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sofa so good

a consultancy service for furniture shops.
  (+21, -1)(+21, -1)(+21, -1)
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o.k. it’s the new year and you have set your heart on a new sofa or bed or whatever in the sales; however you have learned from experience that sometimes on taking delivery of a new expensive piece, you cannot actually move it successfully through the hall into the living room or up the stairs and around the twisty bit to smoothly hump whatever it is into the bedroom.

you may have known the humiliating experience of having to exchange your new sofa for a more modest (smaller) one or perhaps you have gone to great frustrating lengths like dismantling the piece into manageable portions or even removed the front wall of the house…

before making any final payment, this in-store consultancy service will load some of your meticulous measurements and a few basic photographs of such elementary features such as front door, hall, staircases (with or without nasty twisty bits), existing furniture too heavy to lift etc. into their software programme. the consultant can then proceed to bring the shape of your new purchase to the virtual image of your front door and proceed to manoeuvre it around your house.

the consultant will then print out the final recommendations prior to the sale and you will be either advised to proceed with the sale or to make another choice.

sometimes the item will * just * about squeeze around your house and * just * about fit into the desired nook or cranny and in this circumstance, the consultant’s print-out will have detailed instructions and clear pictures of each stage in the battle to achieve this. how the sofa should be tilted at so many degrees at a pre-determined height to get it through the front door and then tilted backwards and turned on its axis to get it up the stairs.

po, Jan 04 2007

Bose Consultancy service...similar to this Idea http://www.boseindi...nsultant-index.aspx
Check it out 21Quest! [yourdenz, Jan 05 2007]

Sofa King. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sofa_King
[po, Jan 06 2007]


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Annotation:







       Suggested reading: "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency," by the late Douglas Adams.
jutta, Jan 04 2007
  

       I once cut a sofa in half to get it out of my guest room easily. +++
nomocrow, Jan 04 2007
  

       I watched two furniture guys trying to get my couch around a tight corner, while they were holding the couch hortizontally. I had to tell them to flip up the couch vertically in order to get it through the hallway. They could not figure this out themselves.   

       I think your invention would also assist the world's furniture delivery men. I don't really blame them - how well can you think when you are carrying a heavy couch.
flynn, Jan 04 2007
  

       Bake it, bake it! I had to cut my bannister down when I moved into my new house so I could get the sofa in. It took me a year and a half to get round to fixing it. (+)
jtp, Jan 04 2007
  

       I look forward to the Ikea-produced furniture moving instructions (they don't seem to have included the extra hand I need to pick this damned thing up).
fridge duck, Jan 05 2007
  

       //Suggested reading: "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency//
Funny, that's about the only thing I remember from that book.
  

       //how well can you think when you are carrying a heavy couch.//
It's when it is about to land on my foot from dropping it that my thought processes tend to speed up.
  

       As for the idea: I've got one word for you, "inflatable blow-up furniture."   

       Oh, and a bun for you, po. I hope it fits.
NotTheSharpestSpoon, Jan 05 2007
  

       cue: skinflaps.
po, Jan 05 2007
  

       Gonflable exploding furniture test and fitting service, yay.
skinflaps, Jan 05 2007
  

       I used to deliver household appliances, fridges, freezers, washing machines etc.   

       I remember one job was delivering a large chest freezer to a Chinese restaurant. Before we could install it in the basement, we had to remove the old one. In this instance, the owners had at some point enthusiastically replastered the staircase to the cellar, meaning that the (gap between the) walls and ceiling of the stairwell were considerably smaller than at the time of the freezer's initial installation.   

       In the end, after trying every conceivable nuance of pitch, yaw and roll, we spent half an hour enthusiastically "unplastering" the stairwell using hammers and a crowbar, before finally emerging, covered in dust and plaster, dragging out behind us into the light, an old chest freezer that hadn't seen the light of day in 20 years or so.
zen_tom, Jan 05 2007
  

       This reminds me of "Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency".
Veho, Jan 05 2007
  

       + I love it, as I have witnessed two guys with a chain saw cut open a doorway to move a stove.
xandram, Jan 05 2007
  

       Few notes :   

       One : The title "sofa so good" copied from a hoarding of a famous sofa maker...not naming for obvious reasons.   

       Two: Idea similar to what another top player in the Audio Players/Sound systems Industry does...They send out their technical consultants to the customers house to see what kinda system (configuration) suits your drawing room and how that needs to be setup and only then will take the order.   

