2023 UK Kitchen Comparison - Wren, DIY Kitchens, Howdens, Magnet & Wickes Review

hi guys behind me here I have created my own little kitchen showroom I have bought and installed five identical kitchens from five of the biggest kitchen retailers in the UK Ren DIY kitchens howland's magnet and Wicks I'll be reviewing everything from each retailer including their quality price delivery and packaging installation ease cabinet construction and edging doors drawers hinges and features plus I'll be giving away one of these kitchens for free to one of my subscribers so please hit the Bell so you can get all the notifications and subscribe and tell your friends this video will have chapters please use the scroll bar or click on the time in the description or pin comments below the video to get to the part you're most interested in I filmed everything from when the kitchens were delivered unpacked installed and obviously our opinion on it all of these kitchens were purchased in May 2023 and I'll disclose as I go any offers I received as a consumer I didn't receive any trade discounts as I wanted this to be for you guys at home so you know what to pay I must declare I have an interest in DIY kitchens for those that have seen my videos before but this is a completely unbiased View and the terminology I may use from time to time might not be completely accurate because I'm an electrician at heart even though I do project manage these things for a living right let's show you around the five kitchens so all five kitchens have been delivered I've got four in the garage here luckily I have a double length garage so we're going to install four kitchens in here and then the fifth kitchen which is a Wix kitchen is going to be in the um old living room I'll show you every one of them how they're packaged how they came slightly different which is interesting um can't complain about any of the delivery drivers all really nice two man teams put all the units in didn't have to lift a finger it was fairly easy because the garage is obviously on the drive but nonetheless very very good delivery starting on our left we've got DIY kitchens 1884 pounds and 92 that's this section here I'll go for everything in more detail in a minute this section in the blue wrap is magnet 2989 pounds and 23 P the back left is Ren and that's 3400 or 14 pounds of 39p and that's all this section in here and then this with the blue wrap over here and the white wrap as well is from howden's 2695 60. so the first things to note are that DIY kitchens and ren come probably how I would prefer it the best so they come in this unpack Edition earlier the doors attached so cardboard on the outside with these tags and the door is attached already same over here with Ren cardboard either side Wren branded straps all the way around and the door is attached as you could see the door was this sort of beigey color here that differs completely from howdens and magnet so howden's as you can see from this one here you can see all the way through no doors attached and all the doors here coming separately and the same with magnet at the front these are all the doors down here and one I prepared earlier taking the blue wrapping off you can see no doors on there it's a small thing but if you're thinking about all the aspects of how these things come then having the doors is another step you have to take some Carpenters actually do take off the doors is the first thing but it is extra work putting all the hinges on and putting all the doors on if you're going to think about how much these things are going to cost a carpet so it's probably going to charge you more um for magnet and howdens for that very reason I've learned that all four can't really complain about how they've come and how they've been delivered and I'll start unwrapping and get the kitchen is from Wix and it's 3515 pounds and 17p as you can probably see behind me it is flat pack which has its positives and negatives in this case one positive straight off the bat is it takes up so little room compared to the other four you've seen me film earlier um it's really in such a small area taking up only a couple of meters space so if you were renovating your kitchen um you could probably order this before the old kitchen's even removed and store it somewhere quite easily the negatives obviously huge negative is that you have to build it yourself or pay for someone a carpenter or kitchen fitter um to fit it as well so it's going to be an extra cost it's obviously very well labeled as you'd hope and this is the the Larder frame here as you can see labeled and we've got M panels down the side here box of feet and screws and things so everything is very professionally done as you'd hope um as one of the more expensive kitchens or the most expensive kitchen actually which did surprise me um but yeah the biggest negative for me is having to build it yourself but absolutely great if you don't have a lot of space and if you need to get a kitchen say upstairs in a flat um or yeah there's no lift or tight access into a property this sort of thing is perfect because it's all all comes flat pack I'm ready for someone to do the work right as you can see behind me hopefully if I tour a little bit all four kitchens are unpacked apart from the ones with the separate doors I didn't want to damage them um I'll speak about the quality aspect of these kitchens in more detail once we've installed them but just first observations so this is the one from DIY kitchens all the doors came attached all the drawers came attached they put the shelves in the bottom of each one and they have a separate box of feet Ren similar DIY kitchens all the doors come fitted on the drawers again are inside and they just put the feet in each one so they don't have a separate box then they just have a bag of fittings and things howdens so I haven't unwrapped the doors yet as I don't want to damage them much easier to move and lighter because obviously they don't have the doors on so that's a benefit if you're shifting them around on your own however if there's two of you I would probably prefer it with the doors on personally feet in each one and interestingly the cabinets are all sorts of colors really we've got different types of wood everywhere so one type of wood here a dark gray here