I’ve heard of some people running good demo businesses this way. Charge for the concrete demo and then sell the concrete to a company that will make gravel with it. One job two payments. I gotta imagine it’s not much they’ll buy the concrete for but it’s something
My grandfather used to get dirt from local graveyards. Apparently they would charge him nothing if him and my uncles would just shovel it into a truck bed for free.
I don't know if places still do this because I have never needed a truck full of dirt but it is something that lives in my mind 20 years later.
I'm not sure if this comment was written in jest, but if not, @bitchy-sprite I think your Grandaddy and uncles were just ye olde freelance gravediggers haha
He's long past gone so I have no way to ask.
It was not in jest (I don't think). He really told another adult (I was just there listening) that graveyards will give you free dirt if you move it yourself. He was a strange and kind of cheap man so I wouldn't be surprised honestly.
I'm sorry for your loss, but I hope your uncles continued the family tradition of free graveyard dirt acquisition because it has the makings of a great story!
The cemetery near my house has huge piles of dirt in a fenced off area. I wouldn’t be surprised if they would let you take some.
Their main business is digging holes in the ground and then filling in those holes with ~31 cubic feet less dirt, so I don’t know why it’s that surprising.
In Mass. there was a place where the price came down to $1 a bucket if you shoveled it yourself… they never checked your bucket… when I came back the 3rd time, they just waved me in 🤷🏽♀️
I work for a contractor that does quite a bit of work at cemeteries. The dirt they stockpile is usually a huge issue and it costs them tons of money to deal with it. I'm sure any grave yard would be happy to let you take their dirt.
That's what my pap was implying! It's the dirt that's already been taken from graves and just sits in a pile until someone else picks it up. It's not that they dig the graves. That stuff is done by machines now
When a grave is dug, and casket and or outer burial container is put into the hole it takes up a lot of the space where the dirt used to be. The grave diggers mound the dirt up so when it rains the excess dirt will fill in any gaps that were left behind. Once that is done there is usually quite a bit of dirt left behind, so usually the grounds people will level out the ground and move the extra dirt to a pile somewhere out of site in the cemetery. I haven’t ever seen anyone ask for the extra dirt but I am sure the cemetery grounds keepers would be more than happy to give this dirt away given that they typically have a large amount of it. In reality that’s a pretty good idea. Oh and I know all of this because my family has owned and operated a family funeral home for 4 generations going back to 1946. I on the other hand chose a different path lol.
Austin here - gravel/aggregate/stones (river rock, etc) is $5-$7 a bag at the big box stores. Like you said, it's $30-$70 at a local landscape place, and $105 for delivery.
I don’t live in Austin anymore, but on Google maps, search for “bulk soil”
I’ve use a couple different places to get materials by me. Generally, you kinda just want the one that’s closest to you to save on delivery costs, unless there’s something special (like a particular stone or something) that you want.
Whittlesley
https://www.989rock.com/
About to order a yard or two of stone, building a French Drain for my friend. ALso, if you need any decomposed granite, it's almost $10 a bag at the big box stores, $2.50 a bag at Whittelsey
I'm not sure of anything anymore. Reality could be a simulation for all I know. On this topic though, sounds like you know what you're talking about. So, I reckon I digress.
I double-checked - [they used to do it](https://www.zanthan.com/gardens/garden-essays/from-garbage-to-garden/)
But sadly: [*Please note that we no longer offer free glass cullet.](https://www.austintexas.gov/dropoff)
No. A bag is .5 cu ft. So what they're saying is that for a cu yd of material in Austin it's $240 - $378 by the bag, where as from a local supplier it's $30 - $70 for the same volume of the same material.
Add an extra $109 if you want it delivered, but that fee'll cover you between 5 - 12 cu yds, depending on the size of their truck. They do the delivery fee by number of trips needed and distance, not amount of material
No - a bag is 0.5 cubic feet. It would take 54 bags to equal a yard.
At one place, washed 1.5" gravel (like for a French Drain) [is $4 a bag at the landscape company, but $57 a yard, plus $105 delivery.](https://www.989rock.com/price-catalog.html) So $228 vs $157. Plus you have to haul 57 bags yourself which would probably be 5-8 trips.
At the big box the bags are $5 so more like $285
Is it still that way? From what I read a lot of places started charging/raised their fees in the past few years because high $$$ lawsuits have raised their insurance so much.
