Where to get kitchen cabinets?

My wife and I have been sitting on a half finished kitchen for almost a year now. After some talking we have decided that, instead of ordering cabinets and me trying to do them myself, we are just going to hire someone to do custom cabinets.

What I'm trying to figure out now is where should I get cabinets from? The we live in a small town about 40 minutes from a large city. From what I've found it looks like our options are the usual Lowes, Home Depot, Sutherlands from the larger cities. There are, however, a couple of small custom cabinet shops in the area.

What would be the better choice to go with? Should I contact all of the businesses and get quotes? What shold I look for that would tell me to go with or avoid a particular business?

Dan

Hello Dan:
Yes, get all the quotes you can get. Each one of them will present a different option here and there so you can look their proposals over and see what strikes your fancy and fits your pocketbook.
The main problem I have with manufactured cabinets is the use of particle board in so many places. Keep in mind that particle board is made of sawdust and glue; when it gets wet it returns to its natural state, sawdust.
For the local cabinet shops you will want several references and you should go and see at least one of the jobs. Ask the customer if there were extended delays or work left undone.
With a good how to guide the manufactured cabinets can be a nice DIY project. Each bidding store will give you a drawing that shows the location of each cabinet and some DIYers can work from that. They will be happy to give advise if you are buying from them.
Glenn

Sounds good you are going to tackle your kitchen. I would steer for the plywood only boxes for your cabinets as Glenn suggested.
Custom shops will very in quality. Absolutely go check out more than one kitchen from the custom guy's. I work with many in my area, and I know who does the best job for different specialties.
If you go with the big box store, be careful of their installers, they go through many in a years time.
You may get a good local carpenter to just do the install for you , I would ask around.
Good luck.

I am not sure how many $$$ you are wanting to invest... but... I bought some cheaper cabinets from lowes... called chadwood 2 (also duece I believe)... they are plywood box oak.... the price was right for me and the bottoms were easy to install... I havent yet bought the upper cabinets.... in my area.. I got a sink base, lazy susan, 12 inch drawer and door, 15 inch 4 drawer, 24 inch door and drawer and 42 2 door and 18 inch pantry for $1500 these were made by Kitchen Kompact and they do have a website http://www.kitchenkompact.com/ they dont offer special things like drawers that close themselves and that sort of thing... but they seem to be made pretty nicely... if you look at each link on their site... it lists the sizes available but not the prices
I have a thread here entitled.. what happened to my kitchen.. that is the saga of what I went through doing the lower cabinets and kitchen floor... and there are pictures of the cabinets in that thread...
I hope you find something you like!!!!!!!!

We are definately going to stay away from the particle board. My wife has been set on that from day one. My main concern is, and the reason I want to hire someone, that I'm not too handy and I want to make sure the cabinets are going to fit. Right now our sink is in an island in the middle of the kitchen and we want to move it under the window. I don't want to get cabinets and find out after spending all that money that the sink is not going to be centered under the window. I've also been thinking that maybe we should look for someone that specializes in kitchen remodels. We still need the drywall to be mudded.

My wife an I are shopping different materials right now. Of course we are in a major metro area (just south of Minneapolis) so we have a lot of choices. Right now with the real estate market the way it is you can really wheel and deal. However, don't be affraid to shop around and spend a lot of extra time planning this one out. Kitchens can be real expensive when you get into a major overhaul. We have priced out Lowes "Shenendoah" cabinets. I am not sure how they compare to the previous cabinets posted in this thread but the ones on display were a major upgrade from our current cabinets. We are also in a home priced in the 250's so I am of the mind set that we should go nice, but not price oursleves out of the market. I contemplated refacing, but the boxes are 30 years old and it is obviously time for new. The one thing I will warn you on is the promotional financing offers. some are ok (Lowes Project Card is not bad), but others can leave you paying a lot of interest when the "12 month" promotion is over. This is primarily for the big box stores.

One last item. Consider finding builder supply warehouses. Sometimes they can have some fantastic deals. These are warehouses where the special order cabinets, doors, windows, etc. were returned for whatever reason. SInce they were custom order they have no recourse but to sell them at a discount. You never know, it may be your lucky day walking in there.

Good Luck!

There are several places to buy cabinets online you may want to check out, our site included. There are directions on our site about how to measure. A lot of the manufacturers make the boxes in 3" increments, so centering under the window shouldn't be a problem. You can also get filler strips and rip them down to whatever width you need to add an extra 1/8" (well, insert increment here I guess) and move the cabinets around a bit that way to achieve "perfect" centering if the box widths don't allow that by themselves.

http://www.thecabinetfolks.com

Well, we bit the bullet and went to Lowes since we already have a Lowes card. Got a quote, and for everything (cabinets, countertop, install, etc) it came to just under $5000, which I thought was pretty good. The cabinets are semi-custom and will be here in about 3 weeks. Our plumber should be calling later today with an estimate for moving the water lines and etc, so it looks like our kitchen will be mostly done in the next few months. Yippee!!

Dan

i willl let you in on a sneakey little trick that works. go to the big box and visi with there kitchen specialest. they will give you a print out of your kitchen. cabinets. be sure to take your merasrments with you. and when you leave you will have a list of each cabinet.size.and order they are installed. now you have something to shop around with. hd wanted 25k to do ''me'' my cabinets. i found a local guy, who made better ''wood'' cabinets for 5k i installed my self and saved another couple grand. we also went with tile tops 125.00 for the tile , laid by me instead of 5 k for granite.

inspectorD said:

Sounds good you are going to tackle your kitchen. I would steer for the plywood only boxes for your cabinets as Glenn suggested.
Custom shops will very in quality. Absolutely go check out more than one kitchen from the custom guy's. I work with many in my area, and I know who does the best job for different specialties.
If you go with the big box store, be careful of their installers, they go through many in a years time.
You may get a good local carpenter to just do the install for you , I would ask around.
Good luck.

Click to expand...

agree with inspectorD, they are really best in the area

I'm hearing that the box stores are not very helpful after the fact if they didn't do the install. I don't know how helpful they are if they DO install cabinets either, for that matter, but figured I'd give a heads up.

This is true, but they usually don't do much after the fact either. Your hired professional is responsible for knowing what is what before they start anyway.
Pictures are worth alot also. And court is court, depends on how good your lawyer is.
I figure they have to have a manuf, warrantee...even if you did it yourself.

The cabinets will be installed next week. I've already met the installer and he seems like he knows what he's doing and is a really nice guy. I'll let everyone know how it goes.

Our cabinets were installed yesterday. They look great. As I was watching the install I kept thinking that I was so glad I didn't try it myself. The countertop will be here in a few weeks. Just wanted to let everyone know how things went.

Dan

Glad to here it is goin good, don't forget those pictures for droolin later on.

I am looking to install new custom or semicustom cabinets and someone told me about a company Custom Kitchen Cabinets, Solid wood entry doors, kitchen cabinets, refacing that manufacturer their own cabinets, doors and dovetail drawers. They are suppose to have the best quality products, they even have green friendly cabinets I guess they can ship in blanket wrapped trucks anywhere in the USA and they sell direct(no middle man). I guess there prices are pretty good too.

Things are slow now, shop some local cabinet builders for a good price. All wood, none of that cardboard faux wood stuff....I have had to replace pieces of my cabinets that just don't hold up well.