white internally and there's a light gray on this drawer unit as well so sort of four different types of wood which I think is fairly unusual and actually I forgot to mention Ren and a few dark gray bits randomly as well I find that interesting because I wonder why they do it maybe it's slightly cheaper wood maybe it's wood left over but it's interesting because DIY kitchens is all white in the cabinets and outside so it's just something I've observed and lastly magnet again doors off so I've left them to do once we fit the kitchen and some different colors as well so they've got gray internally and then white on the inside of the cupboard so that'd be really interesting to see why they've done that one it's all installed so that's it now it's time to get my around to give me a hand and we're going to install the five kitchens um I'll mention make sure I go inside and get Wicks done as well and uh let's get cracking [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] thank you [Applause] [Music] thank you [Music] foreign [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] all right [Music] foreign [Music] kitchens [Music] Kitchen number two from magnet Kitchen number three from Ren and Kitchen Number Four from howdens I'll cut to the Wick's kitchen as I could only fit four kitchens in my garage and that's my fifth kitchen and I'll use this DIY kitchens one example of what we've ordered identical for each one so they all have ladder cupboards with wire work 500 mil wide they will have a three drawer pan drawer 600 mil wide oven housing 600 mil a 600 mil just plain cupboard with shelves and then a 1 000 unit sink with a 1 000 top box or bridging unit above and then two 500 units either side the idea usually is you leave a hundred mil either side for the extractor all of them are handlerless or J pool as it might have also heard this one is from DIY kitchens and is their Luca gloss range and it came in at 1884 pounds and 92. coming over to magnet as I said exactly the same for everything this is their Luna cashmere gloss and that came in at 2989 pounds and 23 Pence Ren exactly the same and this is the infinity plus handle us in cream that came in at 3 414 pounds and 39p and lastly in the garage before I cut to Wix is howdens at 2 695 pounds 60 for their Clark and well gloss in sound the fifth Kitchen in my living room is this one by wix and it is the Sophia gloss in cream and that came in at 3 515 pounds and 17p exactly the same as the other four the only difference being they don't do a 1 000 bridging unit so I had to put a 900 up here but otherwise exactly the same this one is in the living room as it was a flat pack so I just needed a bit more room to work and put it together with my Carpenter and as you can see one bit is missing but I'll talk about that in my video um there were a few kitchens that were damaged and missing bits and everyone else sent all the things really quickly but this one unfortunately after two weeks still isn't here right let's get started on the review let's start with something about the quality of the doors so are they wrapped and painted which is a better quality or are they edged which is a poorer quality um I'll explain the difference as I go as I can actually physically show you on the kitchens which was great about this um and I'll put all the tables up as we begin but DIY kitchens Wicks and rim were all wrapped which is the better quality and howden's magnet were etched which is the poorer quality so to show you an edged unit it's basically as you'd expect the words to sort of say I don't know if you can see this faint line on the door really hopefully I'm picking this up so that is what edged means when you can actually see the physical edge of the door whereas on DIY kitchens for example if I open the right side there's no visible edging and that's just called wrapped or painted fully and the same with these ones up here so Wren is wrapped no visible Edge on there magnet over here just has that faint faint faint line where you can see the edge and it just means it's a slightly poorer quality Wix also wrapped so better quality and no edging there here's the gloss finish on the doors mirror-like which is a higher quality uh you can see the reflection of say these lights in them or does it have an orange peel effect which if you look really closely it looks like the outside of an orange or the little bubbles so the results of this one were DIY kitchens Wicks and ren were all mirror-like so better quality and how does a magnet were the orange peel effect which were the poorer quality again I'll show you what each of them are hopefully the camera picks this up so howland's is the poorer quality so if you just look at into the light hopefully the camera picks up that you can just see little almost like crevices and I'll see if the magnet one picks it up too so these are slightly poorer quality on the magnet and how does just because you can see those tiny little bumps whereas you look at the better quality ones DIY kitchens and ren are mirror-like as is wix so what is the thickness of the units and what is the thickness of the doors it goes without saying that the thicker both means a better quality um thinner doors usually mean poorer quality so all five companies had an 18 mil unit and or then the doors differed between 19 mil for wicks 20 mil for howdens and magnet and 22 mil for DIY kitchens and Ren and I'll just show you now so why is a thick door important I've spoken earlier about why the thickness of the doors is important however what I didn't really go into is the technicalities of it so in for instance with this ladder cupboard or pretending this is a integrated fridge for example it's much better to have a thick door because you've got so much weight on these shelves imagine if it was full of all your your beans and your things like that it's going to be really heavy or if it's an integrated fridge it's going to be heavy so it's important that it it's a nice thick door to stand the test of time exactly the same if it was saying integrated dishwasher or something like that opening and closing it constantly it's better to have a nice solid thick door a thicker door also has a deeper wider recess that is better for those with long nails or arthritis things like that so these things sound