The Barn Office Furniture are Sydneys specialists in short and long term office furniture hire.

Short term hire prices are based on a hire period of 2 months or less.

Long term is anything more than 2 months.

Online Shoppers Beware

At The Barn Office Furniture we are increasingly seeing people who have bought an office chair online or at a stationery store and they need it to be repaired. When asked why they don’t go back to where they bought it from, the answer normally is either that they don’t have spare parts or it is just too hard, even when the product is still under warranty.

                Some online only stores don’t have return policies or even state where they are located. One customer told me that they purchased a chair which included free delivery. The chair was faulty from the start and when they contacted the online store they were told to return the product in the original carton. They problem was that the customer had to pay the return freight and the online store was based in Perth WA and the customer was in Sydney. The customer had trouble finding a freight company that would deal with a one off package and the expense was prohibitive.

                When we ask the people what made them buy the office chair from that particular supplier, the response is normally “price”. In some cases it was convenience, they were already buying stationery and the supplier also had office chairs. Some still paid good money, it wasn’t about price.

                We tell customers not to purchase office chairs online unless they know the chair and the supplier, including their return policy and location. An office chair is a personal item as we are all different sizes and perform different tasks.

I would like to show an example of some chairs that can be purchased online.

Can you tell the difference between the two chairs below. The black chair we purchased online from a competitor for $179, the charcoal chair is The Barns Sydney typist chair selling for $169 medium back and $199 high back version.

Both chairs have two levers and are high backs. We have cut the fabric off these office chairs and pulled them apart. For The Barn’s standard chair we used a mid back as we already have this chair on our showroom floor to show customers its integrity.

Above- what’s under the fabric? The Barns chair is on the right.

The online competitors chair showing the cut foam

The above images show what is under the fabric. Note that we have used a medium back version of The Barns Sydney typist chair. The chair on the right is The Barns model, note the moulded foam base and back. This ensures that the chairs shape lasts, and provides the contours for comfort.

The competitors chair is made from cut foam, it simply doesn’t last. It initially maybe  comfortable to sit on, but this will deteriorate in no time at all.

The images below show the mechanism, note the lack of seat supports on the competitors chair. These supports help stabilise the chair when you lean to the side to maybe access your printer or draw pedestal. Without these supports your chair will twist and deteriorate very quickly.

The Barns model, note the supporting brackets.

The competitors chair, note NO supporting brackets.

                Now this competitors chair sold for $179, so you can imagine what a $69 or $99 chair is going to be like. Obviously these problems are not isolated to just typist chairs and if anything are worse in executive chairs. As the old saying goes “you get what you pay for” . One of the problems we face being online customers is the huge selection available. How do you pick the right chair, how much should I pay. If two chairs look the same but are different prices, should I pick the cheaper one?

Over the coming months I am going to be creating a series of articles and videos on “How to pick an office chair”.

Stay tuned!

Darron Wolter

Managing Director

The Barn Office Furniture.

Resources

Sydney typist Chair

The Barn return policy