Learn about landscape options for your AWS system.
Chuck from Advanced Waterfall Systems explains the three landscape options available with every AWS installation. The base website price covers only the waterfall system on the pool beam; landscape materials like boulders, steps, and crushed stone are separate. Customers can source materials themselves for maximum savings, buy semi-selected loose boulders from AWS's New Jersey facility, or upgrade to the VIP package where AWS selects, numbers, drills, and photographs every landscape rock for use with the EZ Lifting system.
What You'll Learn
- The website price includes only the waterfall system on the pool beam; landscape materials (boulders, steps, crushed stone) are purchased separately.
- Option 1: Contractor sources and installs all landscape materials — the most cost-effective approach, especially for cross-country shipments.
- Option 2: AWS supplies semi-selected loose boulders sorted by approximate size that match the waterfall rock — mid-level cost; contractor handles placement.
- Option 3: VIP package — AWS selects, numbers, drills every rock for the EZ Lifting system, photographs the full layout, and provides numbered videos showing exactly where each piece goes.
- AWS's New Jersey facility stocks over a thousand tons of rock sorted into rough-size piles for boulder selection.
- The three-tier option structure exists for flexibility: some customers prefer local material; others want AWS to supply everything.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why are landscape materials not included in the AWS system price on the website?
The website price covers only the waterfall system — the panels on the pool beam plus any included slide. Landscape materials are priced separately because different customers have different needs: some prefer to source boulders and steps locally, especially when shipping cross-country would be inefficient, while others want AWS to supply everything from their New Jersey facility.
What is included in the AWS loose boulder supply option (Option 2)?
AWS supplies loose boulders that match the rock used in the waterfall system, sorted at their facility into rough-size piles. They are semi-selected — grouped by approximate size range, not individually chosen — and the contractor handles on-site placement and arrangement.
What does the AWS VIP landscape package include?
AWS selects every landscape rock individually, then numbers and drills each one for the EZ Lifting system. The full layout is photographed and palletized. You receive numbered videos showing exactly where each rock goes, which speeds up installation and produces a more cohesive finished appearance.
Can I use locally sourced boulders with an AWS waterfall system?
Yes. Option 1 lets you source all landscape materials locally — boulders, steps, crushed stone — while AWS provides only the waterfall system. This is the most cost-effective approach and avoids shipping heavy stone across the country when local material is available.
Does AWS drill the rocks in the VIP option, and what does that enable?
Yes. Every landscape rock in the VIP package is individually selected, drilled through, and fitted with AWS's EZ Lifting hardware. This eliminates the need for straps during placement, reduces handling time on site, and ensures each rock sits in exactly the right spot because it has been pre-selected and numbered to match the landscape plan.
Video transcript
Hello. This is Chuck from Advanced Waterfall Systems. Today, we are gonna talk about the three different landscape options when it comes to installing your AWS system. Okay? First option is what is priced out on the website.
Okay? The system that you see on the website is just the the waterfall system. Okay? Everything on the beam of the pool and a slide if it's included. Everything else off the beam of the pool, all the landscape materials, boulder steps, crushed stone, all that stuff is not included.
That would be you would buy that yourself. You would install it yourself the whole bit. Okay? That's the most cost effective way. The second option is you buy the system and we can supply loose boulders that match the waterfall.
Okay? We have piles of rock outside and they're like, I will call them semi selected. They're not random. They're kinda put into piles of rough sizes. So some contractors will have us supply loose boulders for them, and then they will install and locate those rocks and where they go.
That's kind of the mid level cost. Okay. Then you have sort of the white glove, so to speak, the VIP option, which is the most expensive, where we actually select every rock. Okay? And then we number it and we drill every rock and make it part of our EZ Lifting system.
So the actual installation of the rocks are easier because you don't use straps. Okay. Now this one right behind me, that's what we did. We did the VIP on this one. Okay?
Where you've got the system right here and the slide, but then all these rocks you see here, all these rocks that are set in a crushed stone base or on cinder blocks, they are picked, chosen, located, numbered, and drilled. Every one of them. All the rocks from this entire project. So, obviously, there's a cost associated that with that. But if you go that direction, then, the install goes faster.
You don't have spend time locating rocks and picking rocks and do all that stuff. We do all that here at our facility in New Jersey. And if you look right out that door, there's over a thousand tons of material all put in the piles. Okay? And we select from those piles to make sure that the project looks good.
Now why would we do that? Well, the reason that we have we have options from the landscape perspective is because that part of it, we want to be flexible. Okay? Landscaping, different people might wanna do things different ways, and some people might wanna use local material. If we're shipping a a system across the country, it doesn't necessarily make sense to ship boulders or steps across the country when they might have them local.
Other people want us to supply everything. Right? So it's really about flexibility, and that's why we have three options for the landscape component of the AWS system. That's also the reason that we don't include the landscape materials and the cost that you see on the website. So we'll show you guys out in our yard where we pick a lot of this material from.
So for option two, what I was saying was we can supply you with loose loose rock. Okay. Now all this rock matches what we build the systems out of. Right? We build the systems out of all this rock here.
Right? But then if you decide you want us to supply your loose rocks, we they're kinda semi selected. In other words, what happens is the rocks come into the yard and they get dumped in the middle, and then our guys go through and they separate them into piles like this pile right here. They're not all exactly the same size, but they're all kind of roughly the same size. Right?
They're rocks. They're natural. It's not tile from Home Depot. Right? So they're all kind of in a roughly in the same size range, like all in here.
And you can see over there, they're all really big rocks. Right? These are medium, so these are flat over here. So, again, we got seven or eight piles of material that are kinda, like, in roughly the same range. So if you if you, wanted us to provide you loose rocks, we would say, alright.
We're gonna give you, you know, three tons of 18 to 24 inch or whatever it might be. Right? That's the option two. Right? Now option three is we give you the landscape plan.
You say, we want you to pick every rock, locate every rock, and number it. Well, then we would go through all this material. We would lay it out like we did in there. Pick every rock, locate every rock, drill every rock so that you can use our EZ Lifting system, and then we would number it and then photograph everything. So when you get you get your system, it'll be all palletized, but when you get it, you have numbers and videos that show you where everything goes.
Right? That is a faster install. You know what I mean? A matching material to look nicer, but it's also more expensive.