obvious that a thicker door is better but actually in Practical terms it's something that's really important and one of the most important things when choosing a kitchen is the front of the door the same color as the back this is basically a quality thing as well and a cost saving thing um so obviously it's way cheaper just to paint the front of the door for these kitchen manufacturers so usually the better quality in my opinion is the companies that do it both sides which in this case was DIY kitchens and howdens so Ren Wicks and magnet did not do that so I'll show you quickly DIY kitchens as is howdens same color front and back and there is magnet Ren and wicks it slightly differs in color in the back was there anything missing from the delivery and was anything damaged either during the manufacturing process or maybe on delivery as well I'm not too strict on these companies because these things are happen we're all human and these things can be damaged at any time the companies who were good were DIY kitchens nothing missing nothing damaged howdens nothing missing nothing damaged magnet as you can see we have the drawer front which is here we have the drawer but they were missing the hinges or class to actually fit one to another I've requested it it's been two weeks and I still haven't received the delivery so unfortunately there has to be noted Rin so we had two damaged items here one on this corner here there was a bit of damage and one there's a on this wall unit here there's a bit of damage I've saved these units here so that's the damage on the top box and on the wall you've got a tiny bit down the bottom there for Wix there was a missing draw so it's flat pack obviously so the drawers and the drawer fronts come separately this is the draw from and the drawer was missing I've requested it two weeks ago and unfortunately it still hasn't arrived must say though the customer service teams on all five companies are really good these sort of things do happen during Transit so don't hold it really high on the scale of um who's the best and who's the worst kitchen and you can easily get Replacements sent for any damaged items but this one a magnet a little slow to send The Replacements unfortunately and I've got a film and show it how it is how many items made up the delivery so this really surprised me as I thought some of them were just too excessive DIY kitchens behind me nine howden's 20. over here magnet also 20. Ren 10 and Wix next door had a huge 29 but that is higher obviously because it's a flat pack kitchen everything's separate on there so you for just the pan drawer for example you have free packaging for just the drawer fronts and then six packages just for the drawers because they come in two for each drawer so you've got nine units just for a pan drawer which obviously is a bit excessive um what I didn't like about the other kitchens as well as howdens all of them had carble wrapping which is what you'd expect house has had an additional layer of just plastic around the edge as well which I just see is completely unnecessary and un environmentally friendly but yeah Wren and DIY kitchen's really good at 9 and 10 pieces I don't know why the others have to have so much packaging it's because they ship magnet and Howden ship with the doors separately so the kitchen floor has to fit the doors so again it's more packaging for me it's just much better if the doors and drawers and everything's fitted less packaging less waste were the cabinets rigid assembled yep so DIY kitchens howdens magnet and ren all rigid assembled which basically means come pre-built um and they were all glue and dowel and Wicks as you'd expect were not rigid assembled as it was flat pack and that's called camon doubt so that's a different way of of them being made up as you'd expect rigid assembled is better and grew endow is also stronger so the four in this Carriage here feature much higher than Wix unfortunately but that's just because it's flat pack well the cabinets sturdy um yeah generally I'd say they all were other than Wicks due to as I've mentioned not being manufactured as well because it's flat pack so it can't be um howlands was slightly wobbly but then Ren DIY kitchen is a magnet really sturdy um so no complaints about those how did the units come so DIY kitchens and random came exactly the same so they were pre-built rigid assembled with the doors drawers hinges attached really good for Carpenters because they can literally just start installing it there and then and don't have to do anything themselves howdens and magnet were slightly different and that they came with the units rigid assembled but they had the doors separate so that means the carpenter has to put the doors on which I mean Carpenters do usually take the doors off to make them lighter but it's still just extra time putting the hinges on putting the brackets on and putting the doors on later stage where you can just literally flip a door off in seconds so I much prefer the way Ren and DIY kitchens were doing it ever so slight differences with howden's um a magnet so they came with the actual drawers in themselves in magnet and you just have to put the drawer fronts on and howdens did something ever so slightly different to that where they just had the shelves already in in here whereas for example on DIY kitchens the shelves are at the bottom and then you have to put them in yourself so ever so slight difference but much further away Ren and DIY kitchens do it Wix obviously everything came separately as it was flat pack so the units were separate the drawers were separate the drawer fronts were separate and it's the same with a wall unit like this so you've got a separate cabinet separate door and then the shelves and stuff are in with the cabinet and then you've got boxes of hinges lots of plastic and waste in that regard as well so a big one how much do these kitchens cost I've already mentioned earlier on in the video but these results really surprised me starting with DIY kitchens behind me 1884 pounds and 92 P the next cheapest was howdens 2695 pounds and 60p the next cheapest was magnet 2989 pounds and 23p Ren 4th 3414 pound and 39p and in fifth Wicks at 3515 pounds and 17p I must say Rick surprised me the most being fifth or most expensive if you want to put it that