[redwitch]

Jessica, I do understand and somewhat sympathize with you. I am self-employed and it is my reputation that gets me customers. I can have hundreds of satisfied clients but it only takes one to be unhappy for me to be out of business. You have an unhappy client. I would be standing on my head to make him happy unless I truly thought he could never be satisfied and then I would simply walk away. He has not complained about all of your work, just the trees not being staked (something that it seems should be standard -- I know it is in California where I used to live).

For you to threaten Mr. Mucci with slander and defamation is, quite honestly, ridiculous. He has spoken the truth. There is no slander (oral defaming of character) if what was said is true plus there was no defamation of character. Given the photos, I'd say the facts speak for themselves. There is no libel since what was written simply reiterated Mr. Mucci's feelings and the facts as he knows them. One thing I would never do is publicly threaten a client with a lawsuit -- people are going to take notice of that and remember it long after the emotions have died down.

You had (and have) choices. Do what you can to Mr. Mucci happy -- stake his trees properly. You can go back to his property, remove your plants, etc. and have him get a new landscaper that might make him happy and refund his money. You can do nothing and let him complain. If you're as good as you say you are, you might not get a customer or two but your previous satisfied customers will take care of that problem. You can try to sue but I doubt you'd be doing more than giving your hard-earned money to an attorney and the court.

If this were my business, I'd jump through the necessary hoops to get those trees staked properly, apologize to my client that there was any issue at all and go about my business (with a mental note to not deal with him again). If I felt fixing the tree issue would just lead to another complaint and then another, I'd remove my landscaping and wish the client well. As hard as it is, sometimes the best thing you can do as a small business owner is suck it up.