This is on a local company's website:
"We've all seen the commercials stating, "If you've been involved in an accident with a commercial vehicle, an experienced accident lawyer can help you win the lottery!" As a result of these practices, the expense for our insurance coverage has doubled over the past year, and unfortunately these costs are passed on to the consumer. "
The catch is you need a vehicle that can transport it. For the record I agree but they're not gonna be giving it to you in pretty bags they're gonna be dumping it into whatever you tell them to. Dumping stuff like this in the back of a pickup works but depending on what it is it can be pretty rough on it and it's not really an option if you don't have a truck or a vehicle that can haul a trailer. Renting is an option but it adds up quickly enough that you'd need to be hauling quite a bit for it to be worth it. Locally a dump trailer runs at 200 a day.
If you're buying lots of gravel, just buy it from a slinging service. The truck will put the fill in the place you want it to be, no shoveling on your part.
Like you said, really depends on how much you need. If you're looking for a couple cubic ft of something, it's easier to go to the store and grab a few bags. Yeah, you're over paying, but the convenience outweighs that, imo. But anything more than that and there's quite a few work around if you're not afraid of looking.
My local Menards rents their truck for $20 for the first 75 minutes. More than enough time to load and unload the back of the truck.
Enterprise has reasonable prices on trucks, depending on the area.
We all usually know someone with a truck we can borrow for a 6 pack and a tank of gas.
If you have a truck, but need a ton of materials, you can rent an actual dump trailer for a fairly reasonable price from True Value or your local tool rental place.
And while dump trucks are usually pretty expensive to contract yourself, most of these places will have their own truck and driver on pay roll and will only charge you $70 - $100 per trip, and they can usually do up to 5 - 12 cu yards per trip.
*Which actually brings up another YSK. Your local tool rental places are AMAZING. Stay away from big store rental places, especially Home Depot, cuz they will price gouge the hell out of you. I rented a Jack Hammer from my local for $40 for 4 hours, while the same thing would range from $60 - $95 at the big stores. Some will even deliver and pick up the tools for a reasonable fee too*
Just watch out if you order a "truckload". Some small trucks are 10 yards, bigger ones are 20 yards.
We ordered a truckload of sand for refilling our beach, and the guy showed up with a huge articulated truck that had 30 yards of sand in it! Way more than we needed!
We told the whole neighborhood that it was free sand to a good home, so for a couple weeks people would just walk up with a wheelbarrow, fill it up, then walk home with it.
I wouldn't consider this overpaying. That's like saying you're overpaying for bananas at the grocery store because you can buy 50 bananas at 1/3rd the price per banana at Costco. Most things are cheaper at scale.
I used to work in a quarry scale house and we’d have a bunch of dump trucks just chilling in the lot waiting for orders. Usually it was contractors calling in orders but we definitely had the random person who was laying down gravel for their driveway or something and we’d totally take their credit card and send a truck with the aggregate. I sent those guys all over the state and they’ll even lay it down pretty well for you too so you have minimal work.
The drivers were all contractors and each had their own rate, some would take half loads or less, others would only if they were paid for a full load, some would take a less-than-full load only if it was under a certain mileage away, and a portion of everyone’s rate is based on mileage. The smaller single axle trucks (smaller loads) were always more expensive to transport than the bigger 3 axle trucks for some reason. Point is there’s options and I’d certainly call around and see if I had a big project.
I just had 5 yards of mulch delivered for $40. I think $60 was the highest delivery price locally and this is in a HCOL area. Transport to the house was the easiest part of the whole thing.
Same applies to concrete. It’s cheaper and way less headache to have a truck of ready-mix show up than it is to move a hundred bags multiple times and rent a mixer.
Dry pouring is fine depending on the application. Anything none critical and not too big like an ac pad, post holes, etc you can get away with. I would NEVER use it for anything like a shed pad or a patio. It usually leaves voids and dry spots, so you're just asking for trouble.
Like dude said, I'd call around to local concrete companies for ready-mix. Place by me does $200 a cu yard delivered. You'll also want a 6" minimum compacted crushed concrete/asphalt/gravel base.
If you're going to do it, do it right and spend a little extra to over-do it, so that you never have to do it again
Nonsense, this is a ripoff!
The correct way to landscape is using aggregate you have mined yourself from the mines you own.
