Nowism
In previous posts, we have focused one eye on Foreverism, but if we expect to create custom cabinet customers for life, we must simultaneously focus the other eye on its counterpart, Nowism. A term like “Nowism” conjures up many possible interpretations, so let’s begin the discussion by establishing a workable definition provided by Trendwatching.com:
Nowism | “Consumers’ ingrained lust for instant gratification is being satisfied by a host of novel, important (offline and online) real-time products, services and experiences. Consumers are also feverishly contributing to the real-time content avalanche that’s building as we speak. As a result, expect your brand and company to have no choice but to finally mirror and join the ‘now’, in all its splendid realness and excitement”.
In an ever increasing affluent world where the time needed to secure the basics of life is ever being reduced and where goods are plentiful, the status derived from obtaining them is becoming less important. What has become more important than having the item itself is the experience of obtaining the item. Thus, this focus of obtaining the experience and the drive to collect as many experiences as possible—living in the now, so to speak—has become the game.
In our constantly accelerating online world, instant gratification is ever easier to obtain. For custom cabinets in particular, if the experience is less than satisfying the next is only a click away. More than any other single factor, the development of the internet has hastened this thirst and addiction for the next experience as quickly as possible. According to a business study by Deloitte LLP’s Technology, Media & Telecommunications, the need; no, the demand for instant gratification not only applies to individuals, but to entire communities. Companies are then obligated to go beyond their ‘customers for life’ mindset and by thinking what it will take for community success. In their report, they present the stark reality of this expanded playing field.
Some of the biggest obstacles to creating a successful community are getting people to:
• Join (24 percent)
• Stay engaged (30 percent)
• Keep returning (21 percent)
These statistics, particularly the attrition rate represent a whole new set of metrics that an organization must be aware of while learning to satisfy customer needs now. The perfect example of this now phenomenon is the social media world of Twitter. Millions of people, services, products world wide all connected and Tweeting in real time. It doesn’t get any more “now” than that. The conversation is visible in real-time and to everyone.
How is the Kitchen Cabinet Industry Responding to Nowism?
The kitchen cabinet industry is a significant part of the remodeling and home improvement industry. According to NAHB and the Harvard University's Joint Center for Housing Studies (JCHS), they estimate the remodeling market at $280 Billion in sales and is on pace to top $350-$400 Billion in market size over the next ten years.
Even with this industry size, the home improvement sector needs to speed up to the realization that as home improvement consumers embrace and even expect to receive what they desire now, they will highly utilize the Internet to browse, explore ‘lifestyle, design/architectural trends, shop, find the right ‘qualified professional’ who can help them realize their dream, etc. Additionally, they will:
1. Expect intelligent tools to help them minimize decisions that they would have to make at the showroom.
2. Want fast, quick responses “via personal contact” from every media including instant message, e-mail query, etc.
3. Rely on social networking as a dominant “qualifier.
4. Make decisions based on the fact that your: Reputation Online is Huge!
Note: This last point is worth reading twice as with consumer communities hooked on “Nowism”, instead of the old days where an unhappy customer would tell 10 of their friends, if a customer is happy with your service moving forward, their message spreads to more than thousands; instantly!
The brands that fail to grasp and engage this “Nowism” are doomed to a shrinking old world economy. Those that grasp the new opportunities this paradigm represents will flourish among this brave new real time world.
Stay tuned for next time as Nowism Goes Mobile!
What ways can you think of that companies and marketers can embrace and demonstrate this trend?
In order to set conditions where all could agree on the reasoning and need for change, I have discussed in two previous posts, the history of the 10 X 10 sample kitchen and how it simply fails with a litany of shortcomings as a reliable pricing unit for custom cabinets. Providing no real value aside from empowering retail establishments with an effective advertising gimmick, the 10 X 10 has proven to be a great disservice to the home improvement consumer for too long.
