Kitchens - cheap vs expensive

[sutoka]

Zarco said:

Yazza54 said:

princeperch said:

The kitchen in my last house was from magnet.

The price started out at 24k. Then 12k. Then a load of special one time discounts applied, and then when I said I'd buy it then and there if he made it 6k he made it 6.5k.

It's all absolutely laughable really. It's just cheap chipboard wood which has been tarted up.

What is the profit margins magnet and wren etc make on their kitchens on average, does anyone know?

Yeah their prices on the system are just nonsense, that's why there's always a sale on. Ours was 45k on the screen ... Ended up 17250 with appliances, less worktops.

fk me.

That is ridiculous. Do some poor mugs pay the list prices?

I used to work for one of the DIY sheds a good few years back. not in kitchens but sat in on briefings and sales meetings and the amount of ste from Head Office bamboozled the staff selling them so how customers worked it out is a mystery.

Pricing was based on 8 units so doors and carcasses and excluded worktops, handles, appliances etc. Who has a kitchen with 8 units nowadays? So what was £1800 quickly turned into £5k plus fitting. Offers just switched around so when it was 20% off doors it was 20% on appliances. When it was 50% off worktops the units went up 50%. So the reality was the customer was paying the same price all year round.

Then it was £3000 to fit a kitchen but the guy they used charged the store £1k so they made £2k on fitting alone. I saw people easily spend £15k-£20k on a DIY Shed kitchens. At the time they had a price match going so if you went to another shed and got the same type of kitchen they would knock off 10%, if they went back to the other shed and they knocked off 10% then they would let that sale go.

When it came renewing my kitchen I didn't go near my previous employer. Went to some independent place and got a good quality kitchen about 15 units, 6 drawers, quality doors, handles, integrated appliances and quartz worktop for £8k fitting plumbing and electrics was about £1200.

It would have easily been double that my old haunt.

Edited by sutoka on Friday 30th December 05:55

[Yazza54]

Wozy68 said:

Yazza54 said:

Zarco said:

Yazza54 said:

princeperch said:

The kitchen in my last house was from magnet.

The price started out at 24k. Then 12k. Then a load of special one time discounts applied, and then when I said I'd buy it then and there if he made it 6k he made it 6.5k.

It's all absolutely laughable really. It's just cheap chipboard wood which has been tarted up.

What is the profit margins magnet and wren etc make on their kitchens on average, does anyone know?

Yeah their prices on the system are just nonsense, that's why there's always a sale on. Ours was 45k on the screen ... Ended up 17250 with appliances, less worktops.

fk me.

That is ridiculous. Do some poor mugs pay the list prices?

Don't think so, it's just so they can overinflate their savings and sales as well as giving loads of discretion on stuff.

I bet some do, may not be many but I’m pretty sure there is the occasional one.

Utter shocking way to behave IM0.

Most things have a daft RRP that you never pay. I saw the 45k on his screen as he was totting it up but he never tried to sell us on that price. I think it's mainly a sales tactic so they can look like they're giving you huge discounts when really all they're doing is working it back down to a normal price. Gives the sales man more scope I suppose... But I guess you'll get other sales men like the chap above too. It probably helped that I told him I'd already gotten a price from Howdens so had an idea what it needed to cost, but didn't tell him what that price was straight away. He immediately undercut them without telling him any magic numbers.

[Wagonwheel555]

Currently getting quotes to install our Wren kitchen which we have on order.

Kitchen is £11500 including appliances.
Quartz coming in about £4000 based on estimate
Fitting around £6500 based on the three quotes I got.

Not looking forward to trying to live without a kitchen for a week or so with a 3 year old.

Kitchen is around 3.5m x 3.5m

[Pistaaah]

Wagonwheel555 said:

Currently getting quotes to install our Wren kitchen which we have on order.

Kitchen is £11500 including appliances.
Quartz coming in about £4000 based on estimate
Fitting around £6500 based on the three quotes I got.

Not looking forward to trying to live without a kitchen for a week or so with a 3 year old.

£6,500 for fitting and it will take a week? - surely a typo? That’s £1,500 per day, even if there’s 2 of them, that’s madness. Are they brain surgeons, moonlighting?

[princeperch]

I guess there could be 2ks worth of gas safe and electrical work in there too but agreed that sounds a lot.

[Wagonwheel555]

Pistaaah said:

£6,500 for fitting and it will take a week? - surely a typo? That’s £1,500 per day, even if there’s 2 of them, that’s madness. Are they brain surgeons, moonlighting?