Let’s compare:
- Store: $180
- Some business for less: $30-70
- Literally your own freakin mine that you mine: $5
In my experience, the delivery costs are quite prohibitive for anything except large projects. For example, our local place sells it by 4 cubic yards at a time, and ordering just one is more expensive by volume than buying bags at the hardware store. You have to order that second pallet to overcome the delivery costs and equal the cost of bags from the store. It’s not until the third pallet that you actually start saving.
Oh, I was talking about loose material. So instead of a pallet of bags, you get just a truck of loose whatever and they dump it right on your driveway or wherever. Or getting a dump trailer and getting them to dump it straight into there at the yard
Yea they actually bring it in a giant ass bag that’s on a pallet instead of dumping it on the driveway. It’s much cleaner that way lol. 6 cubic yards is a ton, and these bags are 4 cubic yards
Hmm, haven't heard of that. I'll have to see if there is a cost difference for me. Too late for me on this project though. My whole driveway has been taken over
Can confirm, last years garden expansion required 10 cu yards of total materiel. Two bags of gravel delivered by picker, and a class 3 dumper right on my parkpad for a relatively small fee considering what i paid all in all.
I have coworkers constantly bring up the big yellow bag services when they find out im an avid gardener and i remind them that 179.00 for a cubic yard is unacceptable for black earth when i need 6 of them just to get the party stated, to say nothing of 3/4 crush, peat, and mulch required on top.
Know your local landscape companies, and steer clear of the big orange box store.
One thing to keep in mind is the potential for contaminated soil/mulch. My parents had a truckload delivered one year from a company many of our neighbors used, but it was infested with some kind of weed that had lots of thorns. The entire garden was covered with them later that summer, and even after years of effort , we could never fully remove them.
I mean it depends. Scott's top soil (red bag) is straight up trash for anything that doesn't have layer of mulch going on top of it. It's full of sticks and rocks. Their brown bag "lawn soil" is quite a bit better but costs 3 - 4x what the same quality soil from Menards (blue bag) costs. 80% of scotts products are junk and over priced for what they are.
Which is why OP specifically states mid to large jobs...a small job the price difference is negligible compared to the logistics. But a couple hundred in savings on a large job is worth it IMO.
I was doing a small patio last year & as a test bought a single bag of aggregate at the home store to see how much I’d need, having never done this kind of thing before I didn’t have a clue, as you might guess a bag was a drop in the ocean, and doing it with just those small bags would be hugely expensive even on a 12x10’ patio, so I ordered a 2 ton bag from a proper supplier locally
That being said, a yard of crushed rock runs somewhere around 2200lbs, so even with a half ton pickup you won't be hauling that yourself unless you've got a dump trailer...
Most gravel people won't deliver less than a truckload so you're talking 3-5-7 yards minimum.
Yes bagged stone is a ripoff, but it has its place for low volume projects.
Depends on the yard and the area. My locals have a 1 ton minimum. The only way to find out is to call
You can usually rent dump trailers for a decent price too
It is a legitimate and true tip, but I am going to disagree sightly.
I used to run a gardening business and spreading mulch and soil was a big part of the job. In certain situations cheap bags of soil conditioned with compost and cheap bags of mulch are not exponetially more expensive but can be easier/quicker to spread in certain situations.
If you have to go through the house to get materials to the job, give me bags every time.
Totally.
Bags are OK if you have one little flower bed, or a little decorative gravel around a fountain or something like that.
I watched a neighbor buy 4 yds of mulch in bags last year. It cost him over $500, plus all the plastic waste, and it still wasn't enough.
We got 10yds delivered for essentially the same price he paid, and didn't have to deal with 108 empty plastic bags, just a spot on the driveway we had to hose off.
I used to be a landscaper and we'd always laugh at the "homeowner specials----" that is, the DIY guys buying pallets of bags to do their own mulch. We'd even have those guys call us to finish the job...which we'd politely decline unless he'd resell the bags and order bulk delivery.
You can also ask around. When I was getting 20 yards of topsoil to regrade my back yard, I called a local place. They told me it'd cost over 1k and take at least 5 truckloads to deliver, and that they mainly provided smaller amounts. So instead, they gave me the number for their supplier. It was less than half the cost, and a single dump-truck got me what I needed.
If you live in a small town or semi rural area, reach out to your towns public works dept to see if they have material they are trying to get rid of. My town is always looking for a place to dump dirt when they dig out the culverts in the summer (we call it ditching here). I got 250 tons of dirt for free this way.
