First Impressions:

Buying cabinets can be expensive and when you’re about to spend a large sum of money, possibly tens of thousands of dollars, you want to know the person you’re dealing with is professional, honest, knowledgeable and forthright with a good amount of experience under their belt, and you certainly don’t want a “Yes-Man” If you happen in a store and are greeted with the most sugary hey y’all, sweetie pie, sugar darlin’ you’ve ever heard, let the flag raise. Maybe they’re just have a colorful personality, let’s give them a chance. Now, if they want to talk to you about their pets and their problems more than they want to talk about how they be of assistance, let the flag wave. Again, maybe they’ve simply “never met a stranger”, a great personality trait. However, If they don’t ask relevant questions or have immediate answers aside from canned sales-trained responses; plant the flag and leave. At least you gave them a chance. That’s all any of us in the industry hope for; the opportunity to show you what we can do, have done and how we can be of assistance in hopes to earn your business, hopefully, for life. Unfortunately, these chances mean more to some than others.

Don’t Get Me Wrong

There’s nothing wrong with trying, learning and being enthusiastic/personable but there’s an obvious thermal cline that will reveal those folks to simply be this month’s sales rep with no actual hands-on knowledge to speak of. It’s not their fault. Most just need a few years experience through some form of hands on apprenticeship, training and support and it doesn’t hurt to have a ladder to climb but, unfortunately, they don’t get that. They’re simply thrown to the wolves and expected to perform at a high level. This is but a few of the many reasons for the high turnover rate which means a perpetual loop of newbies attempting to handle very complex and expensive projects, again, with zero support or training to speak of. So, you have to ask yourself, is this the person I want handling my project? This is especially true within the big box stores. We suggest avoiding those altogether and not because we are bashing the competition, we shop there all the time, but rather because it’s a square peg in a round hole because they’re focused on selling a whole lot of other things. Our point? We want our readers and potential clients to get a vision of what to expect, why and what to look out for; all in an effort to avoid a bad situation before it starts, mainly because you weren’t communicated with properly, informed correctly and shown the details of the design and materials from the start and not kept abreast of progression. Trust us. It happens all the time. That’s literally why we exist as a company.

Why Is It Like That?

We’ve asked ourselves that a million times. Simple:

• They’re just employees. Many are short term or new and inexperienced, or, they’re typically nestled into a groove of working with builder clients.
• The company they work for caters mostly to home builders. Your single kitchen or vanity is small potatoes and your questions are annoying them.
• Cabinets are but a small part of their overall building supply business. Most have their “Cabinet Showroom” set up in a tiny dusty corner of a 50,000 square foot building. They’re focused on supplying lumber and the like.
• Because they can. Big box stores employ big buying power to cut out the locals, even if they have to lose money for a while to do it. Contractors and companies like Hancock helped build those stores to the juggernauts they are today just for them to now be actively trying to take over the installation side of home improvements. That’s just wrong. I’ll talk about that another time…

We Were Actually Forced Into The Cabinet Business

Hancock Kitchen & Bath didn’t start out or, necessarily set out, to become the best cabinet supplier and installer around like we are today. However, after years of dealing with local suppliers and expanding out to those not so local, our personal, professional and vicarious frustrations mounted to the point that we knew we had to and could do things better and treat our clients much better than anyone in the business. We grew very tired of the lack of attention towards us, our clients, the project progression and updates. The lack of reasonable communication along with repetitive excuses for low quality, damaged deliveries and long production delays made us feel as though these were simply empty excuses. At best it was a chain of command issue where nobody claims responsibility and get to hide behind anonymity. I digress, just ask yourself, like we did, if they all treat a customer, like us, who brought them a lot of annual sales revenues, for several years, how will they treat your single little project? I’ll wait…

Best Decision Ever

For decades now, being in control of our cabinet lines through direct communication with manufacturers, suppliers, vendors and installers has saved our clients more hassle, time and money than we can calculate here. It allowed us to fast track and streamline projects like never before and customer satisfaction has continue to soar. So yes, it could be done better. See our cabinetry lines here and let us know how we can help!