I received this cabinet as a gift for Christmas. I was wanting a better way to store our shoes than the hall closet. I liked that it also had a few drawers for odds and ends and thought it would be good beside our door. At purchase, reviews were not good (2 stars) but I thought worst case Walmart would take it back for me.
Cabinet arrived packaged fairly well. I assembled this by myself and it took about 3 hours. In unpacked everything first, and found a surprising lack of instructions! There was one page of instructions, labelled Page 9 (the last page) with a staple at top, but no other papers? There were a few pieces of board that had some scuffs, but all of them are really hidden inside so I didn't feel the need to replace them. That's good, since I have no idea how to contact the company.. After all is said and done, I was missing one screw to hold one of the 4 magnet pieces inside the doors.. I just put the magnet at the top only on that side and will try to find me a little replacement.
I've assembled lots of furniture lately, and I enjoy logic games and puzzles, so I took it as an opportunity to have some "fun" figuring it out. I imagine many people would not appreciate that though. Everything did go together okay and seems decently sturdy (you get what you pay for). The particle board is the cheaper grade that seems really flaky to touch. I imagine it will not last a super long time, and don't ever get water on it! The most disappointing part of the piece was probably the back panel that gets tacked on. It comes in two pieces with some push pins to hold in the middle along with all the nails around the edges. Try as I did, there is still a tiny gap in the middle of the unit you can see through if you look. Seems like this should have been made into one foldable piece! I guess it is shut up anyway, so it will be fine.
The color is pretty nice... I wanted a cherry one to match the rest of our living room, but options were only black/white/espresso. I chose espresso, and it is pretty dark, but a nice finish. The cabinet is very tall, turns out it would cover my light switch by the door so it had to go elsewhere in the room. Be sure to check the dimensions if you want it in a specific space.
They do need better quality control. The lack of instructions could be very frustrating, and thankfully the scuffs to my pieces were all inside and the only missing part will be easily replaced. I think it does deserve better than the 2 star review it had when I got mine though. It seems sturdy and accomplishes its task - holding lots of shoes!