A Better Way Has Arrived
Finally, Crossroads Virtual Kitchen (CVK) is well on its way to establishing a reliable pricing unit for the kitchen cabinet industry helping it to transform into an Internet savvy industry poised for healthy growth and success in the new millennium. As consumers increasingly discover smart and convenient ways to budget for their homes with CVK while being empowered to bypass the expensive multi-layered dealer and home center channels, their confidence to invest in their homes will once again be ignited.
What Makes CVK Different?
Crossroads has created CVK to actually contain the typical amount of cabinets found in today’s average kitchen but more importantly includes drawer base cabinets, a tall oven cabinet, refrigerator panels, 24” deep wall cabinet above the refrigerator and functional corner cabinets. It includes a large crown moulding, light valance moulding and finished toe kick to trim out the installation properly. The overall cabinet heights are 90” instead of 84”. The goal was to create a price sample that is representative of a real world kitchen and still have the ability to compare different door styles, wood species and finishes to gain insight into the relative price differentials.
Serving the needs of the consumer, Crossroads CVK allows them to make informed conclusions for their home remodel and is indeed unique today as it:
- Provides a reliable pricing unit and budgeting tool for fine cabinetry.
- Is based on cabinetry estimated in the real world for actual sized American kitchens.
- Includes items that are critical to meeting requirements for your kitchen’s safety and functionality.
- Doesn’t demand costly add-ons as essential items are added; not to mention upgrades.
- Enhances affordability for amenity items on your wish list.
Also included in CVK on selected styles are values added at no cost for premium finish options including glazing, burnishing, hand padding, cow tailing, washed paint, and speck distressing; additionally, on selected designer options, unique physical distressing features reminiscent of antique furniture have been included such as sand through, joint crack, wood splits, worm holes, nicks, corner & edge wear, rock indents rasping, hand rubbed, and worn options.
Ensuring each customer is thoroughly and accurately informed, each CVK option provides a specification chart applicable to the virtual kitchen being viewed detailing the quality and luxury features inherent in each selection along with any applicable premiums and an actual floor plan.
I personally invite you to explore the difference CVK can make for your kitchen remodel and you will realize what many others are, that Crossroads Virtual Kitchen (CVK) is the long awaited, reliable pricing unit for consumers in search of confidence in their custom cabinet shopping experience.
What are your issues, comments, etc. related to kitchen cabinet pricing?
Norma Rodriguez of @Home Magazine recently sat down with Michael Baugus, Crossroads CEO to discuss specifically why Webinetry.com is the best place to start your remodeling project.
It wasn’t long ago when shopping for custom cabinets, many homeowners would focus only on the look of the cabinets; and sometimes to their detriment and long term dissatisfaction, ignore the most important feature of the cabinets- the material used to make the cabinet box.
This is why at Crossroads Academy, we go to great lengths to educate all kitchen cabinet consumers on the various construction types, the differences between framed cabinetry and full access cabinetry, the best places to buy kitchen cabinets, and even to introduce quality and luxury features inherent in fine custom cabinetry to those that haven’t had the opportunity to experience them first hand.
Now, we will set out to clarify, in a series of posts, a topic that is growing in controversy (and confusion), Plywood vs. Particle Board. So let’s begin with a simple question and a not so simple answer.
Question: Which is better Plywood vs. Particle Board?
Answer is “it depends”.
Both plywood and particle board have features and benefits that make it suitable for different situations; however, since our focus at Crossroads is that of making the luxury of fine custom cabinetry affordable for all, I will cut through the persuasive rhetoric and take an early stand for particle board. I don’t feel this is a disclaimer however, as most major cabinet manufacturers are in agreement.
As you venture out to read up on the topic, you’ll quickly discover that it isn’t easy to separate fact from fiction, and that there are compelling sounding arguments on all sides. So in order to gain a greater understanding of particle board and plywood and what will be right for you, we will examine the nature of these two products by diving into several stories, which fuel these debates, with the goal of using our best logical and analytical reason to identify the facts.
