Sequoia Tree Service Inc.

I liked working with Gary. My favorite moment was when I came outside to see how he was doing. I found him up in our citrus tree, calmly and carefully hand sawing branches with a small saw. He uses words like «ecology» and knows what it means. Another guy we had out to do our trees was about speed and his team hacked away without seeming to care much about the overall aesthetic. Gary’s vibe was very different.
Gary said the following a couple times to me «Trees in nature don’t need pruning. Trees have survived fine forever without people pruning them» (to paraphrase). So, he’s not all about hacking up the tree because he can and moving on. Also, his price was really good compared to some other tree services we checked out. And, the tree looked really good when he was done.

Gary does a good job.
I have a Japanese Tea Tree that split and he got out here quickly, with his people, and took care of the job. No nonsense. No bullshit. And at a fair price.
The tree, right next to the rear of our house, split. About a quarter fell across our patio onto our jasmine hedge and the other quarter fell onto the roof.
Gary and his guys were out here and cleaned up the situation with 24 hours.
I like this guy because he gets the job done and he doesn’t f**k around.

We called Sequoia Tree Service to take care of some branches hanging over the roof that needed to be cut back for fire safety. As first time home owners, this was the first time we have had to take care of any trees on the property. Since we had to have work done anyhow, we decided to find someone who would actually care for our trees and do the job properly beyond cutting some branches. The big coastal oak in the garden was definitely in need of some love.
Gary was very responsive from the start. He cared about getting the job and worked with us to find a fair price, and to build a long term business relationship.
Gary worked hard and answered questions willingly. The oak tree looks beautiful and the garden has opened up because of the trimming. The guys helping him haul away debris were also really good, and our garden, deck and driveway were nice and clean at the end of the day.
We will continue to use Sequoia Tree Service to care for our trees.

My wife and I moved into our first home in Oakland’s Maxwell Park two years, and although we love it, our acacia tree in the back yard has been a relentless thorn in our side. It seems like every weekend we are sweeping the patio of the leaves and seeds that endlessly fall. Finally we had enough and found Gary/​Sequoia Tree Service here on Unilocal,and couldn’t be happier with his service. Gary is very knowledgeable of his craft. We had discussed the pros and cons of removing the tree and decided to go with an aggressive trim. Once Gary is on the job, not only does he let you know what is going on with your tree (s), he can tell you what kind of maintenance it’s had in the past — I had no idea our tree had been capped and now it had branches growing straight up!
Gary and his crew are great, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend him!

Gary with Sequoia Tree Service is a very knowledgeable arborist providing very good advice on shaping trees in addition to excellent service. As junipers and trees grow very quickly in Berkeley, it is a great partnership to work with Gary and Sequoia Tree Service. Three years ago Gary helped opening up my view towards the Bay as trees were obstructing it. This year I called Gary again for help; he responded quickly, provided me with a quote after we discussed and decided on the best solution for my tree invasion, and completed the work very professionally.
I am a happy customer of Sequoia Tree Service!

Gary has been wonderful to work with as we removed five trees from our property. He was prompt returning my initial call where other services either did not call back or did not return our call for four to five days. Gary costs were very affordable. He followed up with us throughout the permit process and also provided us with all of the needed information. Gary has first class customer service, and after working with him through this process we have asked him to provide us quotes for additional projects. We would highly recommend Sequoia Tree Service!

Waited without pushing while the city processed the paperwork. Quoted a fair price, did the work promised, and cleaned up after themselves.