       Above idea has just changed the product and used the same concept   

       Any views friends !!
yourdenz, Jan 05 2007
  

       http://www.sofasogood.ca
yourdenz, Jan 05 2007
  

       Bose does similar consultation!
yourdenz, Jan 05 2007
  

       in other words, yourd, you believe that I plagiarised both title AND idea? I love it!   

       btw this idea has nothing to do with designer music systems or kitchens or designer anything else...
po, Jan 05 2007
  

       Why not Sofa King?
Cuit_au_Four, Jan 05 2007
  

       //the late Douglas Adams.// Crap. I didn't know that. + I've been through this before. Taking doors off hinges & stuff.
Zimmy, Jan 06 2007
  

       I've got a wall unit that's so large it won't make any of the turns in my front hall to get into the living room so we had to bring it in over the patio wall (one benefit of ground-floor living). Even then, my 2 nephews whinged and mewled at having to lift the thing up 5 feet. (It only weighs about 40 lbs but it's 5 ft wide and 7 ft tall)   

       Bun for po, it's in the credenza. Bone for yourdenz, on the back porch.   

       And I'm just glad AfroAssault didn't read the "blow-up furniture" part.
Canuck, Jan 07 2007
  

       As a removal man I think this idea should be mandatory in all furniture show rooms. Or at least the sales person should ask a few pertinent questions, ie. Do you live in a house or a flat? How wide is your hallway? Are there any tight corners in your hall?   

       Personally I blame the big furniture chain stores for having massive discount sales and encouraging people living in small council flats to buy furniture designed for large, detached houses. I also blame the likes of Linda Barker for designing such furniture with little or no regard for how aforesaid furniture might conceivably get into place.   

       I have lost count of the amount of times we've had to get windows taken out, door jamb's removed and other such things to allow an over-sized sofa to get into a customers house.   

       @[flynn] They were obviously not very good removal men, or else, giving them the benefit of the doubt, it was maybe at the end of a very long and frustrating day for them and they were suffering from brain freeze.   

       //smoothly hump whatever it is into the bedroom.// ha hah ha haa, i love your turn of phrase Po!   

       So a big bun to Po for hitting on an idea that would ease the pain of us poor demented removal men.
Salmon Of Doubt, Jan 07 2007
  

       //i love your turn of phrase Po!//   

       <curtsey>
po, Jan 08 2007
  

       <bow>   

       Oh, while I remember. "Sofa so good" is what we usually say after maneuvering a particularly troublesome couch around the first right angle bend in a hallway. This is all too often followed by, "So near and yet sofa" when we find out that aforesaid couch will not make it through the lounge door no matter which set of n-dimensions we twist and turn it.
Salmon Of Doubt, Jan 08 2007
  

       do you go home to a much needed whisky and sofa?
po, Jan 09 2007
  

       Although it's rare for the delivery men to spend the whole day with you. Sofa all you know, they could be knocking back the whisky between jobs.
imaginality, Jan 09 2007
  

       Sorry if that came across as a slur; I divan mean it.
imaginality, Jan 09 2007
  

       Remembrances of jobs past: furniture and appliance delivery. Side-by-side refrigerator, one skinny delivery man fresh out of college (me), a rickety set of steel stairs with two 90° turns on the way to a 28" doorway. Didn't measure the fridge before mounting the stairs. I wound up removing the screen door, the main door, and the doors from the fridge before I got it in. Nobody helped.   

       Repossessed it five weeks later. They didn't help then, either. Large, inflexible, scratch-up-the-walls bun.
elhigh, Jan 09 2007
  

       //Although it's rare for the delivery men to spend the whole day with you. Sofa all you know, they could be knocking back the whisk(e)y between jobs.//   

       I recliner to comment on that...   

       Although it does surprise me how many customers like to give us beers for a job well done. Or, if handing a tip over usually say, "There you go, that'll get you and the lads a few pints tonight". I assume that removal men must have a reputation of being heavy drinkers. I rarely drink after work and often have beer (given to me by customers) in my fridge for anything up to two months before it finally gets drunk.   

       [elhigh] I've been in many a similar situation. One thing that does cheer me up is when people have a double glazed front door which can be lifted off it's hinges without tools or even much hassle. Customers are usually shocked and amazed, thinking it's a massive security risk but of course it only works if the door is open in the first place.
Salmon Of Doubt, Jan 09 2007
  


 

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