So this introductory post will be followed up with a three-part series, stories if you will, on why particle board is taking the LEED.
1. The All Wood Story – This story looks into the appealing sound of all wood, what actually is all wood or who is charged with defining and enforcing what constitutes all wood, how does plywood and particle board relate, and finally, what’s does it all mean to you, the consumer.
2. Made to Last Story – In terms of any product having a long usable life, we are all interested in having our investments last as long as possible relative to our investment. For cabinetry, we hear a variety of terms including dimensional stability, structural integrity, and resistance levels to the elements such as temperature, light, moisture, pressure, etc. Warning: One thing you will take away from this story is that many products are NOT made to last a lifetime.
3. The Environmentally Friendly Story -For anyone that is actively trying to make environmentally conscious decisions, they know that many times, it is the simple and small choices we make in our homes that can make a world of difference to our environment. This post will focus on how these building materials impact the environment; and the best ways to protect the air quality in our homes by selecting products that minimize the release of fumes and gases.
If you are getting ready to make a purchasing commitment and need to know the conclusion on this final post now; ultimately, you will be able to conclude that when you select new cabinetry made from today’s engineered wood, such as Crossroads custom cabinetry, you can be assured that you are making a decision that contributes to better indoor air quality.
Let’s conclude this Introduction to this series with some loose definitions.
Plywood is a series of wood veneers, sheets of wood cut from a log, glued together in a cross grain pattern making a composite sheet. Because of the cross grain pattern, plywood is more stable than solid wood. Wood expands and contracts in the direction of the grain. By alternating the grain pattern in each layer of veneer, plywood balances most of the stresses caused by moisture and heat cycling. Exposed plywood faces are finished with veneers of cherry, maple, birch etc.., painted, or have a sheet of low pressure melamine applied. (melamine is a paper product with a print or image on the surface hardened with an aluminum oxide coating)
Particle board, or particleboard (or chipboard in the UK, Australia and some other countries), is a composite material/sheet wood product. The sheet is made by combining wood particles with a binder and either shaping via a mold and press operation or a continuous heat and press process. Since the sheet is a composite of wood fibers that are distributed in random orientations, there is little or no directional movement. Particle board products are classified by their particle size and overall density. The higher the density the heavier the product, in general terms. Additionally, sheet products have grades based on quality control standards set by the industry. Exposed surfaces can be finished with either wood veneers, painting if the material is suitable, or a laminate low pressure melamine.
The term particle board is very misleading and a favorite of marketers who are promoting plywood as superior to particle board; they typically prey on consumers’ misperceptions of particle board which is not difficult to do since there are different grades of particle board like flake board, chip board, oriented strand board, etc. They even drop in my favorite ‘saw dust’ to pigeon hole someone’s view.
So we will conclude by saying that the industrial grade particle board utilized in today’s manufacturing of cabinetry will be better served when we refer to it as Engineered Wood; and I will continue to refer to this more as we reason together and as the stories unfold.
Stay tuned for the All Wood Story. Until then, I look forward to your comments, questions, and/or opposing views.
Last time we talked, we discussed how the global economy has brought about significantly accelerated market conditions where the competitive climate is no longer simply one company competing against another, but a company and its supply chain competing against the other company and their supply chain. This all sounds well and good, but success here is not automatic by any means and there are things you need to keep an eye on; by doing so, it will be much easier if everyone embraces a culture of transparency. 
Why is having a culture of transparency or 'openness' so important? If multiple contributors are looking to contribute value across this dynamic supply or in this case ‘value’ chain, all attempting to work in concert to achieve optimal levels of customer satisfaction, then why is consumer distrust at an all time high? If you are an independent home improvement professional, such as a builder, architect, interior designer, remodeler or contractor, you can learn from large corporations missteps that have created a “guilty until proven innocent’ customer mentality.
First - Who’s to Blame?
