To think there is too much choice and little guidance

[Grimshadylady]

AIBU to want there to be less choice on consumer products? I need to buy a new sofa and I cannot make heads nor tails of the vast choices that are out there. Some of the sofas are exactly the same but sold under different names by different companies. Some claim to be offering huge discounts and then on the original manufacturers website, they clearly do not sell sofas in the exorbitant range that was suggested by this discount website.

Reviews tend to be all over the place with whether the sofa is comfortable or not and so far, based on reviews, I should not buy any sofa from any company.

At this rate, I feel like giving up and making my own sofa out of wooden pallets.

Do you have a comfy sofa? Where did you buy it and did it cost you a small fortune?

I agree. Even small purchases are a nightmare. Hundreds of the same or similar products under different brand names. Cars, so many are made by the same companies but use older established brand names. I hate it

I got a reliable and very comfortable DFS sofa after having similar angst to you.

Agreed, everything is a minefield these days and Amazon seems to be full of a million and one dupes of proper brands, can’t make head nor tail of which are genuine and reviews I suspect are entirely fake and useless.

I don't trust online shopping for items like that. We had some shockingly uncomfortable sofas over the years. I make a point of going to an actual location, sitting and lying down on sofas. It costs more to buy from a brick and mortar shop but at least I won't have to freecycle it after two years because I can't get comfortable on it.

I went to a shop and sat on them.

Best way

This is the issue with discount websites, they have the cheapest prices but the biggest risk.

We went to a reputable sofa shop and sat on it etc

Yes I don't think I would order sofas or beds online

Sofas and stuff. £2k a sofa. Hope they’ll last a life time so don’t mind the cost. Very happy.

I hate online shopping for holidays, you can select where you want to want to go but can't of rule out places. For instance I want to go to Greece but I don't want to to go to say, Faliraki, I can select Rhodes but not a particular part and because it's a big resort there are so may of the offered hotels in the resort I don't want to.

It's not as bad if you have somewhere specific in mind but it's crap for browsing.

Hard agree, op, it's ridiculous and makes even tiny purchases needlessly stressful!

My sofa is from DFS, corner sofa, was about £800 4 years ago, very comfortable. If you gotta showroom do make sure to measure - they look so much smaller in huge shops!

Making your own sofa out of pallets is very hipster. You could then cover it with kilims you bought in a Moroccan souk.

Excess choice is why I'm a member of Which?
If I need something I just buy whatever they've said is the cheapest Best Buy.

We got given our sofa as a free cast-off and it's great. We paid to have it recovered and it's really excellent.

I also got our kitchen table as a free cast-off and it's brilliant too.

We found that all the sofa in shops were absolutly enormous and none of them fitted in our 1920s living room.

Got mine online from Dunelm a couple of years ago. They got very good reviews and are indeed very good. I have this and the three seater sofa bed.

https://www.dunelm.com/product/zoe-velvet-2-seater-sofa-1000240547

Feature armchairs were from Made.com.

Choice fatigue is definitely a thing. I am sometimes nostalgic for the days when most household goods came in a maximum of two sizes and three colours. But a sofa is a good example of something you really need to choose in person rather than online.

Ours is a Next corner sofa but i didn't get it from Next. We've got a couple of discount furniture shops locally that sell factory seconds etc. I sat on loads of different ones and took ages to decide. It's doing well a few years down the line.

We used to have a family run furniture shop that sadly closed, it was very well used but family wanted to retire.

I always bought stuff from there as i trusted them and their advice

Old sofa was DFS, current one is IKEA.
But we went and tried out loads in shops before each purchase. Last time the one I thought I wanted from looking online I actually hated in real life!