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Blog Day Afternoon

Take a walk on the mild side.

A place for your stuff

My bedroom set (two dressers and a nightstand) are almost as old as I am. I got this set when I was a kid and I've carried them with me to every home I've lived in. Every time I think about changing the furniture, I end up realizing that there's nothing out there that's any better than what I already own. There are two very good reasons not to purchase anything new: quality and price.

The stuff that is sold in stores now is of such poor quality that I'm afraid that the drawers will break before the guarantee is up. Very few pieces are made of wood anymore. Most furniture is made from pressboard. This material is notorious for breaking and, if it gets wet, disintegrating. The finish is usually cheap looking. If you can find real wood pieces that are properly constructed, you'll see a world of difference in the quality of the finish and serviceability. Of course, if you want the real McCoy, you'll pay dearly for it. The junk is really, really cheap in price, as is the quality. That's how the stores can sell this low quality stuff; they charge so little for it that people think it's a bargain. In reality, you get what you pay for (most of the time, anyway) and if you pay a little, you get a little. Likewise, if you can find quality furniture that will last a lifetime, you'll pay a high price. Actually, if you work out the price per year, you'll find that the good stuff is a lot cheaper. Let's say you spend $90 on a dresser and it falls apart in three years. It cost you $30 a year. If you spend $200 on a good piece of furniture and you get twenty years of use out of it, then it cost you $10 a year. Chances are that the good piece served you well for the entire time you used it, and the cheap piece probably started to wear out a month after you bought it. You didn't want to get rid of the cheap piece right away because you felt you wanted to get your money's worth from it. It's easy to see that the "bargain" really lies in the quality of the material and in the workmanship.

My furniture has lasted close to forty years and has always worked well. I guess if I got tired of looking at it, I could always refinish it with paint or stain. Then I'd have brand new furniture and still have the reliability of the quality that was built into it when it was new. 

Published Apr 16 2008, 10:23 AM by Blogette
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Comments

 

parker said:

I agree that there is a lot of poor quality furniture out there. Oh, how I wish we had kept my furniture from when I was younger. It was so sturdy and I never had problems with it. Now, it has found another home. My children don't even have dressers right now, we hang most of their clothes and keep the smaller items in small (cheap) 2 drawer pieces but the pressboard drives me insane. I think I will at least have wood pieces custom made to fit in the bottom of the drawers.

April 16, 2008 11:41 AM
 

mike said:

That's a very good point. I had to do a lot of furniture shopping about 4 or 5 months ago. I moved out on my own for the first time and had to buy an entire apartment worth of furniture and decorations. After shopping around a lot I realized the new furniture was just not worth it. So I looked around and shopped at garage sales instead.

The results were amazing. I got a beautiful side table, all nicely finished wood, for $20. 2 great paintings with frames that looked hand carved for a total of around $50. A couch that folds into a bed for $50. They are all considerably higher quality than anything I could pick up at Wal-Mart, but maybe 1/10 the cost. I won't say these kind of prices are anywhere near realistic. You can write it off as divine intervention. But you will find much better deals at garage sales and often find this older higher quality furniture that will still last for ages.

April 16, 2008 11:54 AM
 

writer lady said:

Buy used! There are lots of other people out there who got tired of their good stuff, and traded it in for new cheap stuff, but you're smarter than them!

There are a few places in town selling really good "retro" stuff now. Some of it is the very cool '50s and '60s stuff I like, but more of it (and less expensive) is the high-quality traditional stuff we grew up with.

And buying used is better for the environment.

April 16, 2008 1:46 PM
 

Romo said:

When I was reading your price per year comparison of quality furniture and the cheap stuff I was reminded of the couch my neighbor gave me when I was 18 and first living "on my own". It looked fine but felt terrible! My neighbor told me he'd bought it at the rent-to-own store a mere year before. The difference with rent-to-own, it seems, is that instead of saving money by buying something of poor quality, you buy it for the same price--or more!--than the good stuff. I'd go with Mike and Writer Lady any day and go used before I'd go rent-to-own or pressboard!

April 18, 2008 5:36 PM

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