Quote says:

Removal of existing tiles on walls (every wall is tiled)
Removal and disposal of existing kitchen
Plastering walls
New 10 way consumer unit and additional cooker circuit (EICR included)
Any plumbing work required
Fitting of temporary wood worktops and sink in advance of quartz fitting
Approx 3mq of tiling for splashback - Tiles and grout to be supplied by customer

There are no major plumbing works, a dishwasher is being added where the existing pipework is and the washing machine is moving over slightly.

Electrical is a different ballgame, our consumer unit is fairly old and non RCD so he said it would be better to upgrade it now and have the new cooker circuit added to the new CU than to add a second CU anyway.

In terms of the week, he said its rip out on day 1 and removal of all tiles/adhesive
Day 2 is electrical work so moving sockets where required, adding a cooker circuit and replacing the consumer unit
Day 3 is plastering
Then 4-5 days for it to dry
Then fitting of kitchen is a few days plus remaining tiling etc.

I got three quotes from local companies and £6.5k was the middle figure, although the cheaper one was not cheaper by much

Edited by Wagonwheel555 on Friday 30th December 08:59

Edited by Wagonwheel555 on Friday 30th December 09:00

[-Ad-]

singlecoil said:

IMO about 900 is the optimum width for a drawer unit, more than that and although the drawer can hold more it will take more effort to open it (unless you have electric drawer pushers installed). It doesn't matter how good the drawer runners are, the more that's in the drawer the more inertia that has to be overcome to open it.

I suggest avoiding the type of drawer unit that consists of two pan drawers only. Much better to have the type that has a conventional drawer at the top (for cutlery, utensils, odd and ends) and two pan drawer below.

900 wide units are definitiely easier to open and close, perfect for those who are more slight or less abled. But I found them a bit tight and you would need to spill over into another drawer unit (parent's kitchen has 900s), whereas the main pans and tools could all fit in a single (3 drawer 1200 unit). We both loved the 1200 units and the weight when they were full wasn't an issue. Just felt like a nice tank opening up

LIke you say a 3 drawer unit is vital with the top cutlery/utensil drawer.

loughran said:

Agreed, a fully loaded 1200mm wide pan drawer can be unwieldy brute.

Even with high quality runners a drawer that wide can rack and with an in-frame design with fine shut lines the fronts can bind if opened with one hand.

900/950mm is better.

/thumb

Posting pics of your kitchen porn again, love it

I see why you need a slimmer unit size for custom in-frame designs.

Wagonwheel555 said:

Currently getting quotes to install our Wren kitchen which we have on order.

Kitchen is £11500 including appliances.
Quartz coming in about £4000 based on estimate
Fitting around £6500 based on the three quotes I got.

Not looking forward to trying to live without a kitchen for a week or so with a 3 year old.

Kitchen is around 3.5m x 3.5m

Even after your explanation above, £6500 is taking the ****

£4000 seems a lot for quartz, we had full custom 316 stainless worktops done for £2500. But prices have gone up for everything since the pandemic so maybe it's not far off the mark.

Edited by -Ad- on Friday 30th December 09:03

Edited by -Ad- on Friday 30th December 09:04

[loughran]

In the 80's I took the opportunity to expand my horizons and took a commission only position with a well regarded fitted furniture outfit.

The company operated a system of 'overs and unders" and the salesmen had a list price and a cost price to work with.

The job would be priced at list but could be discounted down to cost. Anything the customer would pay over cost would be credited to the salesman's overs account. The balance of the overs account could be used by the salesman, if required, to offer low prices to 'difficult' customers, closing the deal below cost but allowing the salesman to hit his sales target.

A salesman who had to resort to using his overs account to close deals was mocked by others in the sales team. Much better to build your overs account up as much as possible because every three months you were paid 10% of the balance as a bonus and then the account reverted to zero.

I'm fairly sure non of that was legal, trading standards would have had a field day... but then perhaps this sort of thing still goes on in the world of direct selling ?

[Road2Ruin]

loughran said:

In the 80's I took the opportunity to expand my horizons and took a commission only position with a well regarded fitted furniture outfit.

The company operated a system of 'overs and unders" and the salesmen had a list price and a cost price to work with.

The job would be priced at list but could be discounted down to cost. Anything the customer would pay over cost would be credited to the salesman's overs account. The balance of the overs account could be used by the salesman, if required, to offer low prices to 'difficult' customers, closing the deal below cost but allowing the salesman to hit his sales target.

