Closets By Design

Ursula GT
Unfortunately i have to agree with the majority of comments. I am very objective about this without hard feelings. We decided against California Closet due to the high pricing. At the end CBD provides less expensive service but provides poor quality products with poor manufactured wood. The sample you can look at do give a wrong impression about the end product. We did a smaller walk in master bed room closet, a very small reach in closet, a wardrobe as well a a laundry room. We paid more then $ 12.000. At the end I regret my decision. California closet would have been $ 3000 more. I don’t know exactly about the quality of their end product. If I could go back I would go to the show room and check on it before I make a decision. As a German lady it just hurts me to spend so much money for something what will not last.
The service of CBD was alright. I wanted to add doors and it looked good on the emailed drawings. In reality it was far to tight to the other wall. I would expected from a consultant to make me aware of this matter. We had scheduling problems but this was also because I postponed the first planned installment initially and in the meanwhile the employers changed.
At the end sorry CBD. Your closets look good in your hand out materials and your drawings but not in my real life closet. I would not choose CBD again.

Closets By Design is way beyond the overall ratings here and if you know me I don’t give five stars for nearly any business. We bought a small house with almost no closets and these guys came in to save the day. We were downsizing from a large house and really needed space, Annie came to the rescue with great ideas and wonderful a design. She took our one car garage and turned it into a walk in closet that took care of both of us. In addition, she turned our one closet into a useful space beyond the 1949 hangers and shelf. When it came time to install the team was awesome and worked overtime to make it happen on a Saturday. They really went the extra yard to meet our needs and finish the job. I noticed a lot of the reviews are from people who have done almost no Unilocal reviews, focus on people that have done reviews for years, no jokers that think they can get the same design, products, and service from Home Depot. Good luck.

The service was great. That being said, it looks like I could have gone to Home Depot to put this together. I spent $ 1100 on a custom closet that looks cheap. I am not happy about the appearance of my very expensive closet. I really hope that this shitty looking closet is fixed by this company. I will be warning other potential customers that they think about doing it themselves. The quality of the wood is horrible, it looks like it will fall apart at any time. The material looks cheap as well. I will be calling management and they hopefully will resolve the issue. Will give an update.

Nothing has been installed yet and I’m already wondering why we decided to go with Closets By Design. They were supposed to be here TODAY to install a custom walk in closet for us. One that involved clothes from master closet, guest closet and hallway closets. Finally got through to them only to find out they have a delivery date of next month. REALLY? Not what paperwork shows. So now our house has clothes and shoes throughout. Nice.
NOT HAPPY AT ALL.

Stay as far away from these guys as possible. The designer/​Sales person did a total snow job about quality that is non-​existant. Pieces came damaged and scratched. The installer was a very nice guy, but you could tell he does not believe in the product at all. Also, they never showed for their first appointment. These guys are total frauds and you would be better off going to Lowes and having someone do the installation.

I bought a full size wall bed from these folks two years ago. We are moving and want to move it as well. To my surprise when calling them this morning, they not only don’t do that, but said: «wall beds are not meant to be removed.» I spent $ 3,000 to find out I can’t get it done. Call that a lie of omission. No one said anything before I spent that money.
However, they did suggest I call local handymen and perhaps one of them could do it. I guess that means calling everyone in the yellow pages to locate someone who has that experience? I would have expected more support from them, since they also did our garage and another closet (cheap stuff, pretty much). I am really ticked off that I have to leave a $ 3,000 bed for the new owners, who don’t really want it.
Shannon J

We just had my daughter’s closet reorganized by Closets By Design last Friday. The design process was completed by Jenny who took several visits to our home but did finally come up with a design that we liked. We eagerly awaited the actual construction and completion of the new closet system. After getting a call that they would come between 1 & 3 pm, we waited again and kept waiting. They finally called too say that the installation guys were running behind and would now arrive bet. 3 & 5 pm. Guess I didn’t have to cancel my doctor’s appt. after all. At 5 pm on a friday they still hadn’t showed! We called our salesperson, Jenny, and got her involved. Now we were being told they’d be to our house by 5:30 pm. Guess dinner plans need to be cancelled now too! When they finally arrived, as we expected, the install guys were tired, not in a good mood and (you guessed it), we got the kind of crappy job one would expect when an install goes so wrong. I would say, look else where. Closets By Design has many competitors and surely there’s one that can complete a job start to finish better then them!