Who can blame the consumers when they have been conditioned somewhat by incentive strategies that are not transparent and in fact, many times outright misleading? Customers have had to navigate through well crafted pricing schemes many times only to struggle over what the real cost of something is—and whenever there is a question over the final price—isn’t it interesting how it seems to ‘never’ land in the customer’s favor. Unfortunately, the cabinet industry has turned such pricing ‘bait and switch’ gimmicks into an art form.
Primary examples include firms traditionally offering false list prices with discounts that are really inflated selling prices to offset the discount. Then there are the false claims from firms that are in no way the factory, promising that you can ‘buy kitchen cabinets factory direct’ as though you have arrived at the bottom of the pricing barrel. I heard a radio ad just today that said “on top of already factory direct prices, take another 20% off on all kitchen appliances”. It goes on and on…
The attraction to these tactics for companies is simple; they work in gaining them new sales. But, I want to compel you to go to a higher level and realize the danger in having hard earned trust lost. Our view at Crossroads is a traditional one that says, trust takes a long time to earn, but can be lost in only a moment.
Companies are beginning to recognize that transparency is the counterweight to public skepticism.
Many companies, thinking ‘what if we screw up’ are understandably reluctant to step out and expose themselves by tearing open the veil to the outside world. Do not stand by this old strategy mistake of being unauthentic and realize that the time has come to be asking “What if we never regain the public’s trust again? Realize that being transparent is a smart strategy. This brings us back to Transparency Now which we believe is not only good for business but clearly the right thing to do. It respects the consumer, values their investment, and does not insult thier intelligence with gimmickry that may produce a short term sale at the expense of long term distrust in the organization.
According to my senior kitchen designer, we offer factory direct cabinets in full traditional and contemporary collections and “we give each and every customer the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth”. And as a company, we stand behind and empower that philosophy by offering no discounts, no special incentives, no gimmicks—just prices that are at their very lowest, every day; backed by a best price guarantee and a Lifetime Warranty.
Transparency empowers our entire team internally as well as it allows for consistent messaging across the organization. When you commit to transparency, people don’t have to get their (speculative, distorted) news through the proverbial grapevine.
Don’t Worry, You’re Not the First!
Citing companies from GM to Zappos in a wonderful blog by Vertical Response titled “5 Examples of How Being Transparent is Good for Business”, they remind each company that remains on the fence about becoming transparent, to take comfort that many other companies have already taken this leap of faith with the world and have been quite successful.
Share your ideas on being Transparent Now and Successes!
To Your Success,
Michael Baugus
-Crossroads CEO
According to many recent reports from highly authoritative sources, remodeling seems to not only be on the mend, but set to surge this spring. In a fine home building article, The Joint Center for Housing Studies of Harvard University was cited as saying that home-improvement and remodeling is looking up for 2010 and spending nationwide “is likely to reach a cyclical bottom in the current quarter and steadily increase through 2010.
The Wall Street’s Journal’s Market Watch also reported in an article titled ‘Remodeling on the Mend’, that remodeling activity by U.S. homeowners, which has fallen more than 30% from its peak in 2007, is set to pick up again this year.
Qualified Remodeler reported that after a year of declines, there is a 13% increase in homeowners who plan to remodel in the next 12 months. Citing Remodeling Sentiment Report, this increase follows a 5% increase in last year's Spring 2009 report. Their report continued to suggest that the upward swing in remodeling sentiment indicates that 2010 will show a strong increase in remodeling activity.
Just a few of the interesting trends cited by Qualified Remodeler included a desire for consumers to find smart material sources like cabinets on the web; additionally as it relates to this news set, they mentioned that do-it-yourself projects, both the actual building as well as acting as their own general contractor, has remained steady throughout the economic downturn. Secondly, the number of homeowners reporting they are "excited" about remodeling has climbed to an all-time high of 54%.
For a homeowner looking to remodel their kitchen, the timing couldn’t be better as the cost now is as much as 20% lower than in 2006, according to a special cost to remodel study published earlier this year at www.remodelormove.com. Further savings can be gained as well for custom kitchen cabinets as they are available now direct from the factory.
