The Questions To Ask During A Landscape Design Consultation
As an experienced landscape design company, we hear a lot of questions. Often, clients come to us not just with a design in mind, but wanting to learn more about their options and what we provide. Potential clients asking questions is great for both them and for us as a landscaping company. It allows us to educate clients while clients can see if we would be a good fit for their needs. If you’re looking into asking a landscaping company for a consultation, here are some questions that you can ask to achieve your dream design.
What is your initial vision based on my property and needs?
Even before a consultation, the first piece of landscaping design is your vision. As the one who reached out, you likely have an idea of the features that you want and the sort of design aesthetics that appeal to you. However, this is where it can be helpful to ask a design company what their initial vision is instead of jumping right in. For one, there are some ideas you have that might not be possible. Also, if their vision and your vision align, then it could be a sign that they are a good partner for your landscape.
What materials and features are you considering?
Image Credit: University of Tennessee
Something key to make sure that you ask about is the materials and features available to your landscaper. You likely don’t know the exact names of materials or what they look like, but you probably have a color and material in mind. Seeing what your landscape designer recommends is important, as different landscapers might contract different material providers. If you find over different consultation processes that you’re looking for a specific material, you can start asking directly about that material during the consultation process to see if they can provide it.
This would also be the time for you to note materials that you don’t like. If you have any plant allergies or materials that you are opposed to, communicating this upfront makes it clear throughout the installation. It makes it a lot harder for those materials to be included if your landscape is designed with those preferences in mind.
Have you worked with the style I want before?
In contrast, it’s possible you’ve done so much research for your landscaping that you can name a specific landscaping style that you’re looking for. From modern to cottage to naturalistic, asking if the landscaper has done projects in the style you’re looking for is incredibly helpful. If they have pictures from previous clients, it can be helpful to see them and get more of a sense of the work they’ve done. If they aren’t familiar with your style or usually don’t work with that style, it’s possible a different company might be better suited to your vision. Or, if the company is up for the challenge, you can take the chance to stress to them what about the style you want to incorporate.
What would the cost be, and what factors go into the cost?
With all of the materials and features squared away, the next step to consider is cost. It’s likely that you have saved up money for your installation, but something you can ask specifically for is the cost breakdown. It’s possible that, if it is a certain part of your material or your design that is driving up the cost, there might be something different you can consider to get more for your money.
How do you incorporate revisions?
This is always important to consider. For an investment as big as landscaping, you want to make sure that your design is exactly what you envisioned. If you sense hesitation on their end to accept revisions, or if their communication is inconsistent, it might be best to look for a different landscaping partner. Also, many companies charge extra for revisions alongside their initial fee, so knowing those numbers is important before going into the design process.
How often do you provide updates?
There is no right or wrong answer per se for a business to give to this question. However, depending on the amount of reaching out that you want, it’s important to know what to expect. If they communicate less frequently than you want, reaching out more frequently isn’t likely to get them to communicate more. It might be a sign that you want to work with someone else.
How high-maintenance is this landscape design?
Before you shoot for the moon with your landscaping design, think of the fuel you’ll need to keep going there. If you want something lower maintenance, make sure that you bring this up to your landscaping team so you can discuss options that match your lifestyle as well as your vision.
It’s possible that, without consistent maintenance, intricate designs might become overgrown or die out season by season. This depends on your climate and the area that you live in, but it’s still important to consider. For example, in East Memphis where we are based, water features need careful maintenance and winterization throughout the seasons.
What other landscaping services do you offer?
Image Credit: University of Tennessee
In that vein, if you find you work and communicate well with your landscaping company, ask what landscaping and lawn care services they offer. It’s possible that you could recruit them to perform the maintenance for you if your dream design ends up being higher maintenance. Many landscaping companies offer maintenance alongside design to help address that exact issue. This might allow you to shoot for the moon, after all.
What does the design process look like?
If you like the initial answers that your landscape designer provides you, it’s good to ask about what the design process would look like after the consultation. This can be as broad as what their process is to as granular as what software they use. Overall, seeing what this looks like can help you to understand the timeline and what their mindset is for the project.
How long will the installation take?
Once you get far enough along with your landscape design partner and are ready to start installation, this is a simple but good question to ask. Knowing how long the design process will take, when they start installation, and when installation will end allows you to plan your life around the installation. It also gives a sense of what they will tackle first about your landscape and when.
The Victory Landscape Services Design Consultation Process
There are a lot of ways that we at Victory Landscape Services work to stand out from the competition. For one, we break up the consultation into three separate steps before you have to ever make a decision.
Before we arrive on your property, we have an initial consultation where you can state your project scope, your timeline, and your budget upfront. Then, we have a discovery call where we specifically learn about your motivations. We find that this helps to build expectations for the initial consultation and gives us a full understanding of your goals before we form an impression based on your property. It is after these two consultations that we will tour your property. After this tour, we’ll confirm the budget alignment and get the final decision on any preferences.
These three consultations all provide in-depth answers to questions you’ll look for before we give you a proposal. This allows our clients to make informed decisions throughout their whole time working with us.
Our East Memphis Landscape Design Services
If that sounds like the ideal landscaping consultation for you and you’re based in the East Memphis area, contact us! We’d be happy to work with you for landscape design and can also provide you with maintenance services throughout the seasons. Contact us to begin the consultation process and ask us some questions!