Product: Elfa Heeled Gliding Shoe Rack from the Container Store
Price: approximately $350 for the whole she-bang (on sale and including hardware, all ala carte)
Rating: Strong Recommend*
The Container Store is as pricey as it is seductive. But in just two short weeks, this splurgey system has shortened our get-ready time and made us reconsider our disorganized nature.
The Elfa system has a number of shoe rack solutions, but given our love of pretending to be taller than we actually are and buying en masse on clearance, the gliding rack made the most sense.
Pros:
Space Maximation: 9 pairs of women's shoes (6 men's) fit per rack, and they stack closely to fill your space with no crowding, no topples and no scuffing. The racks pull out nicely so you can access every pair without trouble. What once fell off racks and lived in two closets now fits nicely and lives at a glance. Life-changing? Shoe saving? Yep, absolutely.
The quality was a pleasant surprise, after years of Target shoe racks. It is smooth, steady and quite easily installed - but make sure you keep the directions.
If you don't spring for the whole system, the free-standing vibe is utilitarian. But that's all we want, and were willing to spring for. It also comes in Platinum (i.e., silver), but we chose white to match some shelving we already owned.
It's flexible: You can also get free-standing models, as well as a variety of other solutions.
Cons:
It is not cheap - brackets, anchors, trim and hardware added cost beyond what we expected after chatting with a salesperson. Frankly, there was sticker shock but the buyer's remorse faded as soon as we stocked it.
Of course, it is not flats-friendly. We we ended up switching out a pull-out rack for some horizontal racks to accomodate flats, wedges and sneakers. One fairly flat pair holds on, but barely.
*Our Ratings:
Strong Recommend
Recommend
Weak Recommend
Don't Recommend
Wait for the Container Store sales for Elfa. One just ended that was 25% off.
view LilyC's profile
$350! On SALE?!
view amt230's profile
350 and it still looks cheap.
view samanthalous's profile
seriously?!?!?! THREE HUNDRED AND FIFTY DOLLARS!?
for a plastic-coated wire shoe rack???
please update "strong recommend" to something lower...
yikes!
view staticfritz's profile
If you've ever used Elfa...you'd understand be fine with the price (on sale anyway).
Other systems simply do not compare.
view jamilkb's profile
Elfa goes on sale every year right around Christmas time -- 30% off all systems and components. The sale last 2 months, I think. Wait for the sale!!
view dmh's profile
I used the Rubbermaid line of wire shelves from Lowe's to redo my closets, and saved at least 50%. Not quite as nice or tricked out, but jeez, it's a closet. I did, however, use the Container Store's clear plastic boxes in place of drawers. The mesh drawers are almost see-through anyway.
I recently tossed my dishwasher and sprung for an Elfa drawer unit in it's place. I did wait for the sale, and it was worth it. The drawers are highly quality than the Lowe's system, and it was only $90. I'd like to redo my garage shelving. I'm trying to decide where to go. The suggested Elfa set up is, of course, like $900. :P
view Tinyvoices's profile
I love Elfa systems. I had one at my old house, and recently moved and got a second one installed at the new place.
However, I am not crazy about the shoe rack thingie. It is not great for flats or for boots- and I have had to get a different system for both.
view Coopers_mama's profile
I did a lot of research when i was redoing my closet, and we came *this* close to going with elfa. FYI, definitely wait for the sale, its usually in late Dec/Jan/early Feb. Alternatively, you can save a lot of money by getting some of the base components off craigslist -- as in, buy someone else's set on craigslist, wind up using 1/2 the parts in your closet, and save a good chunk of the cost.
In the end, the elfa closet we wanted was around $1500 during their sale. Even if you get the wood faceouts so it looks nice, at the end of the day Elfa is cheap slatted wire shelving. We ended up going with Easycloset.com for about $2000, where everything was wood laminate and CUSTOM cut to size within 1/8" to the dimensions we requested. It comes in a bunch of boxes and you assemble it as you would Ikea. Its California Closet quality at half the cost, and at LEAST 2x the quality of elfa at 1.5x or half the cost (depending on if elfa's on sale).
Something to consider.
view mh330's profile