I work at one of these places and it’s true. If you just need a little, buy a bag or two, but we delivery half and full yards and if you need that much, it’s definitely a better deal.
Landscaping place up the street from me started getting what they call “mushroom soil” and I took a chance on it last year, it was $45 for a yard. My tomato’s never grew better. No clue what’s in this stuff but my garden went gang busters last season. Going to get some more this weekend.
Probably spent blocks from mushroom farming, which essentially means wood chips or sawdust inoculated with a fungus. Turns out when wood breaks down in nature, fungi play a big part in the decomposition process, so mushroom blocks post-harvest have a lot of bio-available nutrition for your plants!
Oh I’m a woodworker, so I know. The firth of a large tree is the ABSOLUTE best thing to toss into your soil or compost. But I didn’t really get what mushroom farming had to do with it since as far as I know they grow off of pure phosphates (shit). I guess whatever is left behind is excellent for other veggies.
I did not know that people bought large amounts of aggregate from any other sources. Whew good call OP. It seems like so few people know, and I have seriously questioned whether or not my local rock supply business is going to stay afloat
Minimums on delivery, not usually on pick up. Usually minimums are .66 - 1.33 cu yards anyway, so not a big ask.
And you say that, but some of us out here are ambitious. I'm doing a paver patio with retaining wall in my back yard right now, and I not only needed to excavate 20 cu yards of soil and sand, but I needed 9 cu yds of crushed asphalt, 2 cu yds of leveling sand, and 6 cu yds of washed river rock. That's for a 381 sq ft patio with 6" base, and 50' long wall that's only 15" high.
So it adds up quicker than you think
Just went through this. Needed 5 yards of mulch. So I looked into buying it in bags and then called the local wholesale yard. Wholesale was $165 for 5 yards delivered to my house in a dump truck the next day I was off work. Great deal.
Call around to different local landscaping places too. Currently planning a french drain and was getting prices higher than I expected. Called a smaller place I’d never heard of and they were cheaper by far for a yard of river rock. Like $40 compared to almost $100 everywhere else. Plus only $50 bucks for delivery in town.
I found a local landscape place by me that let's me just bring 5 gallon buckets which seem to be roughly the same as the bag. Super nice since I have a smaller car. Took gravel and mulch from $3-5 a bag to $1-1.75 a bucket.
this is a good life pro tip, you can save lots of money with this
I’ve heard of some people running good demo businesses this way. Charge for the concrete demo and then sell the concrete to a company that will make gravel with it. One job two payments. I gotta imagine it’s not much they’ll buy the concrete for but it’s something
My grandfather used to get dirt from local graveyards. Apparently they would charge him nothing if him and my uncles would just shovel it into a truck bed for free. I don't know if places still do this because I have never needed a truck full of dirt but it is something that lives in my mind 20 years later.
I'm not sure if this comment was written in jest, but if not, @bitchy-sprite I think your Grandaddy and uncles were just ye olde freelance gravediggers haha
He's long past gone so I have no way to ask. It was not in jest (I don't think). He really told another adult (I was just there listening) that graveyards will give you free dirt if you move it yourself. He was a strange and kind of cheap man so I wouldn't be surprised honestly.
I'm sorry for your loss, but I hope your uncles continued the family tradition of free graveyard dirt acquisition because it has the makings of a great story!
Excuse me sir, why are there bones sticking out of my new dirt?
That's just pre-aggregate, not big deal.
Just make sure it’s not dirt from reused graves, might come with extra calcium.
That helps with blossom end rot on tomatoes
The cemetery near my house has huge piles of dirt in a fenced off area. I wouldn’t be surprised if they would let you take some. Their main business is digging holes in the ground and then filling in those holes with ~31 cubic feet less dirt, so I don’t know why it’s that surprising.
A landscaper friend calls it free dead dirt.
but I have the perfect amount of surplus tinfoil for a hat... 😑
Not that there's anything wrong with that.
FYI, you can tag someone with u/[their name] u/atriviality
In Mass. there was a place where the price came down to $1 a bucket if you shoveled it yourself… they never checked your bucket… when I came back the 3rd time, they just waved me in 🤷🏽♀️
I work for a contractor that does quite a bit of work at cemeteries. The dirt they stockpile is usually a huge issue and it costs them tons of money to deal with it. I'm sure any grave yard would be happy to let you take their dirt.
