The Chairman — Local services in Dublin

Here is my review of a recent repair done on my kitchen chair by Lamar Spalding (The Chairman). I am satisfied with his work and his fee but feel that his customer service interactions need some improvement. I submitted this review to him prior to publishing and I have included relevant parts of his reply.

Carpentry: The brace repair looks good. I have no reason to doubt its strength, but time will tell.

Quality Assurance: See pictures … there were 8 seat attachments when I delivered the chair to Lamar. There were only 6 attachments when he finished the work. Also, one of the attachments had no screw to bind it to the seat. This does not speak well towards your QA after finishing the brace repair, and I am concerned about how the missing pieces will affect the structural integrity of the chair. I sent Lamar my review before posting it and he responded (sic) “I did not put in the brackets because in the locations missing brackets, the screws would have materially weakened the corner braces which is possible why the chair failed initially. With the remaining clips your chair seat is firmly in place and does not need any more clips.“

BROKEN KITCHEN CHAIR PROVIDED TO CHAIRMAN REPAIRED CHAIR RETURNED TO CUSTOMER See below pