Gallardo Custom Builds vs a Landscaping Company for a Patio

Search for a patio builder in Rogers or Bentonville and most of the results are landscaping companies. That makes sense: landscapers are in your yard every week, they already grade and drain, and adding pavers is a natural extension. Many do it well.

But a patio is not a planting job. It is a small civil engineering job with a decorative top. What decides whether it stays flat is the excavation, the base and the drainage, and in this region those are tested hard. Drake Field averages 93.5 nights a year at or below freezing but only 7.2 days that stay frozen, so a patio base goes through dozens of freeze and thaw cycles a winter. The ground is Boone chert and red clay north of Springdale and shale to the south. So the question is not which kind of company is better. It is which one does your kind of patio as its main trade.

Be honest about the job. A landscaping company is the right choice when:

• The patio is small and at grade, on level, well drained ground.
• The project is mostly planting, beds, turf or irrigation, with a patio as one part.
• You want one company to maintain the whole yard afterwards.
• Budget is the deciding factor on a simple pad.

Good landscapers in this region grade and drain every day. For those jobs, their breadth is an advantage, not a weakness.

There is also a practical argument for continuity. If a landscaping company is already looking after your lawn and beds, it knows how water moves across your lot after a storm and where the soft spots are. That knowledge is worth something on a simple patio, and it is worth asking them about even if you hire someone else for the build. The point is not that one kind of company is better. It is that the job should go to the company whose main trade it is.

The balance tips the other way as soon as the patio has to do more than sit there:

• The ground slopes. A patio on a slope needs a retaining or seat wall, and walls fail from the drainage behind them. The NCMA guide for segmental walls is explicit about drainage aggregate and compaction behind the block.
• The ground is rock or clay. Shallow chert in Bentonville and Rogers changes the excavation method, not just the hours. Shale in Fayetteville changes the base.
• There is more than a patio. Steps, a fireplace, a covered kitchen, a pool deck. Each extra element is another trade if the company does not build it.
• You want to deal with one person. Owner-led means the person who priced it is on site when it is built.

“They built a walkway and patio in challenging terrain. It came out beautifully. Paco explained every step of the way and did not mind all my questions.”

Nancy, Bella Vista, Angi verified review

Nancy's project in Bella Vista is a good example: a walkway and patio on difficult ground, where the retaining work was the real job.

The moment a patio needs a retaining wall, the job changes category. A wall is a structure holding back soil and water, and the rules reflect that. In Bentonville a retaining wall over four feet needs a city permit and an Arkansas-licensed engineer. In Fayetteville, a wall over four feet, or work on slopes of fifteen percent or more or in the Hillside/Hilltop Overlay, brings in a grading permit with a sealed plan. In Bella Vista, the POA's Architectural Control Committee reviews it as well as the city.

Below those heights, the physics are the same even if the paperwork is lighter. Walls lean because water builds up behind them, the base course was not buried, or the backfill was not compacted. Whoever builds your patio and wall should be able to show you the section: the buried course, the drainage aggregate, the drain and the compacted backfill. That is core work for a masonry-led builder, and one of the clearest reasons to choose one.

Whichever type of firm you talk to, these questions separate a solid patio from a pretty one:

More on this in how to read a hardscape quote and why patios sink.

If you get a quote from each kind of company for what looks like the same patio, the numbers will often differ. The gap is rarely the pavers. It is usually one of four things:

Lay the quotes side by side and ask each company to fill in the same lines. If one cannot tell you the base depth, that is the answer. If both give you the same spec and one is cheaper, you have a real comparison.

Often the best result comes from both kinds of company, each doing what it is best at. The order matters:

1. Plan together. Decide where beds, turf and irrigation will go before the hardscape is designed, so levels and drainage suit both.
2. Sleeves first. Irrigation and lighting lines that need to cross under paving should go in as sleeves before the base, not be cut in later.
3. Hardscape next. Walls, base, paving, structures and kitchen.
4. Soft landscaping last. Planting and turf go in once heavy machinery is off the site, so it is not driven over.
5. Maintenance after. The landscaper keeps the yard; the hardscape needs little beyond joint sand top-ups and keeping drainage outlets clear.

Gallardo builds the hardscape, structures, kitchens and pools, and works alongside the homeowner's landscaper where there is one.

Customers who hired Gallardo for patios tend to write about two things: the foundation and the design. Ray in Rogers noticed the crew working "to get the foundation of the patio just right" before he mentioned the pattern. Kimberly, who found Gallardo through Angi alongside several other contractors, wrote about Paco listening to their ideas and adding his own until the design was right.

“We wanted to update our very small ugly patio to something that we would love to spend a lot of time on. ... between our ideas and Paco listening to our ideas and his input we came up with the most beautiful, perfect patio.”

Kimberly, Google review

That combination is the argument for a hardscape builder: someone who treats the part underneath as the job, and designs the part on top with you.

If your patio is small, level and mainly part of a planting scheme, hire a good landscaping company and have them maintain the yard afterwards. If it is on a slope, on rock or clay, or it is the start of an outdoor living space with walls, steps, a cover, a kitchen or a pool, hire a hardscape builder whose core trade is the base and the masonry. In Northwest Arkansas, Gallardo Custom Builds is built for the second kind of job.

To talk it through, call (479) 379-2226 or describe the project.