around 330 designers and architects over our 12 years all over the country from Anglesey to Dartmouth and internationally to Guernsey and the south of France.
Were all these projects with UK designers? Yes, mainly.
30 August 2013 What is your staff structure?
We have four construction teams of two to three people, a soft landscape team who do all the preparation and receive and handle the plants, and also two maintenance teams.
2
and look after it going forward. This makes it easier for them to recommend us as opposed to a construction only company who can’t offer an on-going service.
What do you do when a client comes to you direct instead of through a designer? This does happen four or five times a month and in this instance I will recommend a designer. I visit the client first to find out what they want and what their budget is. I can then choose someone who would suit their particular needs.
3
So you do maintenance as well? Yes, but we only maintain the jobs we have constructed. We found that building gardens and providing a quality service deserved a good level of on-going maintenance. This allows us to provide the best service for the client, with the designer being safe in the knowledge that we can start the job at the site survey stage, then build the garden
So you haven’t thought about having your own in-house designer?
No, I think it could cause a conflict of interest as independent designers would be less keen to work with us. This is how we have worked from day one, sometimes it’s been really difficult to do it this way but I feel it’s the right thing to do.
Is there a typical project price you wouldn’t go below?
No, I like to feel I always give value for money
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