Help with a stone job

[GreenAcresLandscaping]

I have a customer that i spoke to last year about laying some stone in his planting beds. He thinks he wants a medium sized stone maybe river rock He currently has mulch. Do i need to remove the mulch to lay the stone down? I am going to take some measurements but my supplier sells the stone by the tone. So how do i know how much to use? Also i know stone is hard, back breaking work. What do you guys charge? I have one guy who helps me for $8 an hour on other jobs but since stone is such hard labor i was thinking about paying him $10 Any help would be great.

[ECO Landscaping]

Ok tofigure out how much stone you need, take the length of the bed X the width X the thickness all in feet. then devide than number by 27. and thats your qubic yards. River rock weighs about 2600lb per yard. 8'x2'x.2'=3.2 / 27=.1185 yards x 2600= 308.1 lbs

And yes take out the old mulch its will look more professional.

I would not pay the helper any more, work is work .

Hope this helps

[GreenAcresLandscaping]

Thanks that really helps.

I know some people rent a dingo for stone jobs. I checked with a renting service about 5 miles from my home and they want 130 for day. Is it worth it?

[NewHorizon's Land]

If its a large area then it may be worth using the dingo. Are you going to have this dropped by a truck or is it going in the back of your pickup?

As stated work is work. Dont pay your helper more, he/she will expect that pay for each job you do. Just figure more hours to do the work. This may be better suited as a time and material job.

[betmr]

Just 1 suggestion from me, I do not like to use any landscape fabric in mulch beds, But, for stone beds I put down a good quality Filter Fabric under the stone and you didn't say, but also some kind of edgeing to keep stones where you want them.

[david shumaker]

If you live near a Lowes store they have a booklet with different type boarder stones that you can show your customer. The booklet also shows how to lay and level the stone.

Natural stone like Cobble stone is kind of pricey, so my customers usually want the cheaper Lowes landscaping stone.

If you need alot, have it delivered. I only needed about 150 pieces for the yard I did last week, but it was a pain loading and unloading on a pickup truck. I had to make several trips because of the weight.

I charge materials plus labor.

[GreenAcresLandscaping]

Originally Posted by NewHorizon's Land

If its a large area then it may be worth using the dingo. Are you going to have this dropped by a truck or is it going in the back of your pickup?

Thanks for the help. I am going to have it delivered by a guy that i buy my mulch from. He only charges $10 delivery per dump truck load so its not even worth it to pick it up myself. He charges about $40 a ton for the river rock. I am going to go and pick up a few samples of other stone to see what he likes.

[GreenAcresLandscaping]

He mulched it himself last year but just from looking at the beds i would say i would need about 8 yards of mulch if it were a mulching job. So 8 yard x 2600 = 10.2 tons. I am going to go take measurements tomorrow to see for sure how much i need.

[yardatwork]

Ask what kind of river rock it is...there are different sizes...fancy river rock is the smaller sized rocks like 2B and they also make the bigger, softball sized river rock. That'll also change your amounts.

[GreenAcresLandscaping]

I went and measured today, there is 1886 sqft. So 1886' x 12" = 22,632" x the thickness (2.5?) = 56580" / 2600 = 21.76 tons. Did i do this right? The stone is 40 a ton plus 2 trips at $10 for delivery for each one. I figured 1 man hour per ton at 8 an hour. So my cost is 1086. I was thinking 1900 for the job. Is that a good price?