SO WHY CUSTOM?

Good question.

Some folks are totally pleased with off the shelf, out of the box, ready-made cabinets from one of the big suppliers. BUT, there are a few things to consider.

First, store bought cabinets are already made when you order them and are usually made in 6″ increments. The salesperson (not to be confused with a cabinet maker), types the measurements of your space into the computer and, “Voila!”, the space is immediately filled with little cubes. That’s all fine and good, except for the fact that if your cabinets have a frame (as they often do), the vertical piece of frame on the side (called a stile) which is usually 2″ wide in a store bought cabinet, meets up with another 2″ wide vertical stile from the cabinet next door, creating a 4″ wide vertical piece that has no purpose for being there, not to mention the seam in the middle of the two. Seriously? Am I the only one to see such an anomaly? And this repeats throughout your cabinetry.

Furthermore, the computer will place a cabinet with 14″ doors next to a cabinet with 16″ doors, (with that seam up the middle) that have no correlation to one another, and to add insult to injury, will give you a two inch fill piece (adding another vertical seam), instead of giving you a cabinet with four doors of equal size and NO fill piece, which is what the custom cabinetmaker will do.

It is also to be noted, there is no such thing as semi-custom. This was a term invented by the big guys to look like one of us. If you look at a cabinet and it says bc36 or wc30, there is nothing “semi” custom about this. It doesn’t take much to figure out that wc30 is a 30″ wall cabinet and a bc36 is a 36″ base cabinet. Therefore, fp3 must be a 3″ filler piece. If you want to fill a 6′ 8″ space with cabinetry, why not build a 6′ 8″ cabinet, and not an amalgamation of bc30’s, bc18,  and oh yeah, and lets not forget fp2! This will create three vertical seams on three planes 4″ wide.

A custom cabinet will have…none.

How about guarantees? The industry standard is one year for materials and workmanship. Seriously? I could make your cabinets out of paper mâché (almost MDF) and get a year out of them. On the few occasions where we’ve been called upon to repair our work (with plumbing problems and children usually being the cause), we stood behind our work 100% of the time, for way more than a year, and at a nominal cost, if any.

When you compare the look, the quality of the product, and a price that’s only moderately more expensive, the choice seems obvious. It’s also common knowledge among the real estate brokers that custom cabinetry is a great selling point for a home, making it’s cost more than a 100% return. A broker will always mention custom cabinetry, even in a small listing of a home.

If people had two chances to do cabinetry in their home, (which they almost never do) and the first time they go “store bought”, the next time would always be custom.

Quite frankly, I’m quite surprised that some of the cabinetry I’ve seen has the ability to hold stone counters!

You’ve only got one shot at your cabinetry, as it’s almost impossible to remove the cabinetry from under the stone tops that are locked into a backsplash detail and have sinks and plumbing in place. And, stone counters most often, cannot be removed and re-used after the whole thing is torn apart. It’s a mess, and it’s twice the expense.

Why not do it right from the start?

SO WHY CUSTOM?

Good question.

Some folks are totally pleased with off the shelf, out of the box, ready-made cabinets from one of the big suppliers. BUT, there are a few things to consider.

First, store bought cabinets are already made when you order them and are usually made in 6″ increments. The salesperson (not to be confused with a cabinet maker), types the measurements of your space into the computer and, “Voila!”, the space is immediately filled with little cubes. That’s all fine and good, except for the fact that if your cabinets have a frame (as they often do), the vertical piece of frame on the side (called a stile) which is usually 2″ wide in a store bought cabinet, meets up with another 2″ wide vertical stile from the cabinet next door, creating a 4″ wide vertical piece that has no purpose for being there, not to mention the seam in the middle of the two. Seriously? Am I the only one to see such an anomaly? And this repeats throughout your cabinetry.

Furthermore, the computer will place a cabinet with 14″ doors next to a cabinet with 16″ doors, (with that seam up the middle) that have no correlation to one another, and to add insult to injury, will give you a two inch fill piece (adding another vertical seam), instead of giving you a cabinet with four doors of equal size and NO fill piece, which is what the custom cabinetmaker will do.

It is also to be noted, there is no such thing as semi-custom. This was a term invented by the big guys to look like one of us. If you look at a cabinet and it says bc36 or wc30, there is nothing “semi” custom about this. It doesn’t take much to figure out that wc30 is a 30″ wall cabinet and a bc36 is a 36″ base cabinet. Therefore, fp3 must be a 3″ filler piece. If you want to fill a 6′ 8″ space with cabinetry, why not build a 6′ 8″ cabinet, and not an amalgamation of bc30’s, bc18,  and oh yeah, and lets not forget fp2! This will create three vertical seams on three planes 4″ wide.

A custom cabinet will have…none.

How about guarantees? The industry standard is one year for materials and workmanship. Seriously? I could make your cabinets out of paper mâché (almost MDF) and get a year out of them. On the few occasions where we’ve been called upon to repair our work (with plumbing problems and children usually being the cause), we stood behind our work 100% of the time, for way more than a year, and at a nominal cost, if any.

When you compare the look, the quality of the product, and a price that’s only moderately more expensive, the choice seems obvious. It’s also common knowledge among the real estate brokers that custom cabinetry is a great selling point for a home, making it’s cost more than a 100% return. A broker will always mention custom cabinetry, even in a small listing of a home.

If people had two chances to do cabinetry in their home, (which they almost never do) and the first time they go “store bought”, the next time would always be custom.

Quite frankly, I’m quite surprised that some of the cabinetry I’ve seen has the ability to hold stone counters!

You’ve only got one shot at your cabinetry, as it’s almost impossible to remove the cabinetry from under the stone tops that are locked into a backsplash detail and have sinks and plumbing in place. And, stone counters most often, cannot be removed and re-used after the whole thing is torn apart. It’s a mess, and it’s twice the expense.

Why not do it right from the start?