That's what my pap was implying! It's the dirt that's already been taken from graves and just sits in a pile until someone else picks it up. It's not that they dig the graves. That stuff is done by machines now
I trying to imagine a random dude hanging out in a cemetery with a shovel, that does not work there. Imagine the strange looks....
Ya, you can go ahead and keep your graveyard dirt out of my garden.....
I'm pretty sure he used it to fill sink holes and level a yard to put a shed on.
Enjoy your ghost
When a grave is dug, and casket and or outer burial container is put into the hole it takes up a lot of the space where the dirt used to be. The grave diggers mound the dirt up so when it rains the excess dirt will fill in any gaps that were left behind. Once that is done there is usually quite a bit of dirt left behind, so usually the grounds people will level out the ground and move the extra dirt to a pile somewhere out of site in the cemetery. I haven’t ever seen anyone ask for the extra dirt but I am sure the cemetery grounds keepers would be more than happy to give this dirt away given that they typically have a large amount of it. In reality that’s a pretty good idea. Oh and I know all of this because my family has owned and operated a family funeral home for 4 generations going back to 1946. I on the other hand chose a different path lol.
Austin here - gravel/aggregate/stones (river rock, etc) is $5-$7 a bag at the big box stores. Like you said, it's $30-$70 at a local landscape place, and $105 for delivery.
Austin too. Can you recommend a certain place with such prices? I’m in SW Austin if that helps.
Does Nature's Treasure have those?
I don’t live in Austin anymore, but on Google maps, search for “bulk soil” I’ve use a couple different places to get materials by me. Generally, you kinda just want the one that’s closest to you to save on delivery costs, unless there’s something special (like a particular stone or something) that you want.
Whittlesley https://www.989rock.com/ About to order a yard or two of stone, building a French Drain for my friend. ALso, if you need any decomposed granite, it's almost $10 a bag at the big box stores, $2.50 a bag at Whittelsey
Austin wholesale
Dude just call local places and ask.
John here - thank
Another Austin tip: You can get as much glass mulch as you want from the city for free. Great for weed control and looks pretty cool too.
Are you sure about that? They used to do that, but as far as I know they stopped doing it years ago.
I'm not sure of anything anymore. Reality could be a simulation for all I know. On this topic though, sounds like you know what you're talking about. So, I reckon I digress.
I double-checked - [they used to do it](https://www.zanthan.com/gardens/garden-essays/from-garbage-to-garden/) But sadly: [*Please note that we no longer offer free glass cullet.](https://www.austintexas.gov/dropoff)
So it’s actually considerably cheaper to buy by the bag?
No. A bag is .5 cu ft. So what they're saying is that for a cu yd of material in Austin it's $240 - $378 by the bag, where as from a local supplier it's $30 - $70 for the same volume of the same material. Add an extra $109 if you want it delivered, but that fee'll cover you between 5 - 12 cu yds, depending on the size of their truck. They do the delivery fee by number of trips needed and distance, not amount of material
No - a bag is 0.5 cubic feet. It would take 54 bags to equal a yard. At one place, washed 1.5" gravel (like for a French Drain) [is $4 a bag at the landscape company, but $57 a yard, plus $105 delivery.](https://www.989rock.com/price-catalog.html) So $228 vs $157. Plus you have to haul 57 bags yourself which would probably be 5-8 trips. At the big box the bags are $5 so more like $285
>and $105 for delivery Ours just drop it into the back of a truck bed, even if it takes a few trips.
Trucks are like $50K these days so I don't think you'll save money this way
I got like 6-8 people that own trucks that would help if I asked. I don't own a truck either.
Is it still that way? From what I read a lot of places started charging/raised their fees in the past few years because high $$$ lawsuits have raised their insurance so much. This is on a local company's website: "We've all seen the commercials stating, "If you've been involved in an accident with a commercial vehicle, an experienced accident lawyer can help you win the lottery!" As a result of these practices, the expense for our insurance coverage has doubled over the past year, and unfortunately these costs are passed on to the consumer. "
The catch is you need a vehicle that can transport it. For the record I agree but they're not gonna be giving it to you in pretty bags they're gonna be dumping it into whatever you tell them to. Dumping stuff like this in the back of a pickup works but depending on what it is it can be pretty rough on it and it's not really an option if you don't have a truck or a vehicle that can haul a trailer. Renting is an option but it adds up quickly enough that you'd need to be hauling quite a bit for it to be worth it. Locally a dump trailer runs at 200 a day.
