Getting the house carpeted - how to get good quality and good price

[crazyhead]

In the next month or so, we're going to need to get the whole house recarpeted post renovation.

We want decent quality and a decent price, given it is going to involve three bedrooms, stairs and landing and front room. No carpets to remove, so that's one good thing. We're in north London.

Has anyone got any tips for getting the best value? I was wondering about summer sales though we may miss them by the time we're ready.

If you find a local fitter there is an online company called Ollerton Hall Carpets I think. Never used them but have had some samples through from them and they are reasonable. I think you would need the fitter on side so they could measure for you etc before you order though.

I would go to a small independent shop in a not-that-nice area....not worth paying to cover expensive shop rents in posh areas, and in my experience a good independent is cheaper and quicker to fit than the big chains, despite the headline 'SALE' stuff at the bigger chains.

Agree 100% with that. My carpet retailer of choice is in Springburn, Glasgow. Not the best of locations but great prices, advice and service on all ranges of carpets.

We did this last year - 5 beds, hall x2, stairs x2... I started at John Lewis for benchmark good quality prices. It wasn't as scary as I'd thought... but they didn't have the colour we wanted.

I found the colour in a local carpet shop, better quality (more oz's) but more expensive. When I mentioned that I'd had a quote from John Lewis, they asked to see the quote, then said they'd match their price of the carpet and underlay - plus they included free fitting.

So, in the end we got a better quality carpet, in the colour we really wanted with free fitting. So that might be the way to go?

The best thing about the local store was that instead of coming in two fittings as John Lewis would have done, they came in 4 goes (at our request) so that we didn't have the problem of where to put all the furniture as each room was fitted.

BTW - we also checked out CarpetRight, etc to compare. They seem to have great deals - and their cheap carpets are cheap, but if you're trying to get a decent quality carpet, they actually work out much more expensive.

Thanks ever so much for that - very helpful indeed!

I will look do exactly what you all describe....there are shops local to me but the area is pricey, so I'll have a good look in some of the cheaper areas as well.....

Carpetright and the like sell cheap crap with poor customer service. if you just want the floor covered it will do the job, but it doesn't sound like it.

I'd recommend using a small independent. The shops are often scruffy, but many are family run and take pride in what they do and are open to some negotiation.

When comparing prices don't forget to factor in all extras (underlay, gripper, fitting, doorbars, furniture moving, taking away old flooring, etc) as these can differ considerably from shop to shop and you won't get a fair comparison otherwise.

Hmmm....we had new carpet last year on our stairs, landing and main bedroom, and went for local independent for all the reasons mentioned in the thread.

They were crap, ordered the wrong colour by mistake, took an absolute age to get the carpet in, were uncontactable for weeks on end, and fitted the stair carpet so badly they had to come back twice to fix it.

Nice quality carpets, and reasonable prices, but what a stress-fest. DS needs carpet in his bedroom and I'm sorely tempted to go to a big chain.