New kitchen - Howdens or proper kitchen company?

[catweasel44]

We desperately need a new kitchen. Ours is a good size but an awkward space.

We've had a design done by a local kitchen company but it's working out at about £25k including appliances and fitting.

DH wants to see if we can get it cheaper with a builder and Howdens.

Is there a massive difference in quality? We have two tweenage boys so it needs to be fairly robust!

Bold fail

My builder was pushing Howdens. I also went to a local recommended kitchen shop and the price was the same for massively better quality kitchen.

We have a wooden ikea kitchen in a very high value house (not London). I spent a long time with designer friends planning how I would make a cheap kitchen look top spec and I had a good joiner fit it and add trim, feet etc which I then colour matched with paint. Everyone always comments on how lovely the kitchen is and people are shocked when I reveal it's IKEA.

In our previous house we had a howdens kitchen (more expensive than IKEA. It was decent quality and lasted well. No complaints at all.

Thing is it's all relative to your budget, by all means put a lovely bespoke solid wood kitchen that alone is going to cost about £40K and spend upwards of £75K if it's going into a house that's worth at least a few million but if your house is only worth say a few hundred thousand then it's hardly worth spending 25 - 50% of the house value on putting in a new kitchen

Our decision to get a cheaper kitchen was based on the fact that kitchens, like everything else, date. When we moved into our house it had a very expensive Pogenpohl kitchen in it. The previous owners had obviously spent a fortune but despite the cost it looked old fashioned.

We have a Benchmarx kitchen. It's not top end but it's fitted well (by our really great local builder) and the finishing is very good. I think if the fitting and finishing is done well, even a cheapish kitchen will look good. The cost of the kitchen was reasonable - it's the labour that you need to budget for.

Just to add that Benchmarx are similar to Howdens in that they don’t have show rooms like Wren etc. And don’t, in theory sell to the public.
However I bought my kitchen from them and all I needed was open an account. The prices came straight to me, not via a builder or kitchen fitter.
As I understand it they will do a better price for regular customer etc but the price was still much cheaper than the other companies.
It’s worth knowing that Benchmarx kitchens are exactly the same as Wickes but less than half the price.
Also, their units are supplied built which saves a huge amount of time and they have their products in stock so can deliver extra or replace damaged products immediately.

Taffeta,

You are completely correct, the more business the builder puts through Howdens the more kick back discount is given.

You as the customer may be lucky to get a few % discount from the builder. Of course Joe Bloggs builder likes Howdens it's a win win situation for him.

I have a Howdens kitchen, in five years now. It is their more traditional kitchen, ie painted oak. They cannot replicate the dearer kitchens, corner units etc but I wanted a streamlined look. I waited for the October sale, £4,800 for the top of the range units 17 in all. Fitter negotiated down to £4,500 because I felt his costs were a bit high so everyone happy.

I bought the integrated appliances from rangemaster - dishwasher, fridge, freezer and cooker. Cooker not cheap, but other appliances fairly moderate. They are still fine.

The wood units can and do drop and need some adjustment which we had done by the same fitter free of charge. Five years on one or two doors need adjustment and some of the hinges aren't great but they gave me some free ones should they need changing.

Fitting was £1275 and a reasonable job with two fitters for just under a week.

I have seen kitchens I like better but it has stood the test of time and people remark that it is a lovely kitchen that suits the house.

For the price, it is fine. I think all in it was around £8,500 with appliances and worktops.

IMHO the larger cost comes from one set of people supplying and fitting a kitchen.

Split where you buy the physical components from, and someone separate fitting it, and you will usually end up with a much lower cost.

So Howdens and local fitter rather than Magnet etc.

This is all great, thank you.

When I say 'proper company' I mean an independent kitchen company who design, supply and fit, rather than a chain + joiner.

The kitchen we are looking at is Rotpunkt but it feels like a lot. It's a difficult space though so we might not get the range of sizes.

Will check out DIY.

I've uploaded the kitchen designers plans to DIY Kitchens. I have guilt.

Don’t feel guilty everyone does it!

My dream kitchen was a Poggenpohl one. c. £100k

Took the design of it, based our design on that, found similar looking Ikea cabinets, inc pull out pantry, massive island units, floor to ceiling - got the worktop from local stonemason, used some reclaimed wood from build for a few unit fronts, eh voila! A Poggenpohl style kitchen for about £5k plus appliances.

Don't feel guilty - we live in an open market - if people want business, they need to be competitive. I've got one of the nicer DIY kitchens and it's a solid mid-range option.

They do look nice. And we are due to drive past their showroom in a trip up north in a few weeks. It feels like it was meant to be.

They have already come back to me with some extra details. Seem very efficient.

I've got DiY Kitchens. Very good quality mid range. Lovely finish and looks much more expensive. However if you get the measurements wrong it's an expensive mistake. I had one wall cupboard slightly too wide and they wouldn't refund it after it was shipped to UK (I couldn't change it as they didn't have a smaller size). It was an expensive £200 mistake!!

I travelled up to the showroom for a day and spent hours and hours there. Sth to factor in if you pay them a visit.

I think Howdens value depends completely on your relationship with the person whose account you're buying through. My kitchen fitter passes on his full discount, he tags any purchases for me on his account with my name and I just go in and pay Howdens myself. Thanks to the October sale, I got my 10 units, worktop, upstand and sink for £2,700, and then paid £20+VAT an hour to have it fitted.

Thank you very much for your price breakdown baking. We’re about to do something similar and haven’t an clue of the costs. Waiting for quotes now, but the architect pencilled in £15K for kitchen and £5K for decking, with fitting on top of that.

I spoke to a kitchen fitter who came highly recommended and he said there had been issues with DIY Kitchens as 'some of the doors had to sent back'

This didn't seem too much of an issue to me and I suspect his Howdens preference is more to do with the discount he gets.

Independent kitchen company was going to be over £25k all in.

DIY Kitchens has come back as £3,000 plus units and worktops etc so I think will be £12k all in including fitting.