The other day I was asked to assemble several pieces of flat pack furniture.

My client had ordered it all online and booked delivery in time for me to swoop in and do my thing.

The delivery was a disaster (I'll write about that another time). But eventually 'most' of the boxes arrived.

Here's what I found:

1. Although the online furniture company presented itself as a single point of contact, each piece of flat pack furniture came from a different manufacturer. So ...

2. Each piece of flat pack furniture was made with WILDLY different standards of quality. One peice was quite good. And one had some fasteners that were faulty - that is, they couldn't even get their screws right!

3. ALL of the flat pack furniture had poor instructions. I had to guess a lot. An inexperienced person could have really stuffed up.

Which brings us to Ikea. Their fasteners and panels are always correct and their instructions are idiot proof (if you pay attention). BUT you can't buy Ikea online AND they choose to outsource delivery to a courier company that has received many bad reviews:

http://www.productreview.com.au/p/australian-national-couriers.html

So what's a girl to do?

1. If you want flat pack, Ikea is very good. Everyone else is a lottery - may be good - may be bad.

2. Avoid delivery if at all possible. You stand a very good chance of being very frustrated. Better value to rent a ute or bribe a friend.

3. Factor in the cost of professional assembly by, say, me. (PS. I charge less for Ikea assembly)

I’m in Bunnings a lot and I often overhear conversations – OK I snoop. It always amuses me when I hear customers asking the sales assistants ‘how’ to do something as if they were talking to a qualified tradesman.

A lot of people (my wife included) think sales staff should be experts in their field. But it’s been my experience that you don’t get experts by paying minimum retail wage.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Some of the sales staff are very good … at their jobs. The paint mixing guys have a real eye and skill for matching a faded sample chip from someones wall.

But can they scrape, sand, wash, fill, bind, prime and paint an ancient window sill? Probably not because they are SELLING stuff, they are not USING stuff.

PS> Additional thought: Bunnings is basically Coles for hardware. Would you ask a Coles shop assistant how to cook a meal using their grocery items?