Computer furniture woes
November 19, 2005 by Mike Wendland
I never thought finding and buying the right computer furniture would be so difficult. I’m moving my main home office into a 12-by-12 room and would like to wrap two walls with a multi-workstation furniture arrangement that will let me set up three seperate computer areas with room between for printers and peripherals and testing the gizmos and gadgets I need to evaluate.
I spent five hours yesterday visiting all of the big office supply chain stores in the Detroit area - Office Depot, Office Max and Staples. There were a couple of configurations that would work but none were in stock and finding help from the barely-out-of-the-teenage-years store help was impossible. “Ah… that’s special order,” they’d typically say when I chased someone down with questions, or, “you need to talk to Eugenia on that and she’s off today,” or “you need to order through the catalog.” Then they rushed back to the pencil aisles.
I also visited the Ferndale clearance center for the national Cort furniture company that rents furniture and sells out of contract items. Again, there was no help. The lone woman working with customers had a backlog of people and, though pleasant and apologetic, was too busy to asist. The office furniture they had on display looked pretty beat up and battered anyway.
Then I went to the huge Art Van furniture center in Warren, but everything they had was too bulky and ornate.
This morning I spent another two hours online shopping a slew of other outlets. They were either way too high end for me or what they offered would have cost a fortune to ship.
Surely, there’s a solution out there someplace. Ideas, readers?
Ikea. It’s coming soon to Canton, but in the interim, make a road trip to Schaumburg (Chicago) or Pittsburgh. Lots of great stuff, with prices that make the trip worth it. I bought a few things for my home office there and I love it.
Did you try All-Star Desk at Telegraph and 12 Mile in Southfield? We were in the same situation for an office set-up when we moved and almost didn’t stop at the store. They had a lot to choose from and we got just what we needed at a reasonable price. Our salesman, Rick, even worked on a room layout so that all the pieces fit together and look like they were made for us.
Take a look at the offerings at
http://www.smartdesks.com/computer-desks-workstations.asp
I had the same problem 2 years ago when I moved my home office from one room to another. Ended up buying cabintry and counter tops through Lowe’s with a custom configuration and then having them installed by a local carpenter. It may have cost a little more but I ended up with what I wanted and it fit the space plus I have way more storage both overhead and under the counter than with any standard furniture.
Are you skilled enough to make your own furniture? That way, you get exactly what you want for less money AND you also get the satisfaction of knowing that you made it!
I agree, you may have to design and custom build something that fits your specific needs… It doesn’t sound like the generic Office Max furniture will suit your very specific requirements…
Went to All Star Desks in Southfield and indeed found saleman Rick Kachigian and he was just as helpful as you said, Barb. Bought a great system at a great price — now just have to assemble it. Thanks for the advice.
Ikea is a good idea, but before you make thre trip, I’d suggest trying out their office design software (unortunatley, Windows only). The software is free, quite powerful, realtively easy to use, and does an excellent job of making sure everythig will fit in.
I used it to design a space and then picked it up all the componoents we needed at the Chicago store. If you do the IKEA route, you have to to go to the office furiture department to place the order and have the parts pulled from the warehouse.
I had the same problem, so I just custom made my own with an old desk and lumber.
Another very good company is Versa Tables
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