way um because it's flat back I assume flat pack would be the cheapest as it was the most aggravation put it into context it took about a day to build and then another day to install um things like the larger cupboard and hand drawers are quite complicated the wall unit and any spanned base units are fairly simple but the ladder cover took quite a lot of work and DIY kitchens are ready in comparison because they come rigid assembled with the doors and drawers attached hinges on they took about half a day each to install those kitchens whereas this was nearly two more like one one day and a half but one whole day just to just to set it all up is a big thing to point out but the prices uh unbelievable from DIY kitchens 1884 pounds and 92p howden's worth 43 more expensive than them magnet 59 more expensive than them ran 81 higher than them and 86 percent of this week's one so DIY kitchens winning that head and shoulders so I wanted to talk a little bit about the quotes I received the thing I like about DIY kitchens and what I dislike about howden's magnet Ren and Wicks is that with DIY kitchens the price is just the price um you go on their website you put things in your basket and then that's the price they sometimes do a 10 deal across the website but it's the same deal for everyone with these other four retailers what you find is one guy down the road might get a different price to you and I find that very strange and then I'll talk a little bit more about magnet and ren in particular but I received over 5 000 pounds off which seems really good from the RRP but to me it's just a bit of a farcical thing because there's no way that's 8 000 pounds worth of units so DIY kitchens was 1884 pounds 92 and I would get the same price as you guys at home which is what I like and it just shows if they were if we were to get them on their 10 off that might come down to sort of higher 16s low 17s which is such a good price magnet on the other hand 2989 pounds and 23p this price already started off at 8 233 pounds 50. now there's no way eight units in my opinion are worth eight thousand pounds so that's nearly 1 000 pounds per unit you imagine paying one thousand pounds for that and I know that's not the price I ended up paying but I just find the whole back and forth with discounts and things a little bit annoying and I wish the price could just be the price for everyone exactly the same for Ren 3414 pounds and 39p that started off as 7038 pounds and 99p so I received about 50 discount just from applying and to me again it's just a bit of a a bit of a hula and I'm hoping that no one actually pays that retail price of seven thousand or eight thousand for these two kitchens because it's far too much at nearly a thousand pounds a piece maybe they just discounts most people received however with rrp's it does mean that someone has to pay it I guess howden's 2695 pounds and 60p so on this one I received a flat 25 discount um it was a new account and that's just what they applied to it apart from one thing you can see that was 30 again howdens is one where I could get 25 as a first-time customer um but someone down the road could get 30 40 50 and I just don't like the practice I wish the price could be the same for everyone like DIY kitchens does and then lastly Wix was was there a discount on here again yeah so this already was the most expensive kitchen but the total list price was four five nine and five before any discounts um and I got a 10 trade Pro discount which usually is only given to trades but I got it on this inquiry as a retailer and there was 15 off as well but it's interesting to show that Wix is the most expensive but actually the list price was only four five nine live compared to 8 000 for magnet and seven thousand for REM but obviously which just didn't give a bigger discount and maybe someone else would get a bigger discount so yeah just something I wanted to point out that I just think four of the five retailers the way they operate with the salesman and their commissions I just don't like and I wish they could all be a bit more like DIY kitchens where you and I all pay the same price next up do the suppliers provide sample doors so four of them do um magnet Wren howdens and DIY kitchens Wicks only provide color swatches at the moment and don't provide samples DIY kitchens provide three samples for free with six pound delivery that's exactly the same for howlands but you must make a design appointment first and that's also exactly the same with magnet so three free samples after a design appointment um Wix as I mentioned only the color swatches and their two pound per Swatch with free delivery and ren yes they provide samples but you must purchase in store again so do the pan draws I have integrated soft close hinges like Miss howland's example yes and that was yes for all five kitchens so they all have integrated soft close hinges and we're all really good how many external cabinet colors does each supplier Supply not included in bespoke colors as obviously most of these companies do offer bespoke colors too DIY kitchens behind me offer seven howdens three magnet over here also three Ren three and wicks in the living room only two what depth for the pan draws I just wanted to let you know which ones have the deepest pen draws for the most room um and the results were DIY kitchens with 48 how gone through 43 magnet with 47 and a half weeks with 42 and a half and rent with 48 centimeters so Ren and DIY kitchens have the most oh I measured that in this example handy having the back of the drawer open like that was literally just measuring from front to back as so next up what are the Cabernet exteriors and do they match the doors starting behind me with DIY kitchens the color of the cabinet exterior is alabaster and that does match the door as you can see nicely there howdens as you can see they've got multiple things which I said when I was unpacking it which I thought was a bit strange so you've got white on the inside dark gray here light gray here which admittedly won't be seen um but I still find it slightly odd so obviously they do not match these doors the unit's being white here and you wouldn't in this case need end panels which is quite important to think of DIY kitchens though that you wouldn't need an end panel and is a