My husband and I had an estimate from Sequoia Tree Service four months ago and there was no follow up from Gary Kaercher. As a result, we followed up with him a few more times in the hopes of getting a response and moving forward with tree service but still no response… until yesterday, four months later. We received a generic «courtesy follow up» email from him offering a free estimate, which we already had done and he had no idea who we were, despite the fact that he had already paid us a visit and not to mention the multiple follow ups we made with him that went unanswered.
Although it had taken four months to get a response, I was still hopeful that we could get someone out to take care of our trees. Hopeful until I read Gary’s email below:
«I appreciate your getting back with me. I climb and remove very large and dangerous trees for a living with chainsaws, as a professional arborist. We get inundated with emergency work sometimes, resulting in work related injuries, colds, and all sorts or related items while doing one of the most dangerous professions in America, according to the U.S.Dept.of labor statistics. I’m not sure if you work full time in an office or not for a living, but I can assure you the work we do is quite different. I would be most happy to set up a follow up meeting with you, if you have some time again in your calendar. My sincerest apologies for any inconvenience we may have caused you, while trying to provide you with a free estimate, while we were probably busy with life threatening emergency work. Please Advise & thank you!»
If I wanted a million sorry excuses as to why something didn’t get done, I would have asked my 9 year old son why he didn’t write down his homework. Also, the last time I checked, customer service skills didn’t include responding to feedback with nine lines of excuses and inferences that his line of work is more important than ours. Just apologize and be done with it! And to end his email with a BS «sincere» (insincere) apology that falls on deaf ears and another offer for an estimate, I’m thinking to myself «why would I want ANYTHING from this joker»?? Bad business, Gary. Time for some Carnegie Mellon courses in how to win friends and influence people.

I always have a parking space in front of my house. I can thank my giant black acacia for that. When it isn’t dropping leaves, it is dropping seeds, or blowing pollen on everyone’s windshields. The best parkingspotguaranteers are the pollen balls that drop like small sacks of yellow chalk then roll to their destination leaving trails of spores all over my neighborhood.
«You want to keep it?» Says Gary, eyebrows raised. Yes, I like trees… And my parking spot… And free mulch all year ’round. Without further ado, he went to work, measuring and walking up my street to get a good look from all angles. He gave me his professional advice on how to reduce the crown and make my monster blob of a tree into an attractive street tree. Clearly, he is passionate about his job. …Just ask him about «topping» the tree and you will get educated. (Psst, don’t top your tree, ever.) I like passionate people, so I hired him.
In two days my family marveled as our tree came back to life. The broken and dangerous branches were removed. The crown was lifted and reduced. Ah! A beauty from the beast.
Thank you, Sequoia Tree Service! She is so pretty!
I am sure Gary does a fine job taking down a tree, but he did a fabulous job lifting my tree up. The consultation is free; see if Gary can make your messy monster beautiful, too!

Sequoia Tree Service is a company that has earned its reputation and my respect as a reliable and well qualified tree service company. Last summer the trees in my commercial parking lot, some of them are Eucalyptus,
were overgrown and desperately need a trimming and pruning. I came across Sequoia in Yeld where many has recommended them highly. I decided to give it a try. Gary, the owner showed up with his buddy right on the dot. Gary climbed up those tall trees like a mountaineer. He cut and trimmed away all those large branches in no time. His buddy cleaned up the branches and hauled them away. One thing need to mention is their professionalism. They know exactly what needs to be done. They are fast and efficient. They don’t give you a chance to worry. They take care of every details and their price is reasonable. Sequoia Tree Service is highly recommended. JWA

Gary did a fantastic job removing our trees. He was quick, thorough and did a great job. I highly recommend him for your tree service needs.

Rarely these days do I interact with a company or service provider that actually believes in «service». Sequoia Tree Service is just such a company. My phone calls were returned readily, the estimate came the next day, the crew showed up when there said they would, and when they left, they had cleaned and raked all of the trimmings. I would highly recommend them for your next tree service.

Gary was very thorough with the project he did in our backyard. He removed a giant Oak and a number of large Bays in our Oakland yard. He helped me follow through with the need of a City of Oakland permit. He was always safe. He also was an arborist. He worked smoothly with his yard cleanup crew. He used subcontracts to determine the price of the project, which was very competitive.

Gary was on time and worked efficiently. He provided useful information along the way. I had no problems with his service or price.

Gary and his team a really stand up job with my huge, 40 foot tree. The tree was in a state of either being trimmed or taken down and with future plans in the works for my backyard, I chose to take the big guy down.
Gary was prompt, timely, and gave plenty of solutions of removal after the cut job was done. He was also very generous with information about tree types and best uses of what trees I decided to keep. Self trimming to keep things healthy.
Lastly I have to say Gary was very understanding with financial choices in paying off the work. I felt he adapted well with what I could manage.

