The Good:
When we had the closet roughed in, I emailed the local store, located in Longwood, FL just north of Orlando and explained our situation. They indicated they would contact the store in Dallas and obtain the plans and layout of our closet from there. We were amazed that the information was still available - it's been about 13 years. How fabulous that they keep that information. A wonderful woman came out to measure and she laid out our existing system in the new closet so well that we only needed one small section about 2 feet wide.
The Bad:
Unfortunately, the cost was very unreasonable. I requested, and received, a breakdown between labor and materials and learned that the driving cost was labor. Depending upon how much time it would take them, the cost appeared to be somewhere between $125 and over $200 an hour based upon the price and the number of hours I was told it would take. Hellooooo! I am in the wrong business - I should install closets for a living! I realize this is a specialized item, but this is not rocket science. You drill a railing into the wall and the system hangs on it (a similar concept to the Elfa systems sold by The Container Store but higher quality). I went back and forth with them, speaking only to the woman who laid out the closet, who was very nice. The owner of the store, Mark, was the person calling the shots and it seemed to me that he was upset because we were not purchasing a brand new closet from him. I kept hearing "but this is a $9,000 closet system if new" as if I would actually pay $9,000 for a closet system. Really??? I felt as if I were being punished for bringing the Texas closet with us - as if I had done something wrong. That is how I was made to feel by what was said.
The Ugly:
After protracted conversations, I was told they would lower their price by $200 if I drove to the Longwood store and paid cash up front. It was not much of a discount at all (less than 10% of the total - whoopee).
I indicated I was not willing to pay their price for installation (I already had a bid from someone else to do it for less than 1/2 the California Closet price) and I asked if I could just purchase the materials from them. I was informed that they are not in the business of selling parts, so they refused to sell me anything. They indicated that if I had purchased the original closet from them, they might consider selling me the materials, but since I was not their customer, they did not want to accommodate me at all. They suggested I contact the Texas store and see if they would ship the parts to me. You've got to be kidding me. EXCUSE ME - I AM A CALIFORNIA CLOSETS CUSTOMER REGARDLESS OF WHERE I LIVE!!!!
Each of the California Closets locations are franchises so, apparently, each owner has the authority to do as they please. I get this, but if I were the CEO of this company, I would have a policy regarding how to treat existing customers. Is anyone listening????
The Good Again:
After I calmed down, I contacted the Tampa area store, located in Clearwater. The fabulous woman, Diana, who manages that location was appalled at how I was treated by Mark at the Longwood location and indicated she would be happy to sell me any parts and supplies I would need. She also indicated their installation charges were around $80 per hour if they were to do a re-install (which they really didn't do any more). How in the world could two locations so close to one another charge such vastly different costs for labor?
Anyway, I got a list of what I needed from the installers I was using and drove to Clearwater to pick up it up (a total of four hours I cannot get back). Diana couldn't have been nicer. She kept apologizing for how Mark treated me and she still couldn't believe how he acted. She totally agreed that it was terrible public relations for the company to have their customers treated so badly. She understood how his actions ultimately affected her store.
The Good Ending to the Story:
As I mentioned, I received another quote to install the closet which was 1/2 the amount from California Closets in Longwood. The company is Get Organized in Orlando. Not only were they able to install the closet, they added the few shelving parts I needed that matched perfectly and they charged a SMALL fraction for materials of what California Closets in Longwood was going to charge me. (As an aside, they told me they could do the entire closet, brand new, for about the same price as Mark in the Longwood California Closets was going to charge me for a few parts and labor. Really amazing!)
Bottom line - Always get another bid (or even two or three more). If dealing with a franchise, contact another location to see if you can get better service and a better deal. Clearly, it seems like Mark in Longwood is not looking out for the long term impact of his actions on the overall company - only his short term apparent irritation that I was not purchasing a $9,000 closet from him.
By the way, the finished closet looks FABULOUS!
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