If you are a home improvement professional, architect, designer, remodeler, contractor, or builder, I invite you to consider Crossroads Professional Network Program as the best avenue available today to empower your business to be on the front end of this expected upturn.
If you are a homeowner or home improvement professional,
THIS SPRING, Start Your Kitchen Remodeling Project Right Here at Webinetry.com.
Commerce is indeed at a crossroads, and effective collaboration is an imperative for any business to thrive today.
The global economy has brought significantly accelerated market conditions where the competitive climate is no longer simply one company competing against another, but a company and its supply chain partners competing against the other company and their supply chain partners.
If you are an independent home improvement professional, it is imperative that you are leveraging your competitive advantage by regularly monitoring the condition of your partnering strategy and development.
These new forms of a partnerships focus on leveraging the unique strengths of each company to (a) expand markets and market entry points, (c) effect price by driving higher business volumes and operating efficiencies, and (c) improve customer satisfaction with added-value information.
This last point is of particular interest to us; at Crossroads, we provide built-to-order factory direct kitchen cabinets while relying on home improvement professionals such as interior designers, remodelers, builders, architects, and contractors, to enhance our offering by providing specialized services to kitchen cabinet or remodeling consumers on request. Together, Crossroads CPN Program promotes a disciplined project management process that encourages teamwork, collaboration, and processes that are all mutually focused on one common goal shared by all contributors, delivering superior customer experiences.
Rising to the Challenge
Deliver added-value information to support superior customer experiences does not happen without a strong communications platform. In a recent post, I outlined another imperative for success which stated that “in order to achieve service leadership, you must have an obsessive focus on all information surrounding the customer at all contact points”. What about the challenges?
In a recent survey, 42 percent of business executives said that collaborative relationships and market differentiation strategies were one of the biggest business challenges they face. Additionally, industry analysts claim that between 30 and 60 percent of information is inaccurate by the time it reaches the retail level. Certainly, it takes leadership to address these issues and to create synergy with partners all contributing to a customer-focused solution.
With the advent of the Internet, one would assume that this ideal would be easier to realize. The Internet, when viewed as a big free network, offers communications capabilities unheard of ten years ago. Technology isn’t the issue here, management policy is. One over arching collaboration principle for you to take away from reading this post is to “partner with those firms that have a management policy for partners to collaborate on equal footing”.
I personally invite you to join the CPN Network and discover the power and profitability of the Crossroads’ Program! At the heart of the program is a business environment that fosters collaboration and a winning customer value proposition to make luxury affordable and within reach of the average citizen. As a partner, you will help bring fine cabinetry, currently available only to the affluent, to the great multitude of American families.
Dedicated exclusively to the success of America’s Home Improvement Professional, your business will reach new heights when you join the Crossroads’ team.
Michael Baugus
Crossroads CEO
Imagine thinking that the personal computer is too slow.
In our previous post where I introduced “Nowism”, we discussed how the Internet is ushering in a cultural phenomenon where everyone wants their needs and wishes satisfied, and Now! Those companies intent on creating
custom cabinet customers for life should have grasped by now from this series that whether you deliver now or not, they will let everyone they are connected to know about it. Anything that gets in the way of this movement, okay obsession, is rightfully paranoid in that many forces are aligned to remove them from existence or at least any dependence upon them. Ironically on the target list, it is the personal computer with high-speed Internet access that does not always satisfy the appetite for needs wanting to be met instantly and seamlessly.
Why? It’s logical, because you cannot always take your personal computer ‘or Internet access with you. Now consider that this online world is going mobile and that Internet-capable mobile device purchases have now surpassed personal computers, portable and desktop. No longer hindered by a computer tied to a data line or hot spot, consumers are quickly becoming tied to each other through their phones and the connected world is becoming 24/7 worldwide.
