Customer Reviews

Safco Value Mate Series Bookcase, 4 Shelves, 31-3/4 W by 13-1/2 D by 54 H, Black

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Having recently moved into a new home I needed a lot of shelves. Of the six different types I have bought this one in particular stands leagues above the others for one reason: it is absolute trash.

When it arrived every single piece was bent horribly. I had to use a claw hammer to bend the pieces enough to even fit together. Putting the screws in however, become mostly impossible due to the shelves not fitting flush because of severe warping. The bore holes themselves where drilled approximatly a half millimeter off which ensured that inserting the screws was nearly impossible. To add further insult, the screws are of a very cheap material and they turn to dust/strip upon the slightest resistance.

I finally got this atrocity assembled after two hours of effort and it looks nice, is fairly stable but still garbage for the cost. I attempted to look into returning it, but the Safco customer help is rude and said "Return it to the store." Consider the box itself specifically states "Do not return to store."

In conclusion, I can not stress enough to AVOID this shelf and this companies products. Please, PLEASE for your own sanity do not buy one of these wretched abominations of poor engineering and shoddy manufacturing.

Nice bookshelf once it's all put together but you need to be a contortionist with a headlamp to be able to assemble it anywhere near correctly. The holes for the screws don't always align properly (some in the row are perfectly aligned with others completely out) and the angle in which they need to be screwed in gives you no sight line or range to turn a screwdriver.

Ok, we have all seen appalling, chipboard/pressed particle board veneer bookcases - either we had them, or bought them for kids, or seen them - from Ikea, to wherever.

These are worse. Why?

1) The packaging - seems... ok but.. when you open it up - some of the panels and edges are BENT. Not just.. out a little bit, but significantly.

2) Testing if you can gently bend them back (it is cheap mild steel we are talking here) slightly in a section cracks the paint. The paint is micron thin just about, and not resilient at all. I didnt bother bending any other part, just carefully tried to assemble the rest of it. I gave up in the end - having bought two, glad I did not open the other one.

3) They are appallingly designed, in terms of how one needs to put them together. The Quality Assurance checking on them is laughable.

4) The instructions are poor. One can figure it out, but they are poor instructions, and not overly well printed or clear.

5) The holes drilled in the item are variable. The cardboard back to the unit is friable, and not very high quality (can you get high quality cardboard? yes..)

6) The design is incompetent. The engineering behind this is poor. Whoever thought it would be appropriate to have little plastic press studs to fix structural parts of the design, and also to hold the cardboard backing on should have been set on fire, and then jumped on, buried in peat, and then dug up to be slapped about a bit. Absolutely moronic idea this.

7) The fittings are poor too - the plastic press fit things are impossible nearly to use - and coupled with the laughable quality being so variable in terms of the holes for them to fit into, it is mind numbingly ridiculous that these were chose to use over screws. Ridiculous.

Overall? I am returning them, even though they want a stupid amount for returning them. The firm selling them has a fairly smooth returns process - but.. honestly, why not select a better item to sell, so you can not waste your resource and time processing returning items which are not fit for purpose? The buyer for the firm should have been given a glasgow kiss for signing off on this for the firm to carry.

Cannot. Express. Enough. How. Shoddy. This. Is.