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Old 04-12-2008, 06:50 PM
fakie99 fakie99 is offline
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Join Date: Jul 2004
Location: Ann Arbor, MI
USDA Zone 5
Posts: 189
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Stonehenge View Post
Not at all. If you have some connections with some affluent folks in nice neighborhoods, there's no reason you can't do exactly what you want to do. Case in point - my folks used to live in a really nice neighborhood in Clarkston, MI. In that neighborhood there were a few residents who had their landscaping done by an old woman by the name of Ethel. Ethel was in her late 50's or 60's with a reportedly slight build. And she did all of her landscaping from out of her Lincoln continental.

Yes, her Lincoln. And yes, these were high end scapes. My folks probably ended up spending $70K to have their yard "Ethelized." She had helpers do the grunt work and used subs for anything really large. The projects usually took longer to complete, but she was such a joy to work with that the clients didn't seem to mind.

I believe she had extensive experience in horticulture, and her forte was the plantings. But I always got a chuckle hearing about how my folks were having this smallish older woman, working out of her older model luxury car, doing scapes worth up to six figures.

So yeah, it can be done.


clarkston, mi?! that's where i grew up (before it turned into the high dollar district). it's also where i got my start in the green industry. in fact, there were landscape companies there just tapping into the huge wealth coming into that area - a $200,000-1M landscape job was not unheard of. you're not from there originally are you jeff?
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