Okay you finally decided it’s time to treat yourself and upgrade the house. But you are tired of your local furniture store and their overpriced selection, this time around you want to try to find something online so that you can skip the middlemen and have a broader selection of items to choose from. Great!
We all know it can be difficult making such a big investment online, especially now days with so many options out there. That’s why we composed this list to help you through this new experience.
Get Ready
Before you start shopping let’s get you ready to find your dream piece of furniture. Start by measuring your space, it would be wise to do it twice to make sure you got it down. Also, time to take a look at that bank account and see what you are working with, it is always better to set a budget prior to start shopping so you don’t get carried away.
Searching for a Store
Next step is fairly simple, make yourself some coffee or tea and let’s start searching! Go to your favorite search engine and use keywords such as sofa, sofa bed, futon, accent chair to describe the item you are looking for. Also, to refine your search even further you can include your location, and more specific characteristics you are seeking for such as color, fabric or finish.
Verify the Store
Alright you found something that you like, now before you go on to their catalog let’s do our due diligence and verify this website is legitimate. A good start point is the “about us” page, this page can tell you a lot about the retailer and their story. A good sign when shopping online is a well structure website, this usually is associated with legitimate website as it takes a lot of investment to develop a good-looking page.
Reviews
Reviews are also very import to look at before moving ahead. Trusted sites have reviews on individuals’ items as well as their websites and customer service in general. It’s very import to do your homework when it comes to reviews and dig deep to find the truth.
Return policy
If you are reading the website return policy and feel confused, you should probably stay away. A big problem with buying online is that you can’t try before purchasing and when it comes to furniture that really matters. So, make sure the website you are looking for has a comprehensive return policy in case you change your mind.
Narrow Your Results
Now that you have verified that the website is trustworthy, let's narrow down your choices. A good way to do that is ordering a fabric samples to make sure you are happy with the color and feel. Another technique used in the industry is to mock-up your new piece on the floor with tape. This can help you get a better feel for the scale of the piece.
Delivery Options
Alright this is the final step to this adventure and lucky you, it fairly straight forward. All you have to do is pick between the shipping options, usually your choices are delivery to your door, delivery to your room of choice, or full service where they also assemble the furniture for you.