Bobert,

Now you know why I will never take a job in bookstore or a garden center. I couldn't afford to work there!

I buy trees as small as I can find them, usually in five gallon pots. My strategy is this: I don't have to carry as large a plant, dig as big a hole, carry as much water to it (if it's beyond hose stretch), and after a couple of years in the ground they explode into growth and soon catch up to their larger pot-bound relatives. Spend $100 or $200 for instant gratification of a bigger tree and you bust your ass trying to plant and maintain it, and the big thing is so much more compromised by having been in the pot for that long that they're the ones that are harder to keep alive after transplanting. I'm guessing your shrubs are in the 5 to 10 gallon size pots, what's killing you is the repetition. Planting $400 of anything, whether a one big one or lots of little ones is going to be work!

SRS