Getting a green, lush and healthy lawn is not something you can leave to chance. Proper lawn care involves more than just mowing the grass and weeding. The best lawn care services should also control crabgrass, get rid of lawn-destroying grubs and fertilize your lawn to keep it thriving. Hiring a professional lawn care provider takes all of the hard work out of gardening. Apart from caring for your garden, professionals have the expert knowledge to tackle the most challenging aspects of shrub, plant, grass and tree care.
To help you find quality professional lawn care services near you, the reviews team has evaluated some of the best providers out there. This TLC Lawn Care review details the services provided, value for money, quality of work and customer ratings.
TLC Lawn Care is a solid choice when it comes to gardening services. But TLC Lawn Care can’t beat TruGreen. TruGreen has comprehensive service plans to suit your yard care needs and budget.
Our Preferred Lawn Care Companies
Today’s Homeowner recommends several lawn care companies to our readers. Below you’ll see our latest suggestions and their unique superlatives. You can also explore our review of the best lawn care services to find your ideal option.
Pros & Cons of TLC Lawn Care
Why TLC Lawn Care?
It’s essential to get a trusted lawn care company to look after your yard for an affordable price. After all, your garden represents the pride you take in your home and property. Perhaps you also want a front yard that stands out from your neighbors’ lawns.
Does the quality of services that TLC Lawn Care advertises live up to customers’ expectations? Does the company deliver on its promises? A common theme with many of the positive reviews of TLC Lawn Care is the technicians are attentive and helpful. The company is also accredited by the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and holds an impressive A+ rating. It currently holds no customer ratings on the site.
TLC Lawn Care’s Offerings
TLC Lawn Care offers a variety of different plans to keep your lawn looking healthy all year long. Each season has its own needs when it comes to lawn care. Lawn fertilization is essential in all seasons to develop hardy, disease-resistant grass. Other services include crabgrass control, weed control, grub prevention and other necessary treatments.
TLC Lawn Care offers a “5-Service Program” plan to take care of all your lawn needs. This five-part plan is specifically designed to ensure grass grows well from spring until fall. Healthy, well-nourished grass survives harsh winters and freezing temperatures.
Early spring
Grass starts growing in early spring. It’s essential to feed lawns with balanced fertilizers to encourage healthy roots. It’s not just grass that starts growing — weeds also appear, and they need to be controlled. The following services are included in the Early Spring plan from TLC Lawn Care:
- Crabgrass control — Also called finger-grass, crabgrass is a tough weed that can quickly destroy your lawn’s appearance. TLC Lawn Care treats your lawn to prevent this irritating weed from appearing, but without harming the surrounding grass.
- Fertilization — Vigorous growth in spring means your lawn needs extra feeding. Qualified technicians use only the right kind of fertilizer that’s specific to your lawn’s needs.
- Weed control — TLC Lawn Care professionals inspect your lawn for broadleaf weeds and remove or treat them as necessary.
Late spring
April and May are when lawn grubs are most active. The larvae have a voracious appetite and can destroy your beautiful lawn if they’re not eradicated. Late spring care involves:
- Lawn grub prevention — Treatments for your yard prevent larvae living in the soil from feeding on your beautiful lawn. This optional treatment helps avoid thin or dead patches of turf from appearing later in the year.
- Fertilization — Depending on your lawn’s health, fast or slow-release fertilizer is applied. This feeding ensures a deep green grass color and vigorous growth.
- Inspection and weed control — Professionals inspect your lawn for crabgrass, weeds and surface feeding insects. The appropriate treatment is applied to get rid of weeds and pests.
Summer
Specific care is essential to maintain a healthy lawn throughout the summer when the weather tends to be hotter and often drier. As part of the 5-Service Program care plan, TLC Lawn Care professionals inspect and feed your turf as necessary. The following services are included in the plan:
- Weed control — Regular inspections throughout summer ensure weeds are removed immediately. Prompt weeding prevents broadleaf weeds or stray patches of crabgrass from growing out of control.
- Fertilization — Feeding turf with balanced nutrients in summer boosts the health of your lawn, making it resistant to heat, dry spells and stress.
Fall
Proper feeding helps turf recover from hot summer days and lack of moisture. During the fall, the essential lawn care services are weeding and feeding. To revive your lawn after a hot summer, TLC Lawn Care offers the following services:
- Weed control — Lawn inspections look for signs of weeds and remove them at their roots.
- Fertilization — Fall feeding helps repair any damage summer stress has caused.
