You've found an office chair online for $199.
Then you've looked at a commercial ergonomic chair and discovered the recommended retail price can be $1,000, $1,500 or even more.
They both have a seat.
They both have wheels.
They both go up and down.
So what on earth are you paying for?
It's a fair question.
Commercial furniture has a different job.
Furniture designed for a home office might be used a few hours each week.
Commercial office furniture may be used for eight or more hours a day, five days a week, for years.
Sometimes by the same person.
Sometimes by dozens of different people.
That's a completely different level of use.
You're paying for what's underneath.
Two chairs can look surprisingly similar in a photograph.
The difference becomes more obvious when you start looking at:
- Mechanisms
- Frame construction
- Foam
- Mesh
- Gas lifts
- Castors
- Adjustment systems
- Replaceable components
- Ergonomic design
- Testing and durability
A good commercial chair is engineered rather than simply assembled.
Adjustability matters.
Humans inconveniently come in different shapes and sizes.
A good ergonomic chair allows the user to adjust the chair to suit them rather than forcing the person to suit the chair.
Depending on the model, that can include seat height, seat depth, lumbar support, recline tension, arm height and other adjustments.
Those mechanisms cost money to design and manufacture.
Quality furniture can often be repaired.
This is one of the biggest differences — and one that is often overlooked.
When a component fails on inexpensive furniture, the solution can be:
Replace the furniture.
With good commercial furniture, individual components can often be repaired or replaced.
That can dramatically extend its useful life.
Then there's the second-hand advantage.
This is where things get interesting.
Because high-quality commercial furniture is built to last, it doesn't necessarily stop being good furniture when the original company no longer needs it.
That's why the second-hand commercial office furniture market exists.
At George Walkers, we source quality ex-corporate office furniture and give it another opportunity to be used.
That can mean a customer gets a chair that originally retailed for significantly more than their budget would normally allow.
Instead of comparing:
$250 new chair vs $1,400 new chair
you may actually be comparing:
$250 new chair vs a quality commercial chair that originally retailed around $1,400 but is now available second-hand.
That's a very different decision.
Expensive doesn't automatically mean better for you.
We don't believe everybody needs the most expensive chair in the showroom.
The right furniture depends on who's using it, how often it's being used, the environment it's going into and your budget.
Sometimes new makes sense.
Sometimes second-hand makes far more sense.
Sometimes spending slightly more upfront can save money over the furniture's lifetime.
The important thing is understanding what you're actually buying.
So yes — a $1,400 office chair really can look suspiciously like a normal chair.
Until you've sat in it for eight hours a day.
For five years.
And it still works.