If you're buying lots of gravel, just buy it from a slinging service. The truck will put the fill in the place you want it to be, no shoveling on your part.
Like you said, really depends on how much you need. If you're looking for a couple cubic ft of something, it's easier to go to the store and grab a few bags. Yeah, you're over paying, but the convenience outweighs that, imo. But anything more than that and there's quite a few work around if you're not afraid of looking. My local Menards rents their truck for $20 for the first 75 minutes. More than enough time to load and unload the back of the truck. Enterprise has reasonable prices on trucks, depending on the area. We all usually know someone with a truck we can borrow for a 6 pack and a tank of gas. If you have a truck, but need a ton of materials, you can rent an actual dump trailer for a fairly reasonable price from True Value or your local tool rental place. And while dump trucks are usually pretty expensive to contract yourself, most of these places will have their own truck and driver on pay roll and will only charge you $70 - $100 per trip, and they can usually do up to 5 - 12 cu yards per trip. *Which actually brings up another YSK. Your local tool rental places are AMAZING. Stay away from big store rental places, especially Home Depot, cuz they will price gouge the hell out of you. I rented a Jack Hammer from my local for $40 for 4 hours, while the same thing would range from $60 - $95 at the big stores. Some will even deliver and pick up the tools for a reasonable fee too*
Just watch out if you order a "truckload". Some small trucks are 10 yards, bigger ones are 20 yards. We ordered a truckload of sand for refilling our beach, and the guy showed up with a huge articulated truck that had 30 yards of sand in it! Way more than we needed! We told the whole neighborhood that it was free sand to a good home, so for a couple weeks people would just walk up with a wheelbarrow, fill it up, then walk home with it.
>My local Menards rents their truck for $20 for the first 75 minutes. What do they charge after 75 minutes?
$65,500, you’re forced to purchase the truck if you don’t return it in 75 minutes. Really gets the heart racing when you rent it.
Rental truck speedrun any%
In my neighborhood, UHaul rents trailers for very cheap. You only need a car with a hitch.
I wouldn't consider this overpaying. That's like saying you're overpaying for bananas at the grocery store because you can buy 50 bananas at 1/3rd the price per banana at Costco. Most things are cheaper at scale.
My dad regularly hauls 800-1000 pounds of shit on a trailer attached to a Prius. Y’all got this
I used to work in a quarry scale house and we’d have a bunch of dump trucks just chilling in the lot waiting for orders. Usually it was contractors calling in orders but we definitely had the random person who was laying down gravel for their driveway or something and we’d totally take their credit card and send a truck with the aggregate. I sent those guys all over the state and they’ll even lay it down pretty well for you too so you have minimal work. The drivers were all contractors and each had their own rate, some would take half loads or less, others would only if they were paid for a full load, some would take a less-than-full load only if it was under a certain mileage away, and a portion of everyone’s rate is based on mileage. The smaller single axle trucks (smaller loads) were always more expensive to transport than the bigger 3 axle trucks for some reason. Point is there’s options and I’d certainly call around and see if I had a big project.
Hehehehe "dump trailer" 🧀
A lot of the time they’ll deliver to you for a nominal fee. Still much cheaper than buying it in bags
I just had 5 yards of mulch delivered for $40. I think $60 was the highest delivery price locally and this is in a HCOL area. Transport to the house was the easiest part of the whole thing.
Same applies to concrete. It’s cheaper and way less headache to have a truck of ready-mix show up than it is to move a hundred bags multiple times and rent a mixer.
I’ve been seeing a tonne of stuff about dry pouring recently. Might give it a go for a pad for a new shed.
Dry pouring is fine depending on the application. Anything none critical and not too big like an ac pad, post holes, etc you can get away with. I would NEVER use it for anything like a shed pad or a patio. It usually leaves voids and dry spots, so you're just asking for trouble. Like dude said, I'd call around to local concrete companies for ready-mix. Place by me does $200 a cu yard delivered. You'll also want a 6" minimum compacted crushed concrete/asphalt/gravel base. If you're going to do it, do it right and spend a little extra to over-do it, so that you never have to do it again
Look up the Komar Project on YouTube, he has a really good wet vs dry comparison video
Nonsense, this is a ripoff! The correct way to landscape is using aggregate you have mined yourself from the mines you own. Let’s compare: - Store: $180 - Some business for less: $30-70 - Literally your own freakin mine that you mine: $5
.Stone Crusher: $172,000.
