Furniture Frustration

[kurt0811]

Hi Duane,
I have been lurking for a while, and have followed you over from the Garden Web site ( a pox on their families . Anyway, I purchased a Hekman table and sideboard from their Copley collection, through Boyles in NC, a little over a year ago. It was delivered on 8-27-2007. I noticed last week the finish is clouding along the front edge of the sideboard. I've only used Guardsman polish on it, and no matter how i rub, the haze will not go away. I have contacted Boyles, and their response was "It's out of the 1 year warranty" and their hands are tied. I tried contacting Hekman, and the best I got was a terse email saying it is Boyle's problem, not theirs. I'm not sure what to do...I did a fair amount of research before hand and felt Hekman was a quality company, and was feeling the same towards Boyles. Now I am not sure. There seems to be no customer support at either end. Help?
Kurt

[drcollie]

Hi Duane,
I have been lurking for a while, and have followed you over from the Garden Web site ( a pox on their families . Anyway, I purchased a Hekman table and sideboard from their Copley collection, through Boyles in NC, a little over a year ago. It was delivered on 8-27-2007. I noticed last week the finish is clouding along the front edge of the sideboard. I've only used Guardsman polish on it, and no matter how i rub, the haze will not go away. I have contacted Boyles, and their response was "It's out of the 1 year warranty" and their hands are tied. I tried contacting Hekman, and the best I got was a terse email saying it is Boyle's problem, not theirs. I'm not sure what to do...I did a fair amount of research before hand and felt Hekman was a quality company, and was feeling the same towards Boyles. Now I am not sure. There seems to be no customer support at either end. Help?
Kurt

Hey Kurt,

I got a chuckle out of your comment on Gardenweb!

Unfortunately you have entered no-man's land with the application of the Guardsman polish to the piece. The chemicals in the polish may have reacted to the finish on the Hekman piece and caused the clouding. This will give both the merchant and the manufacturer an excuse to distance themselves from any kind of warranty repair.

Here's what I would do:

1) Call Hekman and ask them what kind of finish they are using on the piece. They should not have a problem with releasing that info.

2) Call Guardsman and with the info from Hekman, see if they have any reaction history to that specific finish category. If they say 'no', ask them to put it in writing and fax or mail to you.

3) If the Guardsman looks like its not the problem, then write a nice letter to the President (by name) of Hekman along with photos accurate enough to clearly show the clouding issue, and send the documentation from Guardsman along with it. Ask for them to repair it and clarify that you understand you will have to pay 2-way shipping on the piece since its past the warranty period. I find that most wood case makers will repair/fix out-of-warranty items on questionable defects as a goodwill gesture for retail customers if the customer assumes all costs of transport.

I'd like to see a photo of the clouding issue, can you get some clear photos of it and post it here on the site? Most the time, clouding under a finish is a result of trapped humidity. If Hekman is using a shellac finish with no lacquer topcoat on it, and you had some water contact the finish that wasn't wiped up promptly (or rain from an open window), then that can make that occur. Shellac is a beautiful finish but fragile around water.

Clouding on wood is often a heat issue, but I can't imagine high heat on the face of your sideboard.

And then there's the possibility of the Guardsman polish not being compatible with the Hekman finish.

[Briant73]

Just read through and don't mean to hijack the thread but have some questions on furniture polish.

I have read many sites saying stay away from pledge and those type of products and it seemed Guardsman products were recommended in place of pledge. Is there another product you recommend over it?

[soster]

Lately factories have been telling me just to use water to clean wood surfaces. This came up after we were disappointed after applying polish to a coffee table. The manufacturer told us just to use a damp rag... and that ended up working best.

[drcollie]

Steve is absolutely right. With all the various finishing systems in place by manufacturers, and the huge amount of cleaning/care products on the market, the only safe bet is plain water (except on pure shellac surfaces).

Having said that, I use 'OZ' polish on most everything in the store, and use it pre-delivery as well. It's non-silicone, so less reactive and damaging than products like PLEDGE, etc, and it goes on very fast, has an instant dry time, and lasts about 6 weeks. Going to be hard to find, I have to order it from a Wholesale Jobber that only sells to the trade (Mohawk Finishing Products). Customer love it, so I have it in the store priced at $ 11.95 a can. Some come in an buy a dozen cans at a time!

For special pieces in my home, I'll invest the time every few years to put a coat of tinted paste wax on it, and polish it that way. That takes about 5x longer to do than a spray on product like OZ, so I only do it for my high end items that are considered collector pieces.

[Briant73]

Steve is absolutely right. With all the various finishing systems in place by manufacturers, and the huge amount of cleaning/care products on the market, the only safe bet is plain water (except on pure shellac surfaces).

Having said that, I use 'OZ' polish on most everything in the store, and use it pre-delivery as well. It's non-silicone, so less reactive and damaging than products like PLEDGE, etc, and it goes on very fast, has an instant dry time, and lasts about 6 weeks. Going to be hard to find, I have to order it from a Wholesale Jobber that only sells to the trade (Mohawk Finishing Products). Customer love it, so I have it in the store priced at $ 11.95 a can. Some come in an buy a dozen cans at a time!

For special pieces in my home, I'll invest the time every few years to put a coat of tinted paste wax on it, and polish it that way. That takes about 5x longer to do than a spray on product like OZ, so I only do it for my high end items that are considered collector pieces.

Got my two cans (ordered from Duane) and have to say it seems like a winner so far. Very nice shine to it. Now I just have to learn not to use so much of it and that you more wipe it on than rub it in.

[kurt0811]

Just a quick update to the original post. After sending 3+ letters and emails to both Hekman and Boyles presidents, I have heard absolutely nothing. I have to say , I am disappointed in the lack of customer service on both parts. I mean, at least have the courtesy to reply, even if the answer is to say I'm up the creek. I'm afraid I have also lost standing in my wife's eyes. as it was my idea to spend the money on what I believed was high quality furniture. I feel I may be relegated to standard furniture stores ( Good bye Hancock and Moore, hello Raymour & Flanigan ).

[Briant73]

Just a quick update to the original post. After sending 3+ letters and emails to both Hekman and Boyles presidents, I have heard absolutely nothing. I have to say , I am disappointed in the lack of customer service on both parts. I mean, at least have the courtesy to reply, even if the answer is to say I'm up the creek. I'm afraid I have also lost standing in my wife's eyes. as it was my idea to spend the money on what I believed was high quality furniture. I feel I may be relegated to standard furniture stores ( Good bye Hancock and Moore, hello Raymour & Flanigan ).

From what I read I gather you sent letters and emails. When did you send the letters? Just wondering if the holiday's crawl affected your letters getting there in a timely manner and that the persons you adressed have gone on vacation. Have you tried just contacting them to ask them what can be done to repair the table? Also why not take pictures if you can of the clouding and start a new thread on here so people can offer you advice.

[kurt0811]

I've sent the letters over the past 3-4 weeks. I suppose Christmas could have delayed mail a bit, but I'm thinking even presidents of companies don't get the entire month of December off. I can try to post pictures, but to call me technologically challenged would be an understatement.

[kurt0811]

And yes, I did contact both Hekman and Boyles about repairing the table, and Hekman could not get me off the phone fast enough and did not want to discuss anything with me, instead referring me back to Boyles. Boyles was at least apologetic, but said there was nothing they could do, only refer me to a furniture refinisher who was happy to come look at the sideboard, but his consultaion fee was $125, and that was not applied towards any refinishing that needed to be done. In all fairness, the area of discoloration is mild, but for close to 3K for the piece, I don't think it unreasonable for the finish to last longer than 13 mos.