Coaster Home Furnishings - Gabriel - 9-Piece Counter Height Dining Set - Square Wood Table with Storage & 8 Upholstered Chairs - Dining Room & Kitchen - Cappuccino - 100438-S9

UPDATE 9/11/12: As you read my review below, you will see it broken down into the actual REVIEW OF THE TABLE, and separately, MY DELIVERY EXPERIENCE, which at the time this was originally written was a widespread problem and was very important to the whole purchase experience that I and many others were experiencing as well. As you can see if you read into the comments on this post, other vendors for this table set have begun to crop up, and people have had positive experiences with them. Meanwhile, at least on an initial search, Visiondecor seems to have exited this arena--I couldn't find one listing of this table from them. We must've scared them away! lol When reading the review below, since the original vendor is no longer part of the equation and the delivery problem seems to have resolved, feel free to skip over the delivery experience if you don't find it relevant to you. Since it helped so many people, I'll leave my original review intact for historical reasons, and perhaps to forewarn people of potential pitfalls out there. It's a shame I had to devote such a large section of this review to my delivery experience, however important it might've been. Judging by the responses, it seems to have helped a few people. But in the end, it's all about the table itself...and it is still a pleaser, even nearly 2 years later. ************************************************************************************************************************** MY REVIEW OF THE TABLE: We finally received our table set, and are very pleased with it. My husband says that the assembly was not all that difficult or long, and we had no problems with the lazy susan whatsoever. He suspects they may have corrected any design flaws it may have once had. The dark espresso wood is elegant and the pub seat height is a pleasant change of pace from your run-of-the-mill dining set. We've gotten lots of compliments, and guests who've been by have commented that they very much liked the height and appearance of this set. It lends itself to a more casual, comfortable feel because of the pub height and lazy susan, but the color and design of the entire set are such that it's all still elegant and befitting a formal dinner as well. We typically have this set up with 6 chairs--when the set is empty, it looks much less crowded. The table can fit all 8, and while I wouldn't say that everyone will necessarily bump elbows, it will be a little snug...but no more so than what you might expect at, say, a full table at a restaurant. In planning for family get-togethers, I always give some extra thought to kids in relation to this set--I would guess this is not the best choice for households with little kids, due to the height. I'm not sure, but guessing many high chairs could not be jacked up to this table height, and while the set's chairs themselves should accommodate a booster seat just fine, getting kids up and down from the seats might require parental assistance. At my household, we definitely employ a separate "kiddy table" at Thanksgiving. :) We do not use the glass or wine racks underneath as intended, as I find it inconvenient to reach underneath the table for my wine or glasses. I would imagine this feature is a bonus feature for someone where space is limited, like an apartment, but for me, I use the area for seldom-used dining room storage, such as holiday-themed dining room decorations. MY DELIVERY EXPERIENCE: I have looked for this same table elsewhere on the net, and every search turned up the same vendor, Visiondecor...so I don't think it's available from any other vendor, and as such, I think their delivery and customer service performance are relevant to a proper review on this set. I would've given 5 stars on this review based on the table alone, but because of our delivery experience, I dropped down to 4 stars. In short, they were quite disappointing. Or at least, the delivery company that they use is quite disappointing. The table took a full MONTH to arrive, coming well past its promised delivery date. We tried calling the delivery company, but on the several occasions we tried, we got no answer. (How can you be in the business of scheduling and not have anyone manning your phones during normal business hours???) We came home one day to find a note from their delivery crew stating that they had come by to attempt delivery, and we were not home. Huh?? You want to deliver an order that's so large that it comes on a pallet and requires a crew to move, and you just SHOW UP with it??! Upon finding this attempted delivery note, we called them. We finally got them, along with an attitude that we were interrupting them--they were rude, abrupt, and unpleasant, on top of being incompetent. We learned that they had tried several times in the previous week to schedule delivery, but we supposedly never answered the phone. We found this hard to believe, as my husband was home most of the time, and our calls forward to our cell phones when we're not home...so we were quite sure we'd never gotten any calls. When we verified the number they were calling, we learned that they were calling my mother's home. We've NO clue how they even got my mother's phone number, as we never gave it out--my mom is deaf, and only even has an active phone line for emergency phone calls out. The table was indeed paid for with mom's credit card, as it was a housewarming gift from her, but it was ordered on MY Amazon account, which has her number NOWHERE. Can they get the cardholder's phone number from their credit card company somehow??? In any event, we provided our correct phone number, and were told we would get a phone call following the weekend to re-schedule. We never got a call, and the delivery crew just showed up the following Monday. Apparently, they called again and got no answer (because, as it turns out, they continued to call mom's!! WTH?!!), and so, once again, without any confirmed delivery time, they just SHOWED UP with this giant delivery. It was just fortunate we happened to be home at the time...that's the only reason we have our table now. In short, if you order this table, you should be quite happy with the product, but be prepared for an exasperating delivery experience. UPDATE 1/6/11: We were contacted by Visiondecor regarding our negative review on Amazon, and offered a $125 refund if we would at least remove the negative Seller Feedback we'd given them. We felt this was reasonable, as the delivery was the sole problem to us in this whole purchase, and this refunded most of the delivery costs. I've upgraded them to 5 stars again. They obviously are concerned about customer feedback. The rep from Visiondecor explained that they were experimenting with different delivery companies to see which ones would best serve all their delivery needs. Obviously, the one that delivered to us was a let-down. Hopefully, they never use them again. I see that several other people have had favorable delivery experiences...hopefully Visiondecor can find a delivery company or companies to repeat the good experiences, because everything else about the product and the experience with Visiondecor seems great.

