Kitchens Kitchens had a look at the online profile of Homebase kitchens brand Odina, and how it faired on consumer review websites, so as to have a look at how a big brand was perceived online and whether it suffers from the same problems as small independent kitchen companies.

Industry Wide Issues

The actual issues that generally affect kitchen companies small and large are pretty much the same and in most cases, customer satisfaction is won or lost in the fitting process, where mistakes are generally made by substandard fitters or where a fitter has to improvise.

With Odina kitchens, from Homebase, the kitchen furniture is rebranded Nobilia kitchen furniture but as we have commented before, its here that the similarities end as the design and fitting are where smaller independents tend to fair better.

As such, we had a look at the reviews online to see what mentions the Homebase Odina brand got and contrasted them with the industry norm.

Odina Kitchen Reviews

One review Written on: 02/10/2012 seems to be mirrored throughout some of the mentions about Odina as whilst the Homebase own brand furniture comes in for some criticism about quality, the Nobilia / Odina quality is at least not a point of contention. However, the same cannot be said for the quality of the design, ordering process and fitting, all of which came in for some fierce criticism.

This 1/5 star review posted Oct 2012 titled “Homebase designer & service terrible / Odina…” mentions that the customer was led to believe the kitchen would be made to measure and bespoke, which is not the case with any German made kitchen really and especially not of a Nobilia one, as factory made tends to produce standardised sizes and depths.

Another point relates to issues in the ordering process and the comment of “We bought a kitchen last December 2011, it is still not fitted (October 2012) as we are still awaiting outstanding parts” is particularly worrying but it is not uncommon three other people replied to that one comment reporting similar issues.

Nobilia Ordering process

We spoke to two independents that supply Nobilia and they both confirmed that you need to be on the ball when ordering from Nobilia as there is a minimum 6 week turnaround and you have to learn how Nobilia work so that you order and deliver all of the required parts in the same order.

Another review written 09/05/2012 titled “Very unhappy customer” also mentions about significant delays, this time with a kitchen ordered in October 2011, there were still outstanding items in May 2012.

Overview

From the 94 reviews Homebase had on one consumer review website, with only 31% recommending Homebase, what is more worrying is that whilst there were only a couple of reviews re the Odina brand, we couldn’t find one positive one.

We asked a Reputation Management consultant to look at the reviews we identified about Odina and appraise them for their accuracy and validity and of the reviews we have detailed, they were regarded as being genuine and accurate;

“….the comments we have looked at which mention the Odina brand name do appear to be genuine. Furthermore, the comments appear to be factual, backed up with specific details and don’t contain the sensationalist and often false comment staple of “avoid, avoid, avoid” which are often not from genuine consumers. This doesn’t appear to be the case here but that there are no positive comments about the Odina brand name does give cause for concern in that it does suggest the complaints detailed do have validity.”

With Homebase planning on rolling out more Odina store displays in the coming months, if it doesn’t get a lid on the issues it has been reported of as having, it could spell disaster for Homebase, which is something Nobilia, we are sure, will be keeping an eye on.

Kitchens Kitchens spoke to Jamie Davies at i-Home Interiors in Little Marlow, Bucks and his view on the opening of Odina displays at the High Wycombe Homebase, to which he commented, “…personally, we are not overly worried, as whilst I cant speak about other independent Nobilia dealers, we have tended to fair rather well with local customers comparing ourselves to the Homebase Odina offering and we don’t think things will be any different when the High Wycombe Odina displays come online and we would happily welcome High Wycombe customers giving us a call to see for themselves.”

Click this link for, Nobilia German Kitchens in High Wycombe and to get in touch with at i-Home Interiors.