So this past labor day my wife and I went to one of her old college friends' bbq. She had recently moved into a nice, large home. Kind of a McMansion, but maybe not that big. Anyway, they've got money. Two things happened/observed, I dunno which is worse? (but the second is the tie-in to this forum):
1) I brought by two six packs of Hoegaarden beer. It was a BBQ, so you don't wanna show empty handed. the beer is a kinda fancy Belgian summer beer - I didn't want to show with a 12 pack of schlitz. We arrive, enter, and I give the host the beer. Nothing fancy, but it was the proper gesture I thought. So, he goes and says "Oh, we have a bartender". So, naturally, I ask whether I should give the bartender the beer. He says "no, we have a professional bartender with mixed drinks, several bottled beers, two draft beers, ...." I didn't know what to do! I left them on the kitchen counter, they were still there when we left. Go figure.
2) Okay, the tie in to this forum: taking a tour of the house the owners kept pointing out their various improvements and interior reduxes. One item was that it seemed every closet had "California Closets". And the Madam's office (separate from the Mister's office), had a California closet desk suite, meaning a desk, return, and big table all connected in a "U" shape, with wall cabinets and cornice type moldings. It was done in what looked like birch. They were quite proud. For those that don't know, California Closets is a mall-based store that sells nice-looking closet organiziing systems, being drawers, shelves, rods, etc. custom built for your closets, although it loks modular, very modern and sleek. Apparently they've branched out to offices and such.
I'd never paid much attention to California Closets, but we had a chance to view up close when my wife needed a private room to nurse the baby. Since I had nothing to do, I checked out the work. It was utter crap. Basically, its particle board or mdf with a vinyl wrap, I don't even think its a veneer. They screweed up the installation since where the return met the table, it was chipped and an attempt to patch was made, they read the dimensions of the window sill wrong and thus the thing didn't fit even close to the window sill it abutted (it was off by 4", and it wasn't by design!). The wall cabinets were'nt even/level to one another (only 1/16-1/8" off, maybe they didn't know, but I sure did!), and the cornice molding was both skewed and separated (e.g.: only in 4 ft. lengths, thus spliced, and not well done either since butt spliced and you saw a gap), the whole thing seemed a bit flimsy and it just sat on the ground, no feet or base.
Okay, I know I'm ranting, but I couldn't believe it! This stuff was terrible considering the (presumed) money spent and that they were hyping it up. Worse, as we were finishing, other people came on a self-guided tour (not with the owners) and one of the ladies said to the other four "oh, this is so nice, look, they've even got california closets desk stuff in here!" to which others in the group ohhhed and ahhhed and once said "That's so nice, I want california closets".
I guess my beef is that this stuff wasn't nice, its being passed off as nice, the populace no longer know what nice is, this takes work away from a regular guy who'd come out an do custom cabinets and do them right, and that this company is lowering our society's expectations while branding this name into the memory of every person who will now no longer expect quality nor bother to call a regular one-man-two man operation to get it done right.
okay, rant off.
curt j.
1) I brought by two six packs of Hoegaarden beer. It was a BBQ, so you don't wanna show empty handed. the beer is a kinda fancy Belgian summer beer - I didn't want to show with a 12 pack of schlitz. We arrive, enter, and I give the host the beer. Nothing fancy, but it was the proper gesture I thought. So, he goes and says "Oh, we have a bartender". So, naturally, I ask whether I should give the bartender the beer. He says "no, we have a professional bartender with mixed drinks, several bottled beers, two draft beers, ...." I didn't know what to do! I left them on the kitchen counter, they were still there when we left. Go figure.
2) Okay, the tie in to this forum: taking a tour of the house the owners kept pointing out their various improvements and interior reduxes. One item was that it seemed every closet had "California Closets". And the Madam's office (separate from the Mister's office), had a California closet desk suite, meaning a desk, return, and big table all connected in a "U" shape, with wall cabinets and cornice type moldings. It was done in what looked like birch. They were quite proud. For those that don't know, California Closets is a mall-based store that sells nice-looking closet organiziing systems, being drawers, shelves, rods, etc. custom built for your closets, although it loks modular, very modern and sleek. Apparently they've branched out to offices and such.
I'd never paid much attention to California Closets, but we had a chance to view up close when my wife needed a private room to nurse the baby. Since I had nothing to do, I checked out the work. It was utter crap. Basically, its particle board or mdf with a vinyl wrap, I don't even think its a veneer. They screweed up the installation since where the return met the table, it was chipped and an attempt to patch was made, they read the dimensions of the window sill wrong and thus the thing didn't fit even close to the window sill it abutted (it was off by 4", and it wasn't by design!). The wall cabinets were'nt even/level to one another (only 1/16-1/8" off, maybe they didn't know, but I sure did!), and the cornice molding was both skewed and separated (e.g.: only in 4 ft. lengths, thus spliced, and not well done either since butt spliced and you saw a gap), the whole thing seemed a bit flimsy and it just sat on the ground, no feet or base.
Okay, I know I'm ranting, but I couldn't believe it! This stuff was terrible considering the (presumed) money spent and that they were hyping it up. Worse, as we were finishing, other people came on a self-guided tour (not with the owners) and one of the ladies said to the other four "oh, this is so nice, look, they've even got california closets desk stuff in here!" to which others in the group ohhhed and ahhhed and once said "That's so nice, I want california closets".
I guess my beef is that this stuff wasn't nice, its being passed off as nice, the populace no longer know what nice is, this takes work away from a regular guy who'd come out an do custom cabinets and do them right, and that this company is lowering our society's expectations while branding this name into the memory of every person who will now no longer expect quality nor bother to call a regular one-man-two man operation to get it done right.
okay, rant off.
curt j.
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