bit of a saving going down to magnet you have white and gray so white on the inside here as you can see Gray on the trim around here so when you can see the doors opening but they still do not match the doors are tall unfortunately and ren Pebble Gray which does match the doors nicely like DIY kitchens and on Wix we have a white cabinet with a cream door so again that does not match and you would need to use M panels in this example do the cabinets have hinge holes on both sides as well so again the door can be flipped either way but I see it as a negative as um you've obviously got a big hole or cap on your door like this one behind me so the companies will do well on this was DIY kitchens they again made it bespoke so there's only huge holes on one side but unfortunately howdens magnet red and Wicks both have the hinge holes on both sides so this is the howden's one hinge holes on the right hand side I think it's unsightly obviously they've given caps but you can still see the two holes where the hinge was supposed to be whereas if you compare that to DIY kitchens no hinge holes Ren hinge holes and as you can see that's what it looks like without the cap really aren't attractive in my opinion if you're spending all this money it's not something I want to see and then magnet too wicks also hinge holes both sides and that's how it looks before the cap as I say they prefer caps but it doesn't look very attractive when the doors open in my opinion so one to five who is my best to worst kitchen number one has to be DIY kitchens behind me the quality was high 22 mil thick mirrored doors rigid assembled doors attached drawers attached hinges attached the cheapest price by a huge amount 86 cheaper than our most expensive one and it's just the perfect mix of high quality and cheapest price and you just can't fault it in second place is Ren despite the Hefty price tag of 3414 pounds if there's no Pete being the second most expensive the quality is good on the doors similar to DIY kitchen comes ready made with the doors and everything attached high quality doors high quality drawers everything you can't really fault a few small issues um but nothing too major in third place magnet so had some negatives like I mentioned like the orange peel effect and lower quality items but overall really solid kitchen and not too many faults on that in fourth place unfortunately was howdens too many negatives in my list door quality cabinet quality cabinet colors um and didn't stack up against the others and in fifth place unfortunately it was weeks for the list you've probably seen in my positive and negatives quite a few negatives unfortunately most expensive not quite the worst quality doors but low quality doors and just really disappointing I just assume flat pack would make it the cheapest they would bring it into contention but the fact that it's most expensive and the quality is in there just puts it last unfortunately so DIY kitchens positives and negatives positives what I mentioned earlier was the highest quality 22 mil thick doors obviously the thicker the better mirror-like finish on the gloss door so not that orange peel effect we saw on some of the others um it was the cheapest price 43 to 86 cheaper than the rivals which is just huge when it comes down to it I really like how it came rigid assembled with the doors and drawers and hinges attached such a Time Saver for the carpenter who you're paying by an hourly rate or a daily rate so it's quicker for him to install an easier is on a which Best Buy 2023 which is another reason I rated it so highly as those guys are just test everything to a really higher degree had a packer unit which I we really liked it's basically something that just sticks under here to protect the units and that was on the heavier units like the larger and then what we also liked is these foot bases here fee they were already attached which they weren't on the other unit so I mean you had to put 16 screws in which is time consuming but more so just having these on just protects the bottom when you're moving the units around so all you've got to do is put in the feet so we thought that was a really good addition and not only did you not have to install the feet bases but it also gives a tiny bit of protection for the bottom of the base unit so quite useful really good technical guide so I actually saved this here because compared to the others it's so good it's in color really clear instructions whereas some of the others you still have to do a lot of guessing and measuring yourself we thought that was really good the larger cupboard very nice how it pulls out lots of space can move these shelves about onto different brackets if you want for the wire work very impressed with that it comes with free biscuits and tea which is obviously a bit of tongue-in-cheek comment but um it it's just a nice little photos and they do that everything was quite funny they've got a really good CAD Planner on the website so it's really easy to use and it adds it up as you go so if you're putting the Larder unit and the pattern drawers and the wall unit in your basket for example it tells you if you've made any mistakes by sizes are you not matching up the wall unit size or the top of the ladder and it also puts the price in your basket of what you're accumulating so far as well so really easy to use um their entire doors were painted so we mentioned that earlier so it's not just the front they paint the whole drawer so it just gives that little bit of higher quality and then like we mentioned on the doors as well everything is bespoke to you so no hinge holes this side no excess holes in the cabinet over here and it's just sort of bespoke for you and the only holes you have left over and just for the shelves and actually even where the wall brackets are so these these bits hired the wall fixings they're just really neat in comparison to some of the others like you can see with howdens up here got a huge big unit up there other positives were that they were the joint deepest pad drawers um the end panels are not always necessary which is not something I considered when we started this but we made we noticed that actually when the doors closed these units you can just get away with not having the end panels which you just can't on these others