When buying a dining room table or a bedroom suit it is relatively easy to determine the quality of the furniture by looking at how it is constructed. How do you determine the quality of upholstered furniture when much of the construction is hidden under fabric?
First start with the fabric, it is the easiest to evaluate because you can see and feel it. Sofa upholstery is very similar to sheets, the higher the thread-count the higher the quality. Because almost no retail salesperson will be able to tell you the thread count of a sofa, the easiest way to evaluate a fabrics quality is to feel the thickness of the fabric.
Once you get past the fabric, the evaluation becomes more difficult. Anyone can tell you that the sofas cushions have a 2.5 density or that the frame is corner blocked, glued and screwed for added stability. However, there is no way to verify this information. There is one very crude way to tell the relative quality of a sofa. LIFT IT! It may sound funny, but a simple way get an idea about the quality of a sofa is to lift up one corner of the sofa. Here are a few things to look for when lifting the corner of the sofa:
- Weight difference: If you are comparing two sofas of similar size and one weighs dramatically less than the other, there is a reason. In a competitive, price driven industry like furniture, manufacturers have been forced to cut prices to stay competitive. In order to reach lower price points, manufacturers have been forced to eliminate certain materials, or use lower grade materials in some of their products. To cut costs, some manufacturers have lowered their foam density, stopped using corner blocks and other frame braces and stopped padding frames with foam. All of these materials affect the weight of the sofa, so if you find one that is too light, it may be missing one or all of these materials.
- Stability: When picking up a corner of the sofa, check for stability in the frame. If the frame bends when you pick up a corner, it is likely missing corner blocks or stability braces. It is never a good sign when you lift one corner of a sofa and the entire sofa bends.
- Noise: Loose joints will cause a sofa to squeak. If you pick up a sofa and hear a pop or loud squeaking noise, the joints may not be secured well.
Almost every furniture store has a low priced sofa these days. These sofas are not all bad. In fact, due to the furniture industry’s competitive landscape there are some great values to be found in furniture stores. However, there are also some sofas that have been gutted just to hit a low price point. So when shopping, find a salesperson with some knowledge and use some common sense. If you can lift one end of it with two fingers, it probably is not going to last long.