Gary did a fantastic job trimming three trees on our property, including a fairly tall redwood. He was quick, courteous, and very informative. Additionally, his rates are incredibly reasonable!

Gary is amazing. Recently, our cat somehow scaled a tree and ended up about 30 feet in the air on a branch, in a very difficult-​to-​access place. The police would not come, nor would the fire department. Other tree services would not come, because it was 10:00 at night. But Gary DID come, and with amazing and swift professionalism, scaled the tree, lured the scared kitty to him, and descended with kitty safe in a carrier. Afterward, he dispensed some informal tree advice to our neighbor, whose tree it was. Then, to top matters off, he refused payment from us. Who does something like this? I was, and remain, wowed. Hopefully, I’ll never need a cat saved from a tree again, but I have no doubt about who I will use when I need some tree work done!

Gary of sequoia tree is one of the most professional people I’ve worked with in my time of being a home owner. He was very responsive to my inquiry, followed up, confirmed our appointment the day before and called on his way over. He explained what he recommended doing to our trees in a way that we could understand without being condescending. He followed up quickly with a quote which was incredibly reasonable and even offered up cost saving options.
When he came to do the work, he was incredibly respectful of our space and our trees. He continued to explain what he was doing, ask us questions before making major decisions about what limbs to cut and clearly took his work very seriously. The guy he brought to haul the trimmings, Pedro, even helped us with some other work around our yard while they were there!
You read this right – Gary is a kind, professional and respectful guy who does great work at a reasonable price. Couldn’t be happier.

We have two huge pine trees on our lot, and recently had a huge branch crack in half. It was dangerously close to falling down into the yard, or on the power line below, so we called Gary based on the Unilocal reviews for his business.
He was polite, responsive and courteous on the phone, and came when he said he would come. His price was reasonable, and he gave us the option of leaving the branches, in pieces, in our yard for us to put in the green bin in order to save the cost of having him haul it for us. He was aware that this was an unexpected expense.
He removed the huge branch, being careful not to damage the nearby Japanese Maple. As a piece of the pine branch fell, it collided with our (old) plastic play structure on the ground, cracking one of the corners. He climbed down and came inside to tell us, very apologetically. He explained that he was being very cautious around the power line (!!) and this was a minor casualty. We weren’t the least bit worried about it, but very much appreciated how apologetic and professional he was.
Before he left, we spoke about a few other tree needs in the yard that we would contact him for in the future, including taking down a small pine that was being crowded out by other trees and not thriving. We noted how he showed concern for the trees themselves, as living organisms, not just yard decorations.
We were very pleased, and hadn’t thought twice about the play structure. Then, a few hours after he had left, he called to say that he wanted to come by and take down the small tree for free, because he felt bad about damaging the play structure. Unreal!
It is so rare to encounter great customer service on this level, that I was compelled to write a review right away. Highly recommend.

After repeated calls were unreturned by another Tree Service company whom we’ve used before, my wife and I called Gary to help us figure out what to do with our Loquat Tree in the back yard that has some overgrowth and some sporadic dead limbs throughout. He was very prompt in getting back to us and scheduling a consultation.
He came out to our house — dressed in his company’s notable Blaze Orange T-​shirt. I was struck immediately at how much passion Gary has for his work. Compared to a previous experience with another company that was all about geting In-​and-​Out as quick as possible, giving our tree the equivalent of a Buzz Cut, Gary is quite the opposite experience. He’s careful, meticulous with his notes — and talked about his creation of his own database of the trees he has worked on, that he even discusses his data collection with local arborists and scientists. He’s obviously well-​schooled in biology and other life sciences. He explained his philosophy about working with trees to help them thrive and prosper. I was quite impressed.
Gary’s bid was very reasonable — and the work was conducted incredibly carefully and in a quick time frame. He’s even coming back out to our house afterwards to take a bark sample to help address a possible tree ailment.
I am very pleased to have met Gary, and we will certainly be calling him again for our tree needs.