A salesman who had to resort to using his overs account to close deals was mocked by others in the sales team. Much better to build your overs account up as much as possible because every three months you were paid 10% of the balance as a bonus and then the account reverted to zero.

I'm fairly sure non of that was legal, trading standards would have had a field day... but then perhaps this sort of thing still goes on in the world of direct selling ?

Why would you ever want to sell something below cost? That's just a crazy business model. One that will end in liquidation.

[loughran]

Road2Ruin said:

loughran said:

In the 80's I took the opportunity to expand my horizons and took a commission only position with a well regarded fitted furniture outfit.

The company operated a system of 'overs and unders" and the salesmen had a list price and a cost price to work with.

The job would be priced at list but could be discounted down to cost. Anything the customer would pay over cost would be credited to the salesman's overs account. The balance of the overs account could be used by the salesman, if required, to offer low prices to 'difficult' customers, closing the deal below cost but allowing the salesman to hit his sales target.

A salesman who had to resort to using his overs account to close deals was mocked by others in the sales team. Much better to build your overs account up as much as possible because every three months you were paid 10% of the balance as a bonus and then the account reverted to zero.

I'm fairly sure non of that was legal, trading standards would have had a field day... but then perhaps this sort of thing still goes on in the world of direct selling ?

Why would you ever want to sell something below cost? That's just a crazy business model. One that will end in liquidation.

You can sell a product at below cost price if that low price is being subsidised. Loss leader pricing is a common marketing strategy.

[bristolbaron]

Yazza54 said:

Because Pistonheads.


Yes, came here just to basically suggest that Magnet may be worth a shout if anyone was looking and had a pre conceived idea like me that it would be overpriced... and get told that I've done a poor job of negotiating and magnet are all 15mm carcass so I've got a better deal because it's not as good, neither of which is true.

It's fking annoying.

(I do think promised land was trying to be helpful though)

Edited by Yazza54 on Wednesday 28th December 13:44

We had a new kitchen installed last year and I didn’t consider Magnet even though I have a friend who fits for them. I get decent pricing through Howdens and was happy with what was being supplied so left it at that.

Whilst looking for skirting for the new extension, Magnet was the only place locally with the right profile. I got chatting with the sales guy who discussed the landlords national purchasing group:
https://www.lnpg.co.uk/

I’d not heard of it before, but he explained if you’re a member you get access to insanely low pricing, far below anything a builder would have access to.

Not helpful as a one off purchase, but if there’s any landlords reading this it’d be well worth a look!

As a side note, the skirting was very well priced and good quality, I’d definitely use magnet again.

[Road2Ruin]

loughran said:

Road2Ruin said:

loughran said:

In the 80's I took the opportunity to expand my horizons and took a commission only position with a well regarded fitted furniture outfit.

The company operated a system of 'overs and unders" and the salesmen had a list price and a cost price to work with.

The job would be priced at list but could be discounted down to cost. Anything the customer would pay over cost would be credited to the salesman's overs account. The balance of the overs account could be used by the salesman, if required, to offer low prices to 'difficult' customers, closing the deal below cost but allowing the salesman to hit his sales target.

A salesman who had to resort to using his overs account to close deals was mocked by others in the sales team. Much better to build your overs account up as much as possible because every three months you were paid 10% of the balance as a bonus and then the account reverted to zero.

I'm fairly sure non of that was legal, trading standards would have had a field day... but then perhaps this sort of thing still goes on in the world of direct selling ?

Why would you ever want to sell something below cost? That's just a crazy business model. One that will end in liquidation.

You can sell a product at below cost price if that low price is being subsidised. Loss leader pricing is a common marketing strategy.

That only works if you sell something else to the same customer, ie bread in supermarkets. If you sell a kitchen to a single customer, that customer has to buy something else otherwise otherwise it offers no benefit.

[singlecoil]

Road2Ruin said:

loughran said:

Road2Ruin said:

loughran said:

In the 80's I took the opportunity to expand my horizons and took a commission only position with a well regarded fitted furniture outfit.

The company operated a system of 'overs and unders" and the salesmen had a list price and a cost price to work with.

The job would be priced at list but could be discounted down to cost. Anything the customer would pay over cost would be credited to the salesman's overs account. The balance of the overs account could be used by the salesman, if required, to offer low prices to 'difficult' customers, closing the deal below cost but allowing the salesman to hit his sales target.

A salesman who had to resort to using his overs account to close deals was mocked by others in the sales team. Much better to build your overs account up as much as possible because every three months you were paid 10% of the balance as a bonus and then the account reverted to zero.