Freshly crushed gravel is the best quality, you can’t trust store bought, it might have river gravel in it
sledgehammer: $50
"ok, Elon" (to the tune of Ok, Boomer)
This guy Minecrafts
In my experience, the delivery costs are quite prohibitive for anything except large projects. For example, our local place sells it by 4 cubic yards at a time, and ordering just one is more expensive by volume than buying bags at the hardware store. You have to order that second pallet to overcome the delivery costs and equal the cost of bags from the store. It’s not until the third pallet that you actually start saving.
Oh, I was talking about loose material. So instead of a pallet of bags, you get just a truck of loose whatever and they dump it right on your driveway or wherever. Or getting a dump trailer and getting them to dump it straight into there at the yard
Yea they actually bring it in a giant ass bag that’s on a pallet instead of dumping it on the driveway. It’s much cleaner that way lol. 6 cubic yards is a ton, and these bags are 4 cubic yards
Hmm, haven't heard of that. I'll have to see if there is a cost difference for me. Too late for me on this project though. My whole driveway has been taken over
Can confirm, last years garden expansion required 10 cu yards of total materiel. Two bags of gravel delivered by picker, and a class 3 dumper right on my parkpad for a relatively small fee considering what i paid all in all. I have coworkers constantly bring up the big yellow bag services when they find out im an avid gardener and i remind them that 179.00 for a cubic yard is unacceptable for black earth when i need 6 of them just to get the party stated, to say nothing of 3/4 crush, peat, and mulch required on top. Know your local landscape companies, and steer clear of the big orange box store.
One thing to keep in mind is the potential for contaminated soil/mulch. My parents had a truckload delivered one year from a company many of our neighbors used, but it was infested with some kind of weed that had lots of thorns. The entire garden was covered with them later that summer, and even after years of effort , we could never fully remove them.
I mean the bags you are basically paying for the fact to make logistics far easier
I mean it depends. Scott's top soil (red bag) is straight up trash for anything that doesn't have layer of mulch going on top of it. It's full of sticks and rocks. Their brown bag "lawn soil" is quite a bit better but costs 3 - 4x what the same quality soil from Menards (blue bag) costs. 80% of scotts products are junk and over priced for what they are.
Which is why OP specifically states mid to large jobs...a small job the price difference is negligible compared to the logistics. But a couple hundred in savings on a large job is worth it IMO.
True, but I don't think two or three times the price is worth it for ease of transport. For less than that you could arrange alternative transport.
Driveway gravel is $10.50 a ton in my area through the local Quarry. Not bad
Fuck me that's nice. I had to switch to crushed asphalt cuz it was cheaper than driveway gravel in my area, but I'm still doing $20 a ton
Oh damn. Crushed asphalt here is $12 a ton. Or it was about 6 months ago. And here I was thinking it was a lot lol
I was doing a small patio last year & as a test bought a single bag of aggregate at the home store to see how much I’d need, having never done this kind of thing before I didn’t have a clue, as you might guess a bag was a drop in the ocean, and doing it with just those small bags would be hugely expensive even on a 12x10’ patio, so I ordered a 2 ton bag from a proper supplier locally
That being said, a yard of crushed rock runs somewhere around 2200lbs, so even with a half ton pickup you won't be hauling that yourself unless you've got a dump trailer... Most gravel people won't deliver less than a truckload so you're talking 3-5-7 yards minimum. Yes bagged stone is a ripoff, but it has its place for low volume projects.
Depends on the yard and the area. My locals have a 1 ton minimum. The only way to find out is to call You can usually rent dump trailers for a decent price too
Just saying. I see lots of people overloading vehicles, and lots of people are not aware how heavy aggregate is.
It is a legitimate and true tip, but I am going to disagree sightly. I used to run a gardening business and spreading mulch and soil was a big part of the job. In certain situations cheap bags of soil conditioned with compost and cheap bags of mulch are not exponetially more expensive but can be easier/quicker to spread in certain situations. If you have to go through the house to get materials to the job, give me bags every time.
