Lawn service ruining lawn with their mowers

[Anonymous]

You're likely using a larger more commercial lawn service. I'd switch to a smaller company that uses push mowers or even smaller commercial mowers. Look at who mows your neighbors' lawns. We have both kinds of companies in our neighborhood. My next door neighbor uses a company like OP's. It's a full-on assault when they come with one person on the ride on mower, two with leaf blowers and one with a trimmer. The noise is deafening, but it doesn't last long. I've timed them from arrival to departure - almost always 4-6 minutes.

The rest of my neighbors use a smaller company which is typically the owner and his son for lawn care. They take more like 20-30 minutes but actually charge less and will do custom work if requested like weeding gardens, pruning shrubs and other garden projects. The owner also plants and maintains perennial gardens and thus knows what is and isn't a weed and how plants should be cared for. The smaller company is also how you get someone that knows your particular yard and your preferences. With the larger company you may get different people each visit and a totally generic service aimed to last as short a time as possible.

My husband used to own a landscaping company and had mowing crews and landscaping crews. Mowing and blowing is low skill work anyone can be quickly trained to do and where he assigned the B-team employees who were either new or didn't have a lot of skills. If you want a better level of care you need to go with a smaller company.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You're likely using a larger more commercial lawn service. I'd switch to a smaller company that uses push mowers or even smaller commercial mowers. Look at who mows your neighbors' lawns. We have both kinds of companies in our neighborhood. My next door neighbor uses a company like OP's. It's a full-on assault when they come with one person on the ride on mower, two with leaf blowers and one with a trimmer. The noise is deafening, but it doesn't last long. I've timed them from arrival to departure - almost always 4-6 minutes.

The rest of my neighbors use a smaller company which is typically the owner and his son for lawn care. They take more like 20-30 minutes but actually charge less and will do custom work if requested like weeding gardens, pruning shrubs and other garden projects. The owner also plants and maintains perennial gardens and thus knows what is and isn't a weed and how plants should be cared for. The smaller company is also how you get someone that knows your particular yard and your preferences. With the larger company you may get different people each visit and a totally generic service aimed to last as short a time as possible.

My husband used to own a landscaping company and had mowing crews and landscaping crews. Mowing and blowing is low skill work anyone can be quickly trained to do and where he assigned the B-team employees who were either new or didn't have a lot of skills. If you want a better level of care you need to go with a smaller company.

OP here. The company we've been using is definitely a residential service, but they've become increasingly popular in our neighborhood and so are aiming to do as many houses in as short a time as possible (like most, I'm sure). We've been with them for about 3 years and this was the first year we've had any issues, now that they've switched to the much larger equipment. In those three years they've gone from servicing just one or two homes on our street to nearly the entire neighborhood. There's a few smaller companies that service homes on our block too and so I'm going to get in touch with them for this coming year.

For those saying we have a small yard and just do it yourself, yes, it is small compared to many suburban yards but it'll still take me an hour a week - an hour I don't have.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You're likely using a larger more commercial lawn service. I'd switch to a smaller company that uses push mowers or even smaller commercial mowers. Look at who mows your neighbors' lawns. We have both kinds of companies in our neighborhood. My next door neighbor uses a company like OP's. It's a full-on assault when they come with one person on the ride on mower, two with leaf blowers and one with a trimmer. The noise is deafening, but it doesn't last long. I've timed them from arrival to departure - almost always 4-6 minutes.

The rest of my neighbors use a smaller company which is typically the owner and his son for lawn care. They take more like 20-30 minutes but actually charge less and will do custom work if requested like weeding gardens, pruning shrubs and other garden projects. The owner also plants and maintains perennial gardens and thus knows what is and isn't a weed and how plants should be cared for. The smaller company is also how you get someone that knows your particular yard and your preferences. With the larger company you may get different people each visit and a totally generic service aimed to last as short a time as possible.

My husband used to own a landscaping company and had mowing crews and landscaping crews. Mowing and blowing is low skill work anyone can be quickly trained to do and where he assigned the B-team employees who were either new or didn't have a lot of skills. If you want a better level of care you need to go with a smaller company.

OP here. The company we've been using is definitely a residential service, but they've become increasingly popular in our neighborhood and so are aiming to do as many houses in as short a time as possible (like most, I'm sure). We've been with them for about 3 years and this was the first year we've had any issues, now that they've switched to the much larger equipment. In those three years they've gone from servicing just one or two homes on our street to nearly the entire neighborhood. There's a few smaller companies that service homes on our block too and so I'm going to get in touch with them for this coming year.

For those saying we have a small yard and just do it yourself, yes, it is small compared to many suburban yards but it'll still take me an hour a week - an hour I don't have.

