Today, if you have searched the internet and are looking for seating for you new theater room, you will be overwhelmed with the choices. Sadly, every Tom, Dick and Harry have jumped into this market, both high quality and downright Junk! Many of these links are all the same. They are NOT manufacturers, but importers of the latest ripe off of what appear to be great seating options. Funny thing is if you compare the first four or five listed companies, you will notice the little block next to them that says “AD” or paid ad specifically. Is that bad? Well, this is the way they maintain their top position on page one! Most people never make it past page one on any search for items they are looking to purchase. The other thing you may notice is just about every seating style they offer are the same as the other three or four top listed companies. Why, might you ask? Because they purchase them from the same Chinese manufacturers!
There are a hand full of American based manufacturers who have survived the onslaught of these distributors, discount box stores and or liquidation companies moving what is in stock. Most will only offer a few upholstery options, colors or configuration. Anytime you fill the channel with levels of distribution or pass along product from offshore to U.S. distributor, to sales representatives, on to retailers, commission salesman in the store, etc., the price goes up. What suffers is the quality to try and stay competitive with whatever else out there is being sold. Why not cut out all the middlemen and buy as direct as possible. A few American, family-owned businesses, focused on this category of Home Theater or Entertainment furniture, may offer a more direct buying opportunity. You will be able to customize your seating to exactly what you want, because it will be built to your specifications.
For example, over the twenty plus years PremiereHTS Home Theater Seating has been around, there are just another three or four doing the same. I can think of Acoustic Innovations, First Impressions and CinemaTech to mention the pioneers who, like PremiereHTS, still offer the highest quality seating available and made in America! Some of these company’s design and fabricate the entire room, other specifically specialize in seating alone, like PremiereHTS!
If you try and search for theater seating manufacturers alone, you many find the companies that specialize in the public movie theater arena and not the home recliner type you may be more interested in. Don’t be fooled by those making what appear to be home theater recliners, that are now being installed in the mega theaters. I don’t know about you, but my experience in the public theaters where they have installed these, “so-called home theater seats,” they are uncomfortable and wish they has left their tall back seats of old…
When I have searched, Houzz, Wayfair and Overstock, and try and determine the cover material, whether, vinyl matched, bonded leather, manual, etc., it is unclear. At $3800-$4000 for a connected group of three, you can find much higher quality for near the same! Do yourself a favor and drill through multiple pages of your search and real beware! “Nobody was ever sorry for buying the BEST!”
Michael Laurino CEO/President PremiereHTS Home Theater Seating www.premierehts.com