After shopping at several brick and mortar stores, and trying to find just the right size, style, and price for what we needed (space for at least 6 people), we decided to come back and purchase this from old-faithful, Amazon. What a great decision we made! It's simply beautiful. The picture almost doesn't give it justice. It's darker than what's shown (to me that's a good thing). EVERY corner and edge is rounded and smoothed, so there will be no accidental scratches on little bodies posting up for dinner. The wine/wine glass holder inside the pedestal work great, although they don't accommodate very large glasses. Certainly not a real point of contention for me... The pedestal has doors on either end, so you can see right through the thing, and access items contained within from anywhere. The chairs are far more comfortable than we'd expected as well. They're very solid, don't wobble, and have perfect height foot rests for all sizes. The lazy-susan in the middle is absolutely fantastic! It has very little space between the glass and the table, making it almost a seamless transition all the way across the table from one end to the other. It feels so deeply integrated you don't even notice it's not just an accent! It flows smoothly, and with a nice easy flip, it spins at least 90deg, no dragging. Construction was VERY easy. Everything lined up perfectly, and with the simple aid of an electric screwdriver, we had this entire set assembled in a couple of hours. It took me about 10min per chair, especially after getting my 'system' figured out. The pedestal took me all of 20min, with a little bit of maneuvering to get to the 'harder to reach' bolts. Easily a one-man job to assemble this entire set. Add in a 2nd person and it cut the time in half! About the seller... There was a bit of a quality control issue at the warehouse, and delivery was late. They never contacted us to let us know of the problem, so initially we assumed they were not going to deliver on time. After a couple of emails, they set up a rush delivery to the house, and even refunded a few bucks! The delivery guy was great, and helpful with a few construction tips. We couldn't be happier with this table, and look forward to using it for years to come!

This is a beautiful table that fits well in our dining room. It took 2 hours for my wife & I to assemble it. It was fairly self-explanatory. The table is very sturdy without the use of any glues to assemble. I read reviews that a lot people had issues with the lazy susan, but ours turns perfectly, just takes some maneuvering to get it right in the center of the cutout. I give it 4 stars instead of 5 because it isn't the most comfortable table ever. It is a higher up table with higher up chairs, so that naturally makes it less comfortable than a chair that is lower where you can spread out a little easier. I can see that if you have 8 people sitting at the table, they may knock knees & elbows, and there probably won't be room on the table for 8 plates, glasses and serving dishes, but if you just have plates and glasses, it will be sufficient. We have gotten lots of compliments on the appearance of the table. The wine storage area in the bottom comes in very hand, too!