MOBEN's Scary Sales Tactics (Moben Kitchens)

Member Name: Nat999

Product:	Moben Kitchens
Date:	19/05/01 (4625 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Quality & Price

Disadvantages: Can't trust them

My husband and I are in the process of deciding which kitchen company to go with as we have just moved into a new house and it desperately needs a little bit of TLC mainly in the form of a new kitchen. This opinion will be about one of the companies that we have had dealings with - MOBEN. As we haven't yet decided which one to use, at this stage the opinion can only be about initial impressions, not about actual final kitchen results. And the reason I have decided to write about MOBEN in particular is because of a completely bizarre experience with them.

Background
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MOBEN market themselves as suppliers and fitters of superior quality kitchens at affordable prices. They have many showrooms throughout the country and I found the showroom in Bournemouth quite inspiring. The kitchens do look great and are well set up. The saleswoman, whilst being very helpful and informative, was way too talkative. We couldn't get away and learnt all about her life and family history! But in all this we could not get much information about the actual prices. We had to make an appointment for a salesman to come and visit us. He would measure up our kitchen, design a layout, let us choose all the units, appliances, sinks, taps and at the end of it all, produce a quote which was an all-in quote and wouldn't change. The price included fitting and even if we needed the electrics or plumbing moving, wouldn't change.

The reason why we were initially attracted to MOBEN was because they were advertising specials in the press, the most impressive being a free dishwasher and +- £300 for a Neff Range Cooker. Now anyone who knows Neff, will know that this is a huge bargain.

The Story
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The salesman arrived and gave us the usual marketing talk about how good MOBEN was, blah, blah. But he never really gave conclusive evidence of why this should be. His main focus was on how their prices compa
red to the DIY stores (MFI and B&Q) and produced a photocopied article from the Woman's Own magazine in 1998 comparing kitchens from the DIY stores. The article rated each of these stores out of 10.

And this is where it started to get weird.

While the salesman carried on with his very well rehearsed talk, I was idling scanning the article and noticed that at the bottom was a sticker blocking out a small part of the article. I held it up to the light and saw that the kitchen name was MOBEN. Before I even read what it said I asked the salesman why that part was covered up and he responded very aggressively saying that it wasn't MOBEN, but Modern Kitchens. I argued with him and showed my husband, but my husband wasn't paying much attention and didn't see it. The salesman was getting hotter under the collar. So in order to keep the peace, I shut up.

But of course, I was convinced that I was right and kept reading it. It was definitely MOBEN and it was only rated 3 out of 10! The main reason the person had marked them down was because of their aggressive marketing. The ploys she described turned out to be the same as what this guy used with us when he finally came to discussing the price. Exactly the same sales strategy from 3 years ago was being used on us!

When the salesman left the room to get something from his car, I pointed it out to my husband again. This time he saw what I was on about and when the salesman returned my husband confronted him with it and forced him to read it in the light. Well I must say that good 'ol hubby can be very aggressive himself at times and the salesman went redder and redder and then finally agreed that we were right. By this stage he was flamingly embarrassed and was blaming the admin people for giving him the literature. We should have kicked him out right there and then, but we didn't. We are just way too polite.

The entire appointment took 3 hours a
nd in that time we choose the cupboard unit doors, the counter tops and he drew out the new kitchen design. Finally he produced a costing for us. Now just to establish a framework for you, MFI had quoted (with fitting) £5 000 for their cheaper Hygena range and £5 600 for their more expensive Shreiber range. According to MOBEN, MFI's quality is very inferior compared to their own. The MOBEN salesman then proceeded to tell us that it would cost us £18 000! Well, we just burst out laughing. Funny thing was that he didn't look so amused. He then told us that due to various specials the price would come down to £8 500, but that if we signed right there and then, he could take a cut in his commission and we could have it for £6 500!

Now I ask you! How ridiculous does that sound? And he had the cheek to say that MOBEN did not do the typical double-glazing selling, where they ended up calling their managers. All that these prices highlight is that the company's profit margins and commission structures are hugely overinflated.

Of course, being ever stubborn and having a few brain cells, there was no way we were going to sign anything there and then. And it was our first quote from anybody. And we were pretty confident that if we approached them again in a week's time, we would find the same specials. So finally we got rid of him.

And now it gets even weirder.

Later on in the week we made an appointment for someone from Kitchen's Direct (KD) to see us. We then discovered that although MOBEN and KD are entirely different companies, they use the same manufacturer and so their range of products is exactly the same as MOBEN's. They claim that because they do not have any showrooms their price is cheaper.

The KD guy asked whom from MOBEN had come to see us and it turned out that he knew him! The MOBEN salesman - let's call him Jim - had previously been hired by KD, but was fired/asked to leave
after 4 months for lying to customers! This was all so amazing.

Our appointment with KD then proceeded much along the same lines as with MOBEN, but with the KD guy being much better at his job. He could explain the technicalities of kitchens a lot better than the other guy could and it was here that we realised how little the MOBEN guy had actually told us and how much he had glossed over.

But the really interesting part came when discussing the choice of cabinets. Obviously because the range is the same, we chose exactly the same units and counter tops. But where MOBEN had said the doors were solid wood, KD said they were wood veneers. Where MOBEN had said that counter tops were available in either matt or gloss, KD said that only some were available as gloss and others as matt. With MOBEN we had thought we were buying solid wood doors and a matt green counter top. Not so according to KD. And the cherry on the top was the kitchen design.

We have an oddly shaped kitchen with one wall only giving a depth of 45cm. On the MOBEN plan we were to have 2 pullout larders there. KD said that this was not possible because the minimum depth for these units is 55cm.

So here we have 2 kitchen companies using the same units and 2 different stories. The question arises of whom to believe. My gut instinct says KD just because he didn't promise the world, he knew his stuff better than MOBEN and he wasn't aggressive at all.

Unfortunately KD came in with a much higher quote (£8 300), but of course even that makes you think. How was MOBEN possibly going to do the job for the price quoted? So watch this space? When we finally make a decision I'll let you know.

Conclusion
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Raw materials for kitchen - very good
Price - final 'special deal' price is good, considering quality of materials
Fitting - cannot comment
Media marketing - very effective
Showrooms -
good
Salesmen - aggressive, untrustworthy, not enough product knowledge

Overall - seeing as the salesman will your main point of contact during your entire kitchen project, I just can't see how I can trust that any issues that may come up will be resolved. I am therefore very reluctant to use this company, even if their price is good for the quality.

Summary: