Quality and Landscaping in Crete, Greece

Quality in landscaping is not only the quality of the work or service performed. No, it stretches way beyond that point. In a nutshell, quality according to the ISO 9001 standard is; to assure that the customer receives the product or service as advertised.
The key statement in this sentence are the words “to assure”.

Chloroplastes embraces Quality
Major benefits for the company are
Benefits for our customer are
They say the devil is in the details, And “they”are right
Customers don’t always recognize a detailed garden plan. But they do recognize quality
Quality Control “do’s and don’ts”
We DO have someone else check your work
We DO check our subcontractors work
When our reputation is at stake, we always double-check our subcontractors’ work
We DO write a checklist / Time schedule
We pursue (but don’t expect) perfection

Chloroplastes embraces quality

To assure that the customer receives the garden as advertised, Chloroplastes uses the ISO 9001 Quality Management System.

In addition to the ISO 9001 certification, Chloroplases is also certified for ISO 14001 and the ISO 45001 quality systems.

With this quality range, the environment and safety are also highly regarded within the Chloroplastes organization.

Major benefits for the company are;

Having a controlled internal management process in place. We know what we are doing at any given time,
Increase in efficiency, productivity and by that, profit
Consistent outcomes, measured and monitored.

Benefits for our customers are;

Minimize mistakes,
Improves reporting and communications about the landscaping process,
Better quality products and service,
More reliable production scheduling and delivery.

They say the devil is in the details. And “they” are right

As a landscaping organisation you have to concern yourself with delivering quality — that reveals itself within the most minute details.
Attention to details will set us apart from other landscaping organisations.

But here’s the thing: Our customers do appreciate a wonderful garden. They care. They are looking for — at the very least — their own ideal of what quality is, and they want that from Chloroplastes.
If we’ve convinced our customer that we are the best for the job, they have as a result, expectations.

And, no doubt, those expectations are high — as they should be. Our customers are paying good money for our work.
No one turns over that sort of money to another person and expects crap in return.

Customers don’t always recognize a detailed garden plan. But they do recognize quality

No, as I’ve already pointed out, it’s the details that will set Chloroplastes apart from the rest. A landscaping plan well-executed, free of errors and omissions as humanly possible and delivering exactly what the customer requested.

Quality Control “do's and don'ts”

What controls do we have to put into place to ensure that our work is consistently the best it can be for our customers?

“We DO check your own work”

Each landscaping project is firstly checked by the person responsible for the planning of this project.

We DO have someone else check our work

We all have a tendency, especially as time goes on, to become “too close” to a project. After we’ve been staring at the same project for a long time, it does become difficult to pick up on our own errors.

We invest in a fresh pair of eyes. We always have someone else to check our work — particularly someone who is detail-oriented and skilled in proofing. Just to make sure that all customer requirements have been implemented correctly.

This way, if we missed something during your own check, we’ve got yet another opportunity to catch any errors and make our work better, before we hand it off to our customer.

We DO check our subcontractors’ work

In the landscaping business we do rely on subcontractors.
Nothing against the subcontractors — but we don’t trust their work blind.

This is not a blanket statement about the quality of our subcontractors’ work. Instead, it’s a realization that everything that gets handed to our customers reflects on us, Chloroplastes, and how we want and need to be perceived by our clients. We simply can’t afford to trust anyone to be as vested in that as we are.

And that’s because, it’s our reputation that’s at stake, way more than theirs.

When our reputation is at stake, we always double check our subcontractors’ work

To our clients, our subcontractors are anonymous. In most cases, our clients only see the landscaping expert, they only deal with him/her, and they’ll hold him/her responsible and accountable for any mistakes — including the ones our subcontractors make.

We find it best to assume that the subcontractor does NOT check his or her own work. As such, it would be most ideal if that work could be proofed by two people, before it gets released to a client. But make sure that it’s at least checked once.

We DO write a checklist / Time schedule

For our self and for our subcontractors, a checklist / time schedule is extremely helpful in preventing mistakes from passing through during the process of landscaping.

It might be that different parts of a project will have different checklists. This depending of the size of the project. For example, the checklist / time schedule that we use for the landscape preparation itself won’t look like the checklist / time schedule we use for planting the plants and trees.

But by creating checklists for things that we know we’ll need to check, we’ll be less likely to forget or miss anything.

We pursue (but don’t expect) perfection

We are all human. We all make mistakes, and none of us is perfect.

However, despite how futile the pursuit, we can and should still strive for perfection. Yes, it’s true that in doing so, we will inevitably fall short of that goal — each and every time.

But remember that an archer who shoots for the farthest target — even if the mark is missed — will still shoot the arrow much, much farther than the archer who shoots for the nearest target.

Imagine how high the quality of your landscaping project can go, if we just shoot for it by double checking our work and paying attention to all the details.

Higher quality equals more word-of-mouth referrals. More referrals equals more work. More work equals more money.
You don’t have to be very good at math — but these equations, everybody understands.