The best and worst retailers for DIY furniture

Over the last year, DIY became more popular than ever as we spent more time in our homes, and more money perfecting them. But with many of us choosing to ‘do it ourselves’, which retailers offer the best and worst experience?

Using social listening to capture disappointed posts from customers over the last year, GTSE¹, the one-stop-shop for home and workplace solutions, has revealed which established retailers received the most negative attention online for their flat pack furniture.

According to the findings, the top ten retailers with the most negative attention are as follows:

Rank	Brand	Total number of negative posts
1	Very	30,332
2	IKEA	28,494
3	M&S	12,013
4	The Cotswold Company	10,065
5	Oak World	7,647
6	B&Q	6,684
7	Amazon	3,708
8	Wayfair	3,527
9	eBay	1,953
10	Oak Furnitureland	1,351

Retailer Very is considered by Brits to be the worst for self-assembled furniture. In fact, the brand received 30,332 dissatisfied social reviews over the last 12-month period, averaging a staggering 83 bad reviews per day. Not far behind is IKEA. Despite being famed for its flat pack offering, the retailer gained a whopping 28,494 dissatisfied comments across social media – that’s nearly 550 negative reviews every single week!

While there’s a host of flat pack furniture brands that have received thousands of negative social media comments in the last year, the reliable household favourite is Next having received only 16 negative reviews. Wilko follows as the second-best retailer (73 negative reviews) whilst Dunelm takes the third spot (91 negative reviews).

Commenting on the research, Tom Armenante, Ecommerce Director at GTSE, says: “With flat pack furniture, the main issues often include the absence of straightforward instructions or the furniture taking too long to build. Alternatively, customers may have suffered bad customer service, or a sluggish online shopping experience, which prompted them to express their grief via social media.

“For those looking to buy self-assembly furniture, before making the purchase, we’d always recommend reading the reviews to see what other customers have to say. Not only that, but it’s important that you have the right equipment in your home to help you build your furniture – some retailers will often state what’s needed, so it’s best to doublecheck.”