So I just spent several hours with Garage Envy and I have to say they are REALLY responsive. I just called them earlier today and they had someone at my house by 2 PM right on time. Jan that came out was really nice and was here for 2.5 hours. She took measurements and showed tons of samples. They do it all.
I had NO idea people spent this much money on their garages! She showed me a sample of her portfolio and some of these guys in RSF have spent $60,000 pimping out their garages!
I originally just wanted to get the epoxy flooring and some cabinets but by the time she left I was asking her for work benches, cabinets, storage, custom bicycle racks for 4 bikes, and other things.
They have this program where you can pretty much just see what you want and they can add it on the computer. It’s like the custom cabinet program we used when we did our closets. This stuff ain’t cheap! By the time she was done it was like $15k in stuff.
But definitely they are NOT the place to get epoxy flooring. The price per sq. foot they charge is WAY too much. It’s clear to me they specialize and make their money in all the other stuff they do. The flooring has to be low margin for them and they must purposely mark it way up.
Just doing due diligence I could already tell approximate costs. Their price for their lowest end epoxy flooring was $4.50 per sq. feet. And their highest end one (which is the one I liked) was a whopping $9 per sq. feet. No way I’m spending that kind of money as my garage is 800 sq. ft. She said that price includes the labor, installation/materials and sales tax.
No way it should cost that much. Plus the rub is their warranty on the flooring is only 1 year. On the Perkin’s website it says their warranty is a whopping 15 years. I called her out on that and she told me that Perkins is VERY good and that they have quality products and do a great job. She wasn’t going to lie which I respected and she even said they will definitely beat her on price.
She even said that she wasn’t going to include a budget and that there wasn’t ANY way they could come close to Perkins on the price. I asked her why in the world their warranty is only 1 year??? I told her if they have quality products and quality installation there is NO reason it should only be 1 year. She said they’ve had “issues” in the past. Long story short she said to go with Perkins and they would do a great job and the best in SD.
Perkin’s never called me back today so they don’t sound as hungry for the business like Garage Envy is. Hopefully they call tomorrow as I already know what I want. Garage Envy seems like a really high end outfit. They had slick brochures that looked expensive. They also do Jay Leno’s garage. There were a lot of promotional pieces with Jay Leno in them with photos of his garage.
I’ll still give Garage Envy a chance but I have California Closets coming out this week to quote on the job as well. But for those of you looking for Epoxy flooring it sounds like Perkins is where it’s at.
Thanks again SK for the great comments. And thanks ljinvestor for that referral on Perkins. It helped seeing the website and reading a bit about it before Garage Envy came out and seeing about that warranty difference. Now, if I can get them to call me back for a quote I’m gold.
[quote=njtosd]We’re thinking about using laminate flooring from IKEA. It’s cheaper per square foot than epoxy and looks nicer. I don’t understand the appeal of the confetti look.[/quote]
The confetti look I agree I didn’t think I’d like but looking at photos it looks nice with the right set of custom cabinets. Wow, I didn’t realize what a selection of stuff they sell. I’ve never seen anyone pimp out their garage like some of this stuff I’ve seen. To be honest, I’m not the type that spends much time in the garage before.
The REALLY gorgeous flooring is the Quartz or Metallic epoxy solid finishes that are shiny. Wow they are gorgeous. She showed me a few photos and it looks like a showroom floor. But no way I could justify that kind of price for garage flooring!
She also showed me tons of people that get this interlocking tiles type flooring. Looked a bit strange to me and seems like dust/debris would go through the cracks. Didn’t seem to make sense to me as it was the same price as the Epoxy.
I guess the only possible advantage would be if you spilled something corrosive in an area you can just change out one tile but it reminded me of a gymnasium! LOL.