for example because they just don't match as well that's really good to know because hem camera is going to be so expensive so two to four hundred pounds for a tall one and if you're having say eight or nine of those it could stack up really quickly so quite useful to know that you don't necessarily need end panels on some of their DIY kitchens units the lids packaging and waste so as I said there were eight boxes um sorry not eight boxes there were eight items delivered which were the units with the doors Etc all attached and then one more box which was for the tea and biscuits and the feet um so nine boxes were the least waste so good environmentally friendly and overall I think they're the best kitchen just for ease of use the website customer service um really really really impressed with them and the quality is second to none so negatives to DIY kitchens are that the wall units behind me here are 30 centimeters deep whereas some of the other units are 33 centimeters deep um so a little bit less room on those there's only one main showroom up in West Yorkshire um so obviously some of the other retailers like Ren magnet obviously they have showrooms everywhere like probably over 100 across the UK so that's one negative however they are opening another showroom in Oxford so that's really good for most people down south where I am um Oxford's pretty Central for most people and this is a positive and a negative so you see I've put this on both things but having to measure and order it yourself is a negative for some people who might not be comfortable doing it even though they do have the cad planner now which makes it way easier but I also think it's a positive that you can actually measure and do it yourself because like I said earlier the prices I like that you can just go on DIY kitchens go to the cab planner or go through and order everything and the price is just the price and you can do it all yourself so when you go to these other guys you'll whilst you do get help planning everything you're paying them a commission to do so so I can see that as both a positive and a negative um in that regard and that's all in second place was Ren positives and negatives positives obviously they have lots of stores across the UK easy to go and see the showroom and book an appointment and really good customer service there um some technical things so the good quality again like DIY kitchens and 22 mil doors that were wrapped and mirrored so that's exactly what you want thicker doors mirrored finish means it's just a higher quality material used and the fact that it was wrapped also a very good sign only 10 items in the delivery so one more than DIY kitchens but still minimal waste better more environmentally friendly we really liked the the sink had this small metal bracket so usually what happens with this sink and I'll show you on the others is you have a big lump of wood here that the Compton needs to cut out then put in a slightly solid more solid metal bracket in there um is very different so over here you can see you've got this big wooden bit here and here which basically the carbonsors usually just have to rip out so actually them having that was something that nobody else did and we thought was a really nice touch [Applause] doors hinges and drawers already attached to the unit so similar to DIY kitchens everything comes rigid assembled all the doors drawers hinges Etc on so much easier for the carpenter you can quickly whip off the doors if he wants to make things lighter nice larger unit nice wire work again can easily be moved from one to the other and lots of height and depth in that it goes in really well I had the deepest pan drawers we have DIY kitchens and integrated soft clothes hinges which is obviously really good and then a really good action on those they're definitely the company with the most would you say branding and I had lots of text about delivery lots of texts with QR code installation guides so they're really high up on on that front um but obviously slightly more expensive compared to the others the negatives to Rin um like I mentioned no feed bases like on the DIY kitchens one just means a little bit more work for your calm so hand doesn't protect the bottom and actually that brings me to my next point which was bottom of the sink here as you can see slightly damaged here so that might not have happened if we had the feet bases already on and I don't know whether that happens in delivery or whether that was me it's just something that can happen when you're moving all these items uh we had damage didn't we to the top box and this wall unit I won't hold that in two higher criticism because these things do happen but we had damage here and here but these things can just happen but they were excellent at getting a replacement and I think the replacement came in about four or five days so can't feel that at all um poor quality manufacturing to one of the shelves now this actually is quite bad I think so at first I just assumed it was the back of the Shelf as you can see this shelf just hasn't been manufactured right so I thought oh that must be the back actually the holes at the bottom line up with these here so when you flip it they won't so unfortunately that is the front of the Shelf again I don't think it's a big issue as I imagine if iPhone ran then just send me a replacement shelf it's just one of those things you just expect slightly better for the amount of money um hinge hole covers like I mentioned [Applause] so these are not bespoke so you have hinge holes on each either side whilst they do give you things to cover them I still just think that looks cheap and rubbish in comparison to DIY kitchens where it's just bespoke for what you have I just don't like the look of that when it's open and exactly the same with the hinge as well that you've got there on either side just in case handy if you want to flip it the front of the door only was painted so as I'll show you showed you earlier as you can see slightly different color between the cabinet and the door front and the door back and is the second most expensive kitchen 3414 pounds and 39 and that was with the discount I mentioned earlier I'll show you the invoice 81 higher than our cheapest which was DIY kitchens which is a massive amount in third place