An hour you don’t have? How many hours do you spend on DCUM a week?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You're likely using a larger more commercial lawn service. I'd switch to a smaller company that uses push mowers or even smaller commercial mowers. Look at who mows your neighbors' lawns. We have both kinds of companies in our neighborhood. My next door neighbor uses a company like OP's. It's a full-on assault when they come with one person on the ride on mower, two with leaf blowers and one with a trimmer. The noise is deafening, but it doesn't last long. I've timed them from arrival to departure - almost always 4-6 minutes.

The rest of my neighbors use a smaller company which is typically the owner and his son for lawn care. They take more like 20-30 minutes but actually charge less and will do custom work if requested like weeding gardens, pruning shrubs and other garden projects. The owner also plants and maintains perennial gardens and thus knows what is and isn't a weed and how plants should be cared for. The smaller company is also how you get someone that knows your particular yard and your preferences. With the larger company you may get different people each visit and a totally generic service aimed to last as short a time as possible.

My husband used to own a landscaping company and had mowing crews and landscaping crews. Mowing and blowing is low skill work anyone can be quickly trained to do and where he assigned the B-team employees who were either new or didn't have a lot of skills. If you want a better level of care you need to go with a smaller company.

OP here. The company we've been using is definitely a residential service, but they've become increasingly popular in our neighborhood and so are aiming to do as many houses in as short a time as possible (like most, I'm sure). We've been with them for about 3 years and this was the first year we've had any issues, now that they've switched to the much larger equipment. In those three years they've gone from servicing just one or two homes on our street to nearly the entire neighborhood. There's a few smaller companies that service homes on our block too and so I'm going to get in touch with them for this coming year.

For those saying we have a small yard and just do it yourself, yes, it is small compared to many suburban yards but it'll still take me an hour a week - an hour I don't have.

An hour you don’t have? How many hours do you spend on DCUM a week?

You're right! Why am I not mowing my lawn at 10pm at night?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You're likely using a larger more commercial lawn service. I'd switch to a smaller company that uses push mowers or even smaller commercial mowers. Look at who mows your neighbors' lawns. We have both kinds of companies in our neighborhood. My next door neighbor uses a company like OP's. It's a full-on assault when they come with one person on the ride on mower, two with leaf blowers and one with a trimmer. The noise is deafening, but it doesn't last long. I've timed them from arrival to departure - almost always 4-6 minutes.

The rest of my neighbors use a smaller company which is typically the owner and his son for lawn care. They take more like 20-30 minutes but actually charge less and will do custom work if requested like weeding gardens, pruning shrubs and other garden projects. The owner also plants and maintains perennial gardens and thus knows what is and isn't a weed and how plants should be cared for. The smaller company is also how you get someone that knows your particular yard and your preferences. With the larger company you may get different people each visit and a totally generic service aimed to last as short a time as possible.

My husband used to own a landscaping company and had mowing crews and landscaping crews. Mowing and blowing is low skill work anyone can be quickly trained to do and where he assigned the B-team employees who were either new or didn't have a lot of skills. If you want a better level of care you need to go with a smaller company.

OP here. The company we've been using is definitely a residential service, but they've become increasingly popular in our neighborhood and so are aiming to do as many houses in as short a time as possible (like most, I'm sure). We've been with them for about 3 years and this was the first year we've had any issues, now that they've switched to the much larger equipment. In those three years they've gone from servicing just one or two homes on our street to nearly the entire neighborhood. There's a few smaller companies that service homes on our block too and so I'm going to get in touch with them for this coming year.

For those saying we have a small yard and just do it yourself, yes, it is small compared to many suburban yards but it'll still take me an hour a week - an hour I don't have.

An hour you don’t have? How many hours do you spend on DCUM a week?

You're right! Why am I not mowing my lawn at 10pm at night?

Good time to mow. Get it done OP.

[Anonymous]

Good news! Turns out it isn’t hard to find companies that use normal sized mowers for normal sized yards and I’ve changed companies.

[Anonymous]

You could also consider getting a robot mower. Lots of new models announced at CES that don't need a perimeter wire now. More companies are entering the market creating more competition and better products. I'm waiting for some of the reviews to start to come in on the new models, but I am seriously considering ditching my lawn service to go robotic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They are reckless. I've seen them drive right into a tree trunk. Ruts everywhere. I ended up doing my yard myself. Those mowers are heavy too. Every time they make a turn, they tear up the grass. I often wonder if they smoke pot, and that's why they are so reckless.

At our beach house we get the same - chunks of grass pulled out. They whip around the yard on the riding mower like a race course. And yes, when they get out of the truck you smell the pot.

[Anonymous]

They are some reckless guys on those stand on mowers. I've seen them whip around the trees so fast and making u turns. One day I saw them run into a tree head on. It knock the worker off his machine. They leave ruts in the yard when they make a turn. Its like what's the rush. Can't they take their time without destroying the grass. The evergreen the worker hit head on looks like its dying.