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Archives for January 2016

Bunnings versus Masters – My opinion

January 28, 2016 By Marcus Leave a Comment

One of the reasons I started this blog was to provide a forum for my thoughts on views on services/products available to everyone. This article will focus on the two big hardware stores, Bunnings and Masters, and which one I find provides a better shopping experience when searching for garden, landscape, and/or outdoor related products.

I am sure you have all heard of the recent news that Masters is for sale. It has been estimated that Woolworths could earn $1 billion dollars from the sale of the hardware giant. Whilst the sale goes through Masters will be operating business as usual.

Whilst every Bunnings and Masters store is slightly different they all share the same type of physical layout design so I won’t focus too much on that. I will begin with the outdoor furniture section. This is where I have personally found Bunnings to be a step ahead. They refer to it as their ‘Outdoor Living’ section. They stock a huge range of quality outdoor furniture in a variety of styles such as country living and contemporary. The prices are excellent and the build quality should mean that everyone receives years of use from the product they choose.

Masters on the other hand also has a large range of quality outdoor furniture. I’ve never found the range styles to be as impressive as Bunnings but the good thing about Masters is that they stock Webber products! No Australian backyard is complete without a Webber BBQ. I guess this leads us onto one of the main differences between Bunnings and Masters, the brand of products they stock. Whilst one will stock Ryobi (in this case Bunnings) the other won’t. This is no doubt to prevent needing to compete directly on price and also allows them to establish exclusive relationships with some of their suppliers.

Masters Home Improvement

Moving now to the gardening section. Different brands of products isn’t really a concern here. Do you honestly care where your compost mix comes from? I don’t, as long as it is good quality. In the back of my mind if I want a large range of plants, flowers and supplies to choose from, my mind automatically moves to Bunnings. I have never seen the range to be as extensive at Masters or perhaps it is just the layout of each store. Don’t get me wrong, each are both fantastic but there is just something about Bunnings which is better. If you ever need a pot or even some nifty garden accessories Bunnings is the place to go. When I was there the other week my daughter feel in love with little owl on a metal rod, every time she is outside at home she now goes up to the owl and says ‘Hello Owl’ hence where I got the name for this blog. They even had these cool ‘make your own scarecrow’ kits for children but I am sidetracked so I will come back to topic. If I want the largest range of flowers and plants I will go to a nursery such as Flower Power however if I want some popular plants and flowers at excellent prices I will head to Bunnings.

Having considered all of the above factors I get to the last section, customer service. I don’t know about you but I always find the customer service at Masters to be better than Bunnings. Maybe it is because of more staff? Or are there just more staff available because there are less customers in the store? I’m not sure but I know whenever I need a helping hand it is always much easier to find someone to assist at Masters than it is at Bunnings.

Hopefully this article has been of use to you and please drop a comment below on your thoughts.

Filed Under: Gardening Shops

Why aren’t terrariums more popular?

January 8, 2016 By Marcus Leave a Comment

Yep, you read the headline right, today I started searching around for gifts for people with similar interests in the great outdoors such as myself. I wanted to find something for a garden lover, something they probably don’t already, something that is minimal maintenance and most importantly something that has some garden elements. What did my search discover? Terrariums! And not just any sort of terrarium, really cool style terrariums!

My mind was blown with exactly what is possible with these ‘modern day terrariums’. Did you know that people now put little miniature figurines in them and create ‘scenes’? Maybe I have been hiding under a rock for not knowing about this but to me it looks like an awesome gift idea. Check out some of these awesome terrariums that I found:

Example Terrarium

Beach Terrarium

As with everything this got me thinking, could I make one of these myself? I wouldn’t want it to look homemade and cheap, I want one of the good ones like shown above but nonetheless a quick internet search discovered a heap of material and ‘how to’ guides on how to build your own terrarium if you are so inclined, here are some of my favourites:

  • Inhabitat – DIY Terrarium
  • Indestructables – How to build a Terrarium
  • Apartment Therapy – How to make a Terrarium

I know some of you prefer video instructions to so here is a video guide that is somewhat easy to follow:

These look like a great activity for a weekend which can result in an awesome gift for family/friends. Some of the tutorials online have even been simplified for children for a rainy day type activity. Which leads me to my question, why aren’t terrariums more popular? They must have some negatives that I am missing. I know they need some maintenance but based on what I have read it is minimal, or are I missing something? Geez I have asked a lot of question in this post :)

If you decide to build your own please let me know if the comments section how you went.

Filed Under: Indoor Plants

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About Me

Marcus

Hi, my name is Marcus and I am a gardening/landscaping/anything outdoors enthusiast. I am not an expert at anything I do but I hope to get better over time. This blog has been setup to share the lessons I learn and the research I conduct on topics related to enjoying your home backyard.

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Recent Posts

  • Help me choose a fire pit…please :) February 9, 2016
  • First step towards my dream backyard February 4, 2016
  • Bunnings versus Masters – My opinion January 28, 2016
  • Why aren’t terrariums more popular? January 8, 2016
  • How to make your garden glow in the dark December 15, 2015

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