was magnet um positives and negatives were positive words good larger cabinet a little bit unfair on the others as they didn't actually have a wire work one so this is slightly higher gray which all the other manufacturers do also do but I thought it was a good unit nonetheless um whilst installing we noticed that the fee had lots of adjustment quite handy you've got wonky floor particularly like this this is a concrete floor but it was very wonky um but so having the bigger feet with with more room to expand just makes it a little bit easier if you've got a bit of a sloppy thing but not usually the case with kitchens this was in the which best buyer 2023 as well like I said with Duro kitchens that's a really good sign as those guys test everything to a really high degree everything was rigid assembled with glue and dowel that's always good make it a bit sturdier and have nice deep pan drawers and integrated soft closed hinges as well with a really nice action free sample doors after design appointment as well that's a good positive and really good customer service although a little bit disappointed the the hinge or fixing to my door front hasn't arrived yet unfortunately the negative start with the same as the others is that no feet based on here so you're just a little bit more work and to do the 16 screws and less protection for the bottom separate hinges doors inserts and drawers so you have to put more of it together which is more time consuming for your Carpenter more packaging as items as a result so over double what Ren and DIY kitchens had which meant double the amount of cardboard and waste Edge doors what I mentioned earlier something you don't want to see hopefully the camera picks that up but you can just see they're edged and not wrapped which always means a lower quality and the same with the orange peel gloss effect so I'm not sure if the camera will pick that up but you've got a slight Orange Peel effect rather than a nice mirrored look we are looking for which means higher quality the front of the door only was painted so again the same as some of the others is different on the back which when the when the doors open just doesn't look as nice um one missing item over two weeks now still has an array of which is a shame and the doors are only 20 mil thick compared to 22 mil for Ren and DIY kitchens which just means less not as high quality basically the cabinets multi-drilled which again I mentioned with Ren I do not like not bespoke to your order and you have to put these ugly caps in which when the doors are open just looks very unattractive and exactly the same with the hinge holes like Ren too so I get that it's easier for the manufacturers but not very nice for you guys when you've got it open they were the third most expensive so probably makes sense in third as well with everything I've said at 2989 pounds and 23p um and that's the reason they're third in fourth place was howdens start of the ladder cupboard good ladder cupboard on the positives my work like I ordered with all the others that comes with a little shelf as well and pulls out nicely so you can access it from the front and the side really like that it was the second cheapest kitchen at 2 695 pounds and 60p also on the which best buyer 2023 which again I've spoken about a lot um that's three of the fire kitchens I have here on the which Best Buy 2023 always a great sign um they came rigid assembled with glue and DOW makes them a bit sturdier um technical aside from my Carpenter was that the hanging brackets had long adjustment which is really useful on the wonky wall so basically what he means there is the bit there was really good compared to the others and probably the best soft close hinges like four of the five had always good three sample doors after a design appointment worth mentioning um the front and the door front and the back of the door painted unlike some of them that's really nice so when you open it it's still the same color no damage or missing items so really good manufacturing process presumably or organization and really good delivery team um the drawers were already attached which is a benefit however the drawer fronts weren't so the drawers were in but the drawer fronts weren't so my comps I had to fix those so that's sort of a positive and a negative in one um really good service void on the kitchen with removable bits as well as you can see here so these bits are optional and really deep room for the pipes and any cables coming through there and a really good customer service team so dealt with them and really good with it that's the same with all five to be honest the negatives start with the feet again no feet bases like the other everyone apart from DIY kitchens more work for the carbon Tower not as strong as supporting um when moving around items separate hinges doors and inserts so that was a bit annoying packaging wires so all of these door fronts this door would have been separate so for this item for example you had one unit arrive with the three pan drawers and then one two three separate packages for the door fronts and the same with this you'd have one for the base unit and one for the door rather than having everything ready and more work for the carpenter to attach everything wasteful packaging 20 items and I don't know why they had a plastic wrap around it as well so cardboard would be more than sufficient they also had a plastic blue wrap around the kitchen as well which is just wasteful and bad for the environment some negatives about the quality of it Edge doors like we mentioned you can probably see hopefully the edge there that line going up there so they're not wrapped which means they're poorer quality Orange Peel effect I'm not sure if you'll see this on the camera but not that mirrored effect we're looking for which means lower quality um the top box had no holes for the hanging mechanisms so as you can see we had to as is the garage and this is just for show we had to do that but that's not ideal usually you'd have to cut out and put in proper hanging mechanisms but we just did that temporarily and only 20 millimeter doors so not as thick as the others which means not as good quality I also didn't like the amount of colors so on the interior of the cabinet so you've got white here dark gray here this one's