How Much Should Furniture Cost?

Photo credit: Lachlan Donald, CC BY 2.0.

Since I currently have furniture—and the address to which the furniture is being shipped—on the brain, this Curbed feature about the cost of furniture seems particularly apropos:

The average sofa in the U.S. sells for around $1,000. Most sofa manufacturers can estimate how long a sofa will last based solely on the price.

“When I talk to people I constantly tell them you get what you pay for in furniture. When you see a $400 sofa, it’s got $200 worth of materials in it. When you see a $1,000 sofa, it’s got $500 worth of materials in it,” says BenchMade Modern’s Blazona. “I would say a $1,000 sofa is probably a three- to five-year sofa.”

$1,000 divided by five is $200, which means my $299 Tahoe sofa from Furniture Row should last for a little more than a year. (Is that how furniture math works?)

Except… my parents have plenty of Furniture Row furniture, and it has held up for several years and looks like it’ll hold up for several more. I got to touch my new furniture; it’s real wood, heavy and solid, nothing flimsy that I’ll make even flimsier by assembling it myself. It feels like the kind of furniture that Curbed suggests people aren’t buying anymore: long-term, built-to-last, take-good-care-of-it pieces.

The whole piece is worth reading, especially because it references the time an Awl post inspired West Elm to refund everyone who bought the Peggy sofa. (If you are not familiar with that saga, go familiarize yourself with it.)

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