Closets by Design
I normally don’t Unilocal but feel as if this is long overdue and well deserved. Closets by design have been far more than what I expected from a company that will customize your closet for you. I’ve had the pleasure to meet and still continue to do business with Gia. I had requested for a quote, she called and scheduled an appointment to meet me and see our needs, mind you, this is the first home I’ve bought and as an overwhelming experience it is, Gia made the closet piece so enjoyable. She came, to see what she can offer, I had 4 large closets that needed some work she spent time to take measurements, get ideas from ME and to put it all on paper, the end result, I seriously couldn’t have asked for anything better. My closets are beautiful, designed to fit our family style even the person who came to install our closets was so pleasant to work with we have no single complaints about the service and work the company provided us. I seriously look forward to showing our visitors how happy I am with the work they provided. With very affordable and the competitive price they gave, there is no doubt in my mind that I’ll be doing more business with Gia at Closets by Design! She is your closet GO TO GAL!

This was our first time using Closets by Design. It was a big job — 6 closets. Gia, our designer was awesome. She spent quite a while with us methodically going through each of the closets to make sure they were all well designed. Gia also explained everything to us so we understood exactly what was being installed. During our initial meeting Gia prepared a chart laying out the work to be done in each closet. Pricing was reasonable and the systems are very good quality. It was a two day job. Also, because the closets had molding thoughout (old house was built in 1922), it was a lot of work to get it right. The installers showed up on time and completed the work as agreed. The closets look great and are extgremely functional.

Excellent company, the sales designer was new and very honest and professional, great products

Avoid them!
They were reasonably priced and got the job done (two custom closets), but I had lots and lots of issues (some of them still unresolved). They incorrectly charged my CC and kept saying they had refund me when they obviously haven’t.
Not worth the few $$ saved. Too bad for them given that I have some other work to be done.

This review is for a transaction in 2011.
I should have read the reviews on Unilocal first, but thought Unilocal only did restaurants.
California Closets was too busy to accommodate me (this was weird because the person in the store was so impressed by my diagram and I had gotten systems from them before) so I tried Closets by Design (CBD) that I saw on the Internet. I phoned and learned that CBD had an address in my town and would send a local rep to discuss it with me on site.
The rep came to my apartment to verify the measurements and to discuss the diagram I sent via email. The rep was brusque but efficient. She told me she would draw up the order and give it to me to approve before ordering. She phoned to make an appointment and dropped by my office to show me her drawing. I okayed it and paid 100% up front.
I was delighted that within a decent time interval CBD made an appointment for installation. I could not be present but my contractor was there the whole time. He said there was a lot of swearing during the installation. I wasn’t happy about a couple of crooked looking cabinets and there were not as many shelves within them as I had wanted. Also, and I thought I was dreaming, half of my new storage alcoves were empty. Nothing had been installed in them.
I contacted the sales rep about getting 5 more shelves. She said they would be $ 270 apiece – for white finished particle board slabs. Why so expensive? Because they were not part of the original order. But I did not know that behind the cabinet doors there were not enough shelves. Too bad. I asked about the rest of the order that I, checking the invoice to make sure I wasn’t nuts. had paid for. Not her department.
I contacted the shop and no one knew what I was complaining about. I sent an email with a scan of the drawing from CBD and a copy of the invoice. The shop acknowledged the validity of the invoice but not the drawing. I contacted the rep and she said installation was not her department. I told her the shop did not acknowledge the existence half my order. She said it was a big order and took up two sheets. Maybe one sheet got lost in transmission. Good bye.
I learned CBD’s local address was the rep’s home. CBD was someplace else – I’m guessing Las Vegas? The shop didn’t want to fill the order because they did not receive half the drawings. The rep was not responsible for anything after payment. I threatened to have my attorney sue the rep and CBD for the price of a California Closet system for the empty alcoves. Then the rep said she would contact the shop and send another copy of the drawings. Within 3 weeks the installer made an appointment, filled the other two alcoves and aligned the crooked cabinets.
No apology. No compensation such as giving me the 5 extra shelves at a discount. And the system isn’t even that nice. It’s not as well finished as California Closet. I did not know the shelves in one alcove were going to fixed instead of adjustable. I thought all of them were going to be adjustable. Never again.

Same circumstance as a previous poster. I took time off of work for my appointment and they did not show up. I waited 45 minutes and called CBD and they related I did not confirm the appointment, when, in fact, they never called me. Turns out, they use a third party company to make these initial appointment calls and the info does not always make it back to CBD. I later spoke with the manager, Patrick, about this bad business model – hope it works.
Update: Yes, it worked and received a call from the main office in L.A. He had a designer, Cassandra, call me right away and make another appointment around my schedule. I had used Cassandra in the past and she is extremely efficient, reliable and a great designer. I would definitely recommend her!