kind of irrelevant as is at the back but and that is actually optional to be removed as well because the oven housing but I just don't see the C wire in this particular color that I chose we've got like a gloss gray front a white interior and then a dark gray there the oven might hide most of it but for me it should just be all white or gray in this situation weeks unfortunately were in fifth place um for the reasons I'm going to go through now I'll start with the positives though um so wrap doors so that's really good so not edged and that means this is a higher quality door so that's a really good start especially as mirrored glosses neck so that's really important so no orange peel effect here so that's two really good positives didn't take up much room when not assembled obviously flat pack really good benefit just went up right against the wall took up hardly any room so if you've got a flat or a small house really good until you start to install it a thick back panel at 12 mil so it was the thickest so this is 12 mil really thick strong back panel um taller wall units so these are 73.5 centimeters compared to 70 centimeters on the others and a taller larger cup of two as a result which was six centimeters higher than the others that just gives you obviously a tiny bit more room but I guess a negative to that is in this case in this situation the wall units are going to be slightly higher but then as a positive does give you more room for a backsplash and working room here as well soft close hinges like four of the five of a good quality here the negatives um the big one is the flat pack unfortunately Wicks only do flat pack kitchens and it was just so much slower um a day to assemble and a half day to install whereas all the others were just a half day ish to install so you're adding so much more time and time means money if you're paying a carpenter or if it's just you and doing it yourself then obviously more time it was the most expensive which I did not think it would be I thought flat pack would be the cheapest as you're building it so that really surprised me at 3 515 pounds and 17p 86 percent higher than our cheapest which was DIY kitchens unfortunately it had the finished doors at 19 mil um Cam and DOW obviously which is part of the installation which just means it's going to be a bit more wobbly than anything glue endowed um higher Larder and talking is like I said does mean high warness but harder to reach and a bigger gap down there so that could be positive and negative depending on what you want um the bracket for the larger wire work didn't actually fit in the unit so there's a problem with a flat pack you don't know whether they sent you the right thing so as you can see my Carpenter at the back here the hole in the back because this bar so if I had more time I'm sure I could have spoken to them and got a new one um but that was a big negative but the wire work itself like the others was of a good quality in the ladder unfortunately we have a few negatives of which so bear with me um there was no dimensions for the loud fixings either so the technical guy was not very good at all and I found the same with the flat Pack building it with my Carpenter not that good instructions compared to Ikea and other flat pack I've used before and my cards are basically had to work out where some things went um which just wasn't clear and probably something someone like me couldn't do first time but luckily he does it for a living and got it right hinge holes on both sides like I've mentioned on the others really don't like it even with the Caps just means you have this unsightly thing on display and two little pilot holes as well as here as well so useful if you had to flip a door but personally I think it should be bespoke to what you order so I really don't like that top box had no holes for hanging the door so when you open it it had no holes up here so we had to do all those ourselves which is something we really think you wouldn't have to do but luckily my carpenter knows how to do it but if I was doing it myself probably wouldn't be something I can do the doors were only painted on one side so the back differs ever so slightly from the front missing one item which was the draw and unfortunately that still hasn't come two weeks later despite me ordering it their customer service team was very nice though but they obviously just haven't arranged delivery fast enough um shallow is pan draw which is just a small thing but just slightly less room for your things especially as it looks like it could have had a deeper one judging by that space and no sample doors only color swatches among the others um so unfortunately lots of negatives to Wix past his fifth um if it was cheaper I could deal with the flat pack but it's just the quality of it isn't good as well unfortunately compared to the others oh that's a lot of information as I said please use the scroll bar um to skip to any bits that you think might be interesting and whilst I've got the kitchens here please comment if you want me to look into anything else that I may have forgotten I just sort of thought of these questions myself and I'm trying to go through what I think is important um I'd love to hear your comments and actually I am going to be giving away one of these kitchens for free in a competition so please subscribe to hear more about that in the future hope you guys have enjoyed this video probably the most complicated and time consuming video I've ever done so hopefully that translates into the quality of it and you guys can find it really useful and yeah let me know your comments and thanks for watching and subscribing and take care bye

Channel: Nick Morris

Views: 118,369

Keywords: kitchen, kitchen comparison, DIY Kitchens, wren, wren kitchens, magnet, magnet kitchens, Howdens, Howdens kitchens, Wickes, Wickes kitchens, kitchen review, which kitchen review, which review, kitchen refurbishment uk, kitchen videos, kitchen units, kitchen questions, kitchen nightmares, kitchen design, kitchen with amna, kitchen kings, kitchen renovation, kitchen remodel, kitchen restoration, kitchen worktop, kitchen appliances, home renovation, home decor, house renovation

Id: DkNmhyEFX5U

Length: 63min 33sec (3813 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 24 2023