Now hiring · Saratoga Springs
Apply
Daisies and Dahlias · Saratoga Springs, NY
We're hiring two people. One out in the gardens, one keeping everything behind them running.
Watch this first · about 2 minutes with Rachelle
The people who stay
The people who last here are the ones who'd be out in a garden on their day off anyway. If that's you, we'd love to hear from you.
Two roles · about five minutes
What the work actually is
That's the whole thing, really.
People stop me while I'm working to tell me how much the flowers brighten their day. That happens all the time and it still gets me. A town with flowers in it is a nicer place to live than a town without them, and somebody has to be the one out there planting them.
Every planter you walk past on Broadway got filled by hand. Somebody watered it that morning, usually before you were up. In the summer we're out there every other day, hose and watering can, one storefront to the next.
We don't use chemicals and we don't use heavy machinery. It makes everything slower and it means most of it gets done by hand, which is how we like it. All the plants come from greenhouses down the road, grown by people we know.
Some days you'll be kneeling in wet mulch, hauling bags, and finishing something nobody will ever know you finished. Then in June you'll drive past a bed you put in back in April, and it's full of blooms, and honestly that never gets old.
We find monarch caterpillars on the milkweed. We get excited about it every single time.
So you know what you're signing up for
Both of these are true for both jobs. We'd rather tell you now than have you find out in week two.
If the left column is a dealbreaker, that's completely fine and no hard feelings. Better to know now.
Two open roles
One of them is outside with your hands in the dirt. The other one is the person who makes the outside days possible. Have a read of both.
$20–$25 / hour
You're the one out there making it beautiful. Weeding, edging, mulching, pruning, raking, watering. Putting perennials, annuals, shrubs and trees into the ground with your own hands. Then leaving the site tidier than we found it, every time.
Pay depends on experience.
We'll talk about it on the first call
Right now Rachelle does the client calls, the scheduling, the invoicing, the books, the ordering and the hiring. She also designs and plants the gardens. She'll be the first to tell you it's a lot, and she's been percariously balancing it for about ten years now.
This job is taking most of that off her plate and running it better than she's ever had time to. It's the hire that changes what this business gets to become.
Not sure which one? Pick "either" on the form and tell us a bit about yourself. That's fine too.
No résumé needed
What we're really looking for
We can teach you the plants and we can teach you the software. These are the bits we can't teach, so they're the ones that matter most. The first three count for both jobs.
Eight means eight. This one matters more to us than anything else on this page, honestly.
And if something comes up, you let us know early, while it's still a small thing. Life happens. We just need to hear about it.
Steady, not frantic. You'd take the extra fifteen minutes rather than leave something you wouldn't want to drive past.
Lifting, digging, hauling, walking around all day. If that sounds like a relief instead of a chore, you'll do great.
The people who last here are the ones who'd be out in a garden on their day off anyway.
You're the one who remembers the thing everybody else forgot. A tidy calendar makes you happy.
Rachelle reads every one herself
Who you'd be working with
I grew up here in Saratoga. I started Daisies and Dahlias in 2016, right after finishing at Skidmore, because I wanted a job I'd actually enjoy that fit around my daughter's school schedule. That was the whole plan at the time.
It was a few residential clients and a sedan full of plants. No investors, no partner, nobody's help. Word got around, more people asked, and I kept putting the money back into it. Ten years later there's a crew and a couple of trucks and a lot of gardens.
I studied botany at SUNY Adirondack, finished my degree at Skidmore, and did the Cornell Master Gardener program in 2018. I've done every single job I'm hiring for, which is why I'm a good person to learn from.
"It's super rewarding to watch plants grow, to see the bees visit the flowers and eat veggies fresh from the garden. It gives us hope of new beginnings." Rachelle Thomas
I still read every application myself, and I'll read yours.
No résumé. No cover letter. We'd rather hear how you actually think than read a document you wrote for someone else.
Nobody who applies ever regrets applying.