How to Avoid Buying Poor Quality Furniture

Considering that flashy sofa you saw on a well-known .com? Hold that thought.

You want to avoid buying poor-quality furniture, right? Before you know it, that furniture could end up being... disposable.

One of the rather unfortunate consequences of e-commerce is the rapid growth of discount online furniture retailers selling subpar furniture to unsuspecting consumers.

If you’ve ever been burned by an online furniture purchase, you might have vowed only to shop in-store, where you can see a display model of the pieces you’re interested in buying. While that’s a good start, it still doesn’t make you impervious. Some floor models look great in the store but are made from cheap materials or are designed to fall apart after a year or two. 

At Baer’s Furniture, we pride ourselves on selling furniture our customers can count on being in their lives for decades. We partner with top-tier furniture manufacturers like Lexington, Tommy Bahama Home, Natuzzi, and many others. 

This guide will help you avoid buying disposable furniture from other stores.

Some people are averse to visiting furniture stores because they’re trying to avoid high-pressure sales tactics — a tactic we purposely don't engage in at Baer’s Furniture. However, the showroom is where you can get an idea of the quality of a piece. If you aren’t ready to buy that day, just tell the salesperson why you’re there, but also tell them you haven’t made a decision about the piece.

Even if you intend to shop in-store, it’s helpful to read online reviews. Don’t limit yourself to five-star and one-star ratings. Read a few from the middle. They’re often the fairest and most sincere.

If you do not intend to purchase from the site, you can ignore complaints about the client experience. However, you should take any review that mentions the comfort, quality, or durability of the product seriously. Remember that writing a review takes work. Most of the people who write them are trying to provide a service for fellow consumers. Even if there are only a few one-star reviews, they may pertain to your concerns.

Have you ever heard the term “leather where your body touches”? This is a clever way of saying that the piece has faux leather elements. Baer’s Furniture only sells full leather pieces, so when you see a display ad for a piece like the Natuzzi Editions Accoglienza Dual Power Reclining Sofa, you don’t have to wonder whether it’s constructed from high-quality leather or not. It is.

Other terms to watch for are “split leather,” “engineered wood,” and “composite.”

Most furniture is meant to look great on the surface, but top-quality furniture designers pay attention to the hidden details. For instance, do you know how a sofa’s material is secured to the frame? What type of material are the feet made from? When you look underneath the dining room table, is the surface sanded and finished, or is the raw wood exposed where it can absorb moisture and swell? 

Let's take a look at the Anders Fabric Chair by Bernhardt. If you’re considering this piece, stop by a Baer’s Furniture showroom near you. Ask one of our trained sales representatives to walk you over to it. After you sit in it, run your hand over the soft material, check the tightness of the stitching, tilt the piece, and check the underside.

You’ll find all of the finishing touches you’d expect in a high-end piece of furniture. The material is secured with a sufficient number of fasteners. The wooden legs are neatly fitted to the rest of the frame and secured with heavy bolts. The fabric extends well past the bottom edge of the seat. When you examine a piece this way, you know you’re buying quality.

If you shop for furniture for long enough, you will eventually run into knockoffs of high-quality pieces, or if not actual knockoffs, close copies. While there are avenues available to protect furniture designers and manufacturers from imposter duplicates, they are often ineffective. Because knockoffs are usually copied from photographs and use cheaper materials, they’re usually pretty easy to spot. 

The Midori Wood Slat Bench from Tommy Bahama Home's Island Fusion Collection is a good example of a style that may inspire counterfeiters. While this piece is constructed from solid hickory, a counterfeit might use inferior woods with hickory veneers. You might find pieces that bear some small resemblance to this one at discount furniture stores, but don’t be fooled. They are not Tommy Bahama Home!

With 16 stores throughout the state of Florida, Baer's is your ultimate destination for high-quality original furniture pieces. Shop Baer’s Furniture today.