I just received a report that even
Click-to-Call in Ads on Mobile Devices with Google Adwords is coming soon. Still think you can ignore this trend?
Commerce thrives on mobile “Nowism” and the all new
M-Commerce trend is at a point in the adoption cycle that many marketers will find strikingly familiar. As referenced by Practical Commerce in an article titled
‘Mobile Commerce is Coming’, the large-scale consulting and market research firm Deloitte, offered some helpful insights for merchants following the holiday shopping season on where Americans are heading with regard to mobile devices. According to
The 2009 Deloitte report, 19 percent of the 10,000 consumers surveyed said they planned to use a mobile phone to assist in their holiday shopping. But only a quarter of that percentage said they would use their mobile phone to actually make a purchase.
This is the familiar part of the trend that we better not miss, as many did the last time around, when it was the personal computer that many began researching, at first, before crossing the bridge to purchasing. Right on cue, the majority of the mobile users surveyed said they would use their mobile devices for researching products, prices and store locations. Once again, there will be a bridge built “perhaps more rapidly this time” from where some are comfortable buying now while others are still wary until they have time to get more comfortable with the idea.
The smart phone and the thousands of “apps” available for today’s consumer is increasingly allowing them to quickly research an item, comparison shop and buy while on the go, at any time of the day or night at the never closed online world of today’s worldwide web. If that doesn’t get your attention and inspire you to find a way to join the fray, then you truly are a dinosaur destined for extinction.
Make no mistake about it; mobile merchants will continue to strengthen this bridge by achieving mobile optimization with enhanced mobile security while “apps” creators facilitate processes of all kinds. As I have stressed in other posts, the kitchen cabinet industry has been very slow to adopt the Internet. If you are in this proud field, and particularly if you service
custom kitchen cabinets consumers who rely on having more
information and specialized knowledge at critical times, let someone else be the devil’s advocate this time.
The Nowism trend is as big a trend as there is. While the momentum has been accelerating for years now, consumer enthusiasm and technology are combining in compelling ways that demand businesses to embrace the wild world of real-time marketing, sales and service to the hungry denizens of “Nowism”.
What ways can you think of that companies and marketers can embrace and demonstrate this trend?
With the powerful trend of families remodeling as a result of deciding to remain longer periods of time in their home, the kitchen and bath remodeling industry has been one of the few really bright spots in home improvement since the recession began. Nevertheless, long standing paradigms still govern much of how consumers select and buy custom cabinets.
In reality, kitchen cabinet consumers for far too long have been underserved with limited ‘real choices’ that ultimately force them to either compromise on quality or design and purchase a stock or semi-custom cabinet product in order to attain affordability; or, as only the privileged few have been able to do, make a dramatic compromise on price and spend a fortune to have everything they want fully customized to their wishes.
As this gap in confidence for current offerings continued to widen or at least became more illuminated as a result of a struggling economy, Crossroads decided to take on this challenge head on and find a workable solution that would fill this void in consumer satisfaction. Redefining the U. S. cabinet industry itself, we really set out to empower consumers with a new paradigm that when it came to quality ‘more really meant a lot more’, and when it came to price, ‘less really meant a whole lot less’.
We had three big milestones to achieve in order to make premium quality, custom cabinetry widely available at greatly reduced prices:
1. Create a brand new class of customization with Crossroads Custom Cabinetry where the highest level in luxury features like solid maple dovetail drawers that fully extend, Blum soft-close hardware, and custom luxury finishes are all standard.
2. Forgo reliance on the intermediary channels like distributors and kitchen dealers to allow consumers to buy factory direct kitchen cabinets and avoid paying retail for their cabinetry.
3. Bridge the communication and service gap between the factory and consumers with Webinetry.com where everyone can come together to preview, select and purchase their fine custom cabinetry, all while having an outstanding experience.
Altogether, Crossroads strives to realize the concept of the Empowered Consumer. I invite you to share with us your thoughts on how we can do even better.