I have used Closets by Design a few times over the years and my experience has always been exceptional. I had them do my first project about 2 years ago at my then home in San Mateo and everything from the designer thru the installation exceeded my expectations in every way. A friend had originally recommended their service and I was reluctant because I hate dealing with «home improvement» companies, but the designer they sent was so patient and even met with me 4 times before I was ready to move forward. The installers were equally patient and very professional (not to stereotype, but I am a single woman). In fact the single event that cemented their quality of service for me, was after the project was done. I realized a few days after using the closet that I wanted a coupe more shelves. Not only did they take care of it at no charge, but the manager dropped them off and put them in for me 2 days later. That is service!
The product and service was sooo splendid that I had them do my garage early last year and when I sold my home the buyer fell in love with the garage. Awesome!
Just last week they installed 3 more closets at my new home in Los Feliz (LA)and even though the designer and install people were different, they performed to the same high level I have grown accustomed to.
Call them… you will become addicted like me!

Probably — no definitely — the worst company to ever inhabit the face of this earth. Lost order, wrong delivery date, completely wrong product, jammed it into place to the point the doors wouldn’t open on half of them, damaged it during installation and to top it off, charged us twice for installation. We had to seek out the Better Business Bureau in order to correct their mistake. In the end, it looks like hell and barely functional. DO NOT BUY FROM THESE PEOPLE!!!

I started right, called the number, talked to a nice lady, everything was nice and I was ready for the work and the costs. Then trouble came. The guy who was supposed to come did not come. I took day of just to sit there and call the office to check when the guy will come. Nope, he didn’t show up. That’s the end of my relationship with this company. I called them back and cancelled the appointment and the deal.

Unreliable service, work and followup repair!
The installation they performed in my garage was so shabby that it got undone after a few months. One of the cabinet got detached from the wall. When I called back instead of apology and fast repair they scheduled something for 2 weeks later and change the time of the appointment on the day.
Do not recommend.

After reading some of the reviews I wasn’t sure I wanted to use CBD. However, Judy our designer was wonderful and gave some good suggestions. We had two closets made over with shelves, etc. and the price was right. Edger our installer was knowledgeable and did a great job installing including some extra tasked I asked for. We were very happy with CBD.

Unlike most of the reviewers, we’ve actually had good luck with CBD. We had a makeover done to our master closet and have to say that it was the best thing we’ve ever done. There were things that had to be cleared out and making over the closet forced us to go through all the stuff. That was about three years ago. We just had our laundry room redone with shelving and a mini cabinet above the washer/​dryer. Once again, we are really pleased with the finished product as well as the job done by the two installers, Reymundo and Carlos. Unfortunately Reymundo drilled a screw into the main power line and caused a bit of a problem. Byron said CBD would reimburse us for the cost of the repair and was able to reschedule Reymundo and Carlos to return later that evening to complete the install. You have to understand that these are not «custom» cabinets/​shelves that a cabinet maker would put in but then again, these aren’t a ton of money that the cabinet maker would charge either.
Maybe we got lucky twice with CBD, but all that counts is that both my wife are very happy.

We just bought a new house and the closets installed by the builder were unsatisfactory. I contacted CBD after seeing their ad in the chronicle. The designer was nice but obvioulsy new to the business. On the day of the installation the two gentleman that came out got lost and could not speak English. They finally found someone Bi_​lingual in the neighborhood they went to (about a mile from where I live). No other vendor has had any difficulty finding the house.
After they got here I showed them the site. They had to tear out the previous closets. I expected this but was not worried as I had ordered backs… or so I thought. They indicated there were no backs. I checked my contract, sure enough, I am an idiot. It was too late to cancel the job (they wanted another 2 weeks to do it right). All of the samples I looked at had backing and it never occurred to me that it came without it. There is a paragraph in the contract that says you have to order it special, so that was my fault. But no one warned me how bad it would look after they were done.
They totally destroyed the existing paint job and carpeting. Some of the joints in the closet did not match up. We had to spend 8 hours painting the walls prior to moving in, setting everything back that we had planned.
One of the techs smoked cigarettes in my garage, which permeated the enitire house. He also threw the butts into my driveway. The first day, I was gone for much of it, their radio was blasting tthroughout the entire neighborhood. I asked them to turn it off and got some attitude.
After they were done, they left paper, trash and nails in the driveway. They put extra pieces of leftover wood on top of the closets thinking it was out of sight.
No supervisor ever stopped by to see how it was going. No one ever called to see if I was satisfied. Although after my conversation with Byron, I think they knew how disatisfied I was anyway.
I would not recommend this operation to anyone. I took pictures and sent them to my rep so she could see what kind of shoddy workmanship she was representing. Closets by Disaster.