C-I Cabinets, Inc.

The confusion comes in not to the craftsmanship, but the change in satisfaction by the customerWe highly speculate the customer who selected the finish was satisfied until her husband expressed his extreme disapproval with the choice. In order to keep peace in the family, Frontier Cabinetry has become the desired scapegoat for an independent decision. As far as the ‘experts’ go, we completed the project to the custom specifications we were hired to do. Gary ***, the project contractor, could certainly attest to the validity of Ms***’s decision and what she was toldOf course, since Ms*** is an expert of construction as well, the contractor was let go midway through the job because she apparently knows more about building a home than he does. We have attempted reconciliation with exactly what the customer first requested but that changed and now it’s not enoughOur attempt to address concerns was met by an even longer list of items that were demanded. Our production schedule is very tight and we have little flexibility to go back and address requests like this. We agreed to repaint the items in question when an opening in our schedule occurred, but declined the offer. Our warranty is clearly stated both on our brochures and our website: “Our products are warranted to be free from defects in material and workmanship for a period of three years from the date of purchase. We will replace without charge products found by us to be defective. This is the sole and exclusive warranty for our products. The buyer should be aware that our products are made with natural wood material and therefore may vary slightly from a sample. All products are made to order. We will honor requests to the best of our ability.” The custom cabinets were built to the specifications that the customer ordered. Having a change in heart of the wood and finish after completion is not a warranty issue

I am rejecting this response because:
Dave [redacted] from Frontier Cabinets was on site to install the cabinets sometime between June 5-6. When I was here, I only saw what had been installed on the perimeter, he had not completed the island install (I have photos chronicling (see Attachments 1, taken June 5, 2017), so I did not see the yellow spots prior to him completing our project. I do not understand how there could be any confusion. Both my husband and I communicated our disappointment verbally and via email multiple times to Dave. As soon as we saw the marks on the kitchen (after he was done), I reached out to Dave in an email on June 8 (Attachment 2) indicating we had concerns – namely the yellow markings. The bleeding has gotten significantly worse with sunlight, see attached photos (Attachment 3). These photos were taken 8.1.17. Nearly every cabinet door/face is impacted. On, or around June 9, since I did not have luck getting a response from Dave, my husband [redacted] called him to discuss. Dave tried to convince him that he delivered the finished product we agreed. At the end of the conversation, Dave agreed to come up and check out the door faces. I followed up with an email outlining what we hoped to resolve this situation on June 10 (Attachment 4), in the same email I indicated that our counters were coming and we needed to schedule at time to remedy. I again followed up with an email dated June 13 (Attachment 5) because Dave had not responded. At no time in any of our conversations did Dave indicate that our cabinets would look different than the sample. In fact, he is the one that suggested the pine, indicating that since we were having them painted and glazed there would be no visible difference. Dave makes the statement in two of his responses (to our complaints) that our project turned out great and we will be very happy. We have already established that we are not happy with the way the kitchen turned out. If we wanted knots showing through our painted cabinets, why would we not have stained them instead to save money? The only reason the bathroom cabinets are not an issue is because thankfully we choose black paint and so the bleed through does not show.  We have absolutely nothing from Dave prior or during our process that indicates we should have expected these results. He did not verbally warn us, he did not present samples that match what we have as a finished product, and he gave us nothing in writing indicating that we could have issues. I followed up with another email on June 18 (Attachment 6- email and response). Dave did not respond with a solution, only that mine would only be possible at our expense.  Ironically, several of Dave’s emails makes the statement, “I’m a little confused”. I don’t think we have left any room for confusion. We are extremely disappointed and unhappy with our kitchen cabinets. Dave response on June 20 (Attachment 7) finally concedes to come up and try to fix the issue, but he would not guarantee his work. Since Dave is not confident in his expertise, as he indicated, and he cannot guarantee the result, we do not feel confident that he is capable of fixing our cabinets to our satisfaction—and quite frankly he has been very difficult to work with. The issue with the darkening spots has gotten worse. It is no longer contained to the island. Since we have moved into our home, the spots are showing throughout the kitchen. We are currently waiting for two final estimates from experts who were quickly able to identify the issue and do feel there is a solution. However, it will require completely re-painting and glazing the cabinets to solve the issue. I would not recommend Frontier Cabinets services to anyone. During the course of our project, we paid Dave [redacted] of Frontier Cabinets a total of $43,809.18 (Attachments 8-12). We are very disappointed by our experience dealing with Frontier Cabinetry and do not understand how he could think our kitchen cabinets are acceptable. It did not take much to investigate the cause of the spots through internet research. All Dave would have had to do (if in fact, he really did not have any experience painting pine--something I find hard to believe in 35 years in the industry) is research online the best way to prepare this knotty pine for painting. He should have done this before he sold me on the cabinets! What I discovered is that it takes several coats of shellac or expensive, quality stain-blocking primer to prevent the extractive bleed through (which is sap), but ultimately IT IS NOT A GOOD IDEA TO USE KNOTTY PINE FOR PAINTED PROJECTS. Additionally, it is necessary to use an oil-based paint on pine (not water-based paint). I am certain that Dave did not use a good, quality stain-blocking primer (affirmed by three professional painters) and am not sure he used an oil-based paint for coverage.  I have included a few references below I found referencing the issue we have in our kitchen; if you click on the first hyperlink you will see a photo that resembles what is happening with our cabinets: The only method I have found that works 100% to hide these stains is to use a two-part epoxy marine paint as your primer. Reason being that two-part epoxies cure by chemical cross-linking as opposed to most paints that cure by solvent/water evaporation. The cured epoxy film makes an impervious barrier for the wood resins. Of course, these epoxy paints are expensive so the moral of the story is: don't use knotty pine if you can afford clear pine (or whatever species suits your fancy).  Extracted online from: https://woodworking.stackexchange.com/questions/1976/dealing-with-knots-bleeding...⇄ At this point, we will pursue reimbursement from Frontier Cabinets for the repainting of all of our kitchen cabinets through the courts. We will not welcome Dave into our home, as we do not trust him or his ability to fix the cabinets correctly. We have a professional cabinet painter from Baxter and a furniture painter from Bemidji submitting detailed estimates of the scope of work to resolve our issue and both will guarantee their work, unlike Dave. We hope to have the project completed before the end of the year (2017). There is also the unresolved issue of the two island drawers we had to have retro-fitted and now don’t have the soft close feature due to Dave not figuring in the room for the gas pipes that run at the back of the island cabinets. Something an experienced cabinetmaker should have made allowance in design. At no point in any of Dave’s responses did he acknowledge the issues with the drawers or the spice rack he charged us $150.00 (IT DOES NOT FIT IN ANY OF THE DRAWERS). We paid a finish carpenter $50.00 (Attachment 13), receipt from Top Cut Finish to get the drawers to fit in the island, something Dave should have done as part of our contract. We would like reimbursement now for the spice rack, which we will gladly ship to him once receive once we receive the $150.00 we paid and he sends a pre-paid shipping label, and for the work that was done on the two drawers in the kitchen $50.00. A total of $200.00, plus shipping costs. Further, we would like our complaint posted on the Better Bureau’s site to help prevent any future customers from having to go through this same process with Frontier.  Sincerely, [redacted] & [redacted]