Perhaps one of the super laws, the law of relativity tells us that everything in our material world is only made real by its relationship to something else. “Hot” only exists because we compare it to “cold.” Whether we realize it or not, we all rely on this theory to give intrinsic value to many things in our life. Businesses also rely on relative comparisons in quality, price, service, etc. so consumers can determine what they feel will best suit their needs and budget. It is quite possible, that with the 10’ X 10’ sample kitchen, Albert Einstein is rolling over in his grave.
As I mentioned in my last post on this subject when referring to the importance of having a reliable relative pricing unit for custom cabinets, the 10’ X 10’ sample kitchen was born of a need to be able to advertise cabinetry in a consistent manner no matter the product or manufacturer in order to convey relative price differences of different styles and finishes.
What was conceived was a minimal two wall configuration that contained the basic elements of a typical American kitchen (Refrigerator, Range, Dishwasher, window and sink). The walls were made to be 10 feet each, so as any total cabinet product cost was calculated; it could be easily dived by the 20 lineal feet of the walls to come up with a “price per foot”. No accessories, mouldings or hardware is included in the price and the cabinetry placed to a 7’ (minimal) height standard.
The basics of the base model
This was an attempt to establish a base or ‘basic’ model as the automobile industry has done well, where the consumer has a decent understanding of where they are on price and can add features and accessories from that base point; in fact, the root meaning of base is to simplify or be at the beginning of something.
If only it were that simple for kitchen cabinetry, the 10’ X 10’ could have accomplished what it was conceived to do – give a price for any product configured exactly the same thereby giving relative price differences between the compared examples. There are various versions of the 10’ X 10’ kitchen utilizing different cabinet sizes but they all do the same thing. For service oriented kitchen cabinet providers who seek to identify consumers’ needs and desires for their actual space, the 10’ X 10’ has no value. They are used by mostly by big box retailers, online sellers and many smaller price oriented suppliers of cabinetry to advertise cabinetry prices; and it works.
The issues with this ubiquitous model are many
Without getting into an exhaustive debate on business ethics and society, allow me to state that the use of the word “typical” is probably the most egregious issue as that the layout is anything but representative of the typical American kitchen. It is in fact a fictitious layout whose primary goal was to fill the space in the most inexpensive way thereby ensuring any pricing message is compellingly low. Often in advertising, a beautiful “real world” kitchen image may be shown with pricing for the 10’ X 10’ kitchen for the shown door style, and may or may not have a full explanation of what the pricing represents, which only compounds the misrepresentation further.
The 10’ X 10” sample kitchen is a clear case of having a nice after photo with no relevance to a before photo. Unfortunately to their ultimate disappointment, many consumers get very excited about being able to have this beautiful kitchen or something comparable at the advertise amount. Even adding an “as shown” pricing message often fails to overcome the initial excitement of the low 10’ X 10’ price message.
The following disclaimer is typical when the 10 X10 sample kitchen is used in advertising:
“The 10' X 10' Kitchen is a sample kitchen for simple price comparisons of our different cabinet styles offered. The actual cabinet order for your layout may be more or less, based on overall size and cabinet options selected. The 10'x10' Sample Kitchen is based on the 12 cabinets listed below and does not include molding, decorative hardware, countertop, sink/faucet or appliances.”
As so often is the case, many of us do not pay proper attention to the small print. In the case of selecting custom kitchen cabinetry suitable to individual tastes, spaces and budgets, the 10’ X 10’ is a slippery slope that ends many times in disappointment, lost time, and frustration.
There is a better way!
Stay tuned as next time, I will introduce Crossroads Virtual Kitchen (CVK) as the clear alternative. Crossroads has bridged the pricing unit gap with a reliable budgeting model for consumers and home improvement professionals. I will also provide a chart with CVK and the 10X10 lined up side-by-side so that you can personally discover and verify why CVK is what the kitchen cabinet industry and consumer truly deserve.
What are your issues, comments, etc. related to kitchen cabinet pricing?