Late fall
Late fall fertilization prepares your lawn for winter. Balanced feeding strengthens roots so they survive well through the winter months until early spring. In October and November, lawn care technicians apply balanced nutrients to your lawn so the roots are healthy and hardy. This type of late fall treatment means healthier grass growth in spring, and ultimately less maintenance and care.
TLC Lawn Care Locations
TLC Lawn Care provides services in many areas of the Eastern U.S. Service locations include the following states:
- Connecticut
- Delaware
- Maryland
- Massachusetts
- New Hampshire
- New Jersey
- Ohio
- Pennsylvania
- Rhode Island
TLC Lawn Care doesn’t provide lawn services in the Southern or Western U.S. California, Texas, Florida, North Carolina and Oregon property owners will have to look for a different high-quality lawn care company.
The Cost of TLC Lawn Care
TLC Lawn Care guarantees the lowest prices available. Because every lawn is different, it’s impossible to provide exact costs. The condition of your lawn is also a factor when calculating prices for the best lawn care. Some of the aspects affecting the cost of TLC Lawn Care’s plans may include the following:
- Size of lawn — Larger lawns are costlier to maintain than small yards.
- Condition of lawn — If your lawn was poorly maintained, it might take more frequent treatments to get it looking lush and green. Regular lawn maintenance throughout the season helps reduce the overall costs of lawn care.
- Number of weeds — Some lawns are more prone to weeds than others. Regular inspections help keep the number of weeds to a minimum; however, frequent visits can increase costs.
- Climate — Keeping lawns looking healthy in hot, dry climates can increase the cost because you’ll need to use more fertilizer. In areas that experience harsh climates, it can cost more to winterize a lawn so it’s protected from November through February.
- Extra services — Lawn care companies also offer add-on services to help maintain your green turf. For example, lawn grub control may be necessary to prevent grubs from eating away at grass roots.
When choosing a suitable company to care for your lawn, you should also make sure they offer guarantees. For example, TLC Lawn Care is family-owned, and they provide service guarantees.
The Results
When it comes to caring for your lawn, TLC Lawn Care is a solid choice. The company has a full season care plan to help keep your garden looking beautiful and healthy throughout the year. Qualified technicians only use the finest fertilizers for nourishing grass. They also use high-quality pest control to get rid of surface insects. But when comparing the range of services, customer satisfaction, and value for money, this company isn’t the top choice.
Top Recommended Provider: TruGreen
After extensive research, the reviews team’s top recommended provider for lawn care is TruGreen. This company is rated highly due to the range of services it provides and its wide range of availability. The company provides several services that represent affordable, complete lawn care plans.
Some of the additional services TruGreen offers include:
- Lawn aeration
- Overseeding
- Targeted weed control
- Grub prevention and control
- Soil amendment
- Tree and shrub services
- Mosquito control
- Eight annual visits to inspect and treat your lawn
TruGreen also has a nationwide reach, operating in all states except for Alaska and Hawaii. So, it’s likely there’s a TruGreen office near you, servicing your area. Not only is this company one of the top national lawn care providers, it also offers flexible care plans, to suit your budget and needs. All plans come with a Healthy Lawn Guarantee.
Methodology: How We Rank Lawn Care Companies
At Today’s Homeowner, we strive to bring you the most accurate information for your home improvement projects. Our lawn company ratings emphasize what matters most to you — a wide range of useful products with reliable service and impressive results.
Our ratings are based on publicly available information about each company, secret shopping via phone and internet, customer-review analysis, and discussions with lawn and landscaping specialists.
Each company can earn up to 100 points divided across five categories. We assess those point scores, then convert them to a five-star scale to determine rankings. We researched popular lawn care companies across the country to develop the following category breakdown:
- Plan Options (36 points): Lawn care companies earn the most points in this category if they offer a wide range of plans to fit various homeowner needs. Companies providing services like fertilization, aeration, seeding, and tree/shrub care will earn more points than providers with base-level plans.
- Additional Offerings (11 points): We score this category by evaluating additional offerings that enhance a company’s overall service selection. Companies that provide pest control services, organic lawn care products, and a la carte options score the highest in this category.
- Customer Service (25 points): We considered how far each company goes to ensure customers have convenient, intuitive access to products and services with contact forms, online chat features, and additional learning resources.
- State Availability (8 points): We factored each company’s state availability into its overall score. Companies with more locations and wider service areas score higher than those with limited availability.
- Trustworthiness (20 points): We score each company’s trustworthiness based on its Better Business Bureau accreditation and score, number of years in business, and Google Star ratings.
We monitor company data on an ongoing basis to keep rankings and information up to date.