I'm fairly sure non of that was legal, trading standards would have had a field day... but then perhaps this sort of thing still goes on in the world of direct selling ?

Why would you ever want to sell something below cost? That's just a crazy business model. One that will end in liquidation.

You can sell a product at below cost price if that low price is being subsidised. Loss leader pricing is a common marketing strategy.

That only works if you sell something else to the same customer, ie bread in supermarkets. If you sell a kitchen to a single customer, that customer has to buy something else otherwise otherwise it offers no benefit.

The 'cost' isn't really definable in a situation like this. There's other factors to consider, for instance, keeping your machines and the whole system running, preventing your competitor getting the sale etc. Occasionally buying a job is the right thing to do, even if it is below the notional 'cost'.

[loughran]

Road2Ruin said:

That only works if you sell something else to the same customer, ie bread in supermarkets. If you sell a kitchen to a single customer, that customer has to buy something else otherwise otherwise it offers no benefit.

Did you grasp how the overs and under account worked ?

You're the accountant, I can't understand it for you.

On second thoughts...

Customer A wants a kitchen. The list price is 20k, the cost price is 12k.

The salesman offers 4k discount and sells the kitchen for 16K. Customer gets discount and is happy. Salesman retains 4k in his overs account and is happy

Customer B wants a kitchen. This kitchen has a list price of 14k and a cost price of 9k.

Customer B only wants to spend 8k and the salesman has a looming target review so he agrees to sell at 8k, using 1k from his overs account.

In effect customer A has subsidised customer B's kitchen.

Edited by loughran on Friday 30th December 15:59

[Road2Ruin]

loughran said:

Did you grasp how the overs and under account worked ?

You're the accountant, I can't understand it for you.

On second thoughts...

Customer A wants a kitchen. The list price is 20k, the cost price is 12k.

The salesman offers 4k discount and sells the kitchen for 16K. Customer gets discount and is happy. Salesman retains 4k in his overs account and is happy

Customer B wants a kitchen. This kitchen has a list price of 14k and a cost price of 9k.

Customer B only wants to spend 8k and the salesman has a looming target review so he agrees to sell at 8k, using 1k from his overs account.

In effect customer A has subsidised customer B's kitchen.

Edited by loughran on Friday 30th December 15:59

I can understand the principle for the salesman, if he has a sales target. However as a business owner, I wouldn't allow a sale below cost as it brings the business nothing. In fact it's a double loss in your example.

[Sheepshanks]

Road2Ruin said:

I can understand the principle for the salesman, if he has a sales target. However as a business owner, I wouldn't allow a sale below cost as it brings the business nothing. In fact it's a double loss in your example.

It's pretty unlikely the sales people would be given the actual cost price.

[loughran]

Road2Ruin said:

I can understand the principle for the salesman, if he has a sales target. However as a business owner, I wouldn't allow a sale below cost as it brings the business nothing. In fact it's a double loss in your example.

Where is the double loss ?

Deal A is sold at 4k above cost. Deal B is sold at 1k below cost... giving profit of 3k and a busy workshop.

These days I am a lowly joiner. The world of direct selling and financial scheming was not for me so if you say that the business model does not work, I believe you but the company is still in production 40 years later.

[Minsky]

I can’t be doing with pricing nonsense. I want to know the price I pay is fair.

The place I chose didn’t really shift - all they gave me was some project management time. Kitchen/ utility/ boot room cupboards and a laundry storage unit (900mm) for the hallway.

Combination of oak veneer for main units, oak laminated (in places it doesn’t get see much) and painted.

Overall I am pleased and excited. £22k exc worktops/ appliances / fitting etc. Against everything else it seemed good value.

Overall will be £40k ish excluding flooring and walls

[FWIW]

Wagonwheel555 said:

Currently getting quotes to install our Wren kitchen which we have on order.

Kitchen is £11500 including appliances.
Quartz coming in about £4000 based on estimate
Fitting around £6500 based on the three quotes I got.

Not looking forward to trying to live without a kitchen for a week or so with a 3 year old.

Kitchen is around 3.5m x 3.5m

I would implore you to avoid Wren, if only for your own sanity.
You might get lucky, but if not they’ll take you to hell and back.
It’s really not worth the risk.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the fitters are building in some fluff factor for when they have to keep coming back to fit replacements for the almost inevitable damaged or missing items.

Edited by FWIW on Friday 30th December 23:22

[Sheepshanks]

Wagonwheel555 said:

Fitting of temporary wood worktops and sink in advance of quartz fitting

Are the quartz guys going to template the quartz before the temporary worktops are fitted?