Barrera’s Nursery & Landscape

Stay far away from Barrera’s Nursery!
In the summer of 2015 we completely renovated our backyard, replacing a number of large bushes, the mulch, and all the sod. In an effort to patronize a locally owned business rather than a big box retailer, we purchased everything that we could from Barrera’s. We spent well in excess of $ 2000.00 there.
The last piece of our project was laying sod. We got through two pallets, which were just fine. At the top of the third pallet we encountered a nest of fire ants. We are not talking a few dozen ants, we are talking tens of thousands, along with handfuls of eggs. Coming anywhere close to the pallet was clearly a safety hazard.
Confident that Barrera’s would take care of the problem for us, we called the nursery and spoke with Ezekiel (Nick, the owner, was on site but did not care to speak with us). My husband explained the problem and politely asked how we needed to go about getting the pallet replaced. We were downright stunned when we were told that that sod is sold as-​is and they would not be replacing the infested pallet. Ezekiel «helpfully» suggested that we lay the sod, water it, and treat it with pesticide, clearly not understanding that moving such heavily infested grass would land at least one of us in the emergency room.
I then got on the phone and explained to Ezekiel that we had specifically elected to patronize a local small business rather than heading for Home Depot or Lowe’s to purchase all our landscaping materials. We did this with the expectation that we will get personalized service and that the store owner/​manager will help us out if there is a problem. Ezekiel’s explanation was that Barrera’s does not grow the sod and therefore takes no responsibility if the sod is unusable.
At that point I was angry and explained that my displeasure with this absurd policy would be clearly reflected in as many online reviews as I could post. I asked Ezekiel if I could please speak to the owner about this matter and he stated that the owner would give me the same answer and that he invited me to post any reviews that I cared to.
I have never come across a retailer so unwilling to back up their product. As pointed out by my son, this would be exactly like going to Best Buy and purchasing a computer and arriving home and finding it smashed to bits and unusable in the box, only to be told by the Best Buy manager that we would have to live with it and purchase a new one if we want a functioning computer. Ridiculous!
This is the last time that we will purchase anything from Barrera’s.

My mom uses Barrera’s nursery for her lawn care. Her yard was full of thatch and weeds when she started with them. Now it’s very green and healthy. They don’t use many chemicals. They did a lot of weeding by hand, aerating, added compost and analyzed the watering needs of different areas. Her yard looks so good, she has had neighbors ringing the doorbell to ask who takes care of her yard. The pricing is the same as the other landscaping companies she has used, but the results are much better.