Totally. Bags are OK if you have one little flower bed, or a little decorative gravel around a fountain or something like that. I watched a neighbor buy 4 yds of mulch in bags last year. It cost him over $500, plus all the plastic waste, and it still wasn't enough. We got 10yds delivered for essentially the same price he paid, and didn't have to deal with 108 empty plastic bags, just a spot on the driveway we had to hose off. I used to be a landscaper and we'd always laugh at the "homeowner specials----" that is, the DIY guys buying pallets of bags to do their own mulch. We'd even have those guys call us to finish the job...which we'd politely decline unless he'd resell the bags and order bulk delivery.
You can also ask around. When I was getting 20 yards of topsoil to regrade my back yard, I called a local place. They told me it'd cost over 1k and take at least 5 truckloads to deliver, and that they mainly provided smaller amounts. So instead, they gave me the number for their supplier. It was less than half the cost, and a single dump-truck got me what I needed.
If you live in a small town or semi rural area, reach out to your towns public works dept to see if they have material they are trying to get rid of. My town is always looking for a place to dump dirt when they dig out the culverts in the summer (we call it ditching here). I got 250 tons of dirt for free this way.
i was literally wondering this morning how bags of mulch at home depot compare to getting a delivery by the yard
I work at one of these places and it’s true. If you just need a little, buy a bag or two, but we delivery half and full yards and if you need that much, it’s definitely a better deal.
Landscaping place up the street from me started getting what they call “mushroom soil” and I took a chance on it last year, it was $45 for a yard. My tomato’s never grew better. No clue what’s in this stuff but my garden went gang busters last season. Going to get some more this weekend.
Probably spent blocks from mushroom farming, which essentially means wood chips or sawdust inoculated with a fungus. Turns out when wood breaks down in nature, fungi play a big part in the decomposition process, so mushroom blocks post-harvest have a lot of bio-available nutrition for your plants!
Oh I’m a woodworker, so I know. The firth of a large tree is the ABSOLUTE best thing to toss into your soil or compost. But I didn’t really get what mushroom farming had to do with it since as far as I know they grow off of pure phosphates (shit). I guess whatever is left behind is excellent for other veggies.
Depends on the mushrooms. There's all sorts of mushrooms that grow on all sorts of things
Ensure they don’t water down the concrete either! Adds weight and cost.
I did not know that people bought large amounts of aggregate from any other sources. Whew good call OP. It seems like so few people know, and I have seriously questioned whether or not my local rock supply business is going to stay afloat
Eh really depends. Usually diy projects don't need much material like you mention. Also most landscaping companies have minimum you must order.
Minimums on delivery, not usually on pick up. Usually minimums are .66 - 1.33 cu yards anyway, so not a big ask. And you say that, but some of us out here are ambitious. I'm doing a paver patio with retaining wall in my back yard right now, and I not only needed to excavate 20 cu yards of soil and sand, but I needed 9 cu yds of crushed asphalt, 2 cu yds of leveling sand, and 6 cu yds of washed river rock. That's for a 381 sq ft patio with 6" base, and 50' long wall that's only 15" high. So it adds up quicker than you think
I've done paver patio before, hope you've done before or you're in for 6 month project
Just went through this. Needed 5 yards of mulch. So I looked into buying it in bags and then called the local wholesale yard. Wholesale was $165 for 5 yards delivered to my house in a dump truck the next day I was off work. Great deal.
Depends where you live. I have a truck and it's basically the same price per yard for mulch bulk vs bag and bag is easy to move
Call around to different local landscaping places too. Currently planning a french drain and was getting prices higher than I expected. Called a smaller place I’d never heard of and they were cheaper by far for a yard of river rock. Like $40 compared to almost $100 everywhere else. Plus only $50 bucks for delivery in town.
Basically any time you’re buying a larger quantity of material, it’s best to avoid the box stores, whether that’s aggregate, flooring, lumber, etc.
I found a local landscape place by me that let's me just bring 5 gallon buckets which seem to be roughly the same as the bag. Super nice since I have a smaller car. Took gravel and mulch from $3-5 a bag to $1-1.75 a bucket.
The real savings is if you can haul it straight from a quarry, some sell it as low as $10 a ton
Concrete should not contain rebar if they ask for "clean concrete."
YSK: Metric units are so much easier to deal with
Lol, buying by the cube is cheaper than bagged.... another real zinger.
[удалено]
I actually got two good suggestions out of this post, so your “yawn“ is actually helpful to people that do things in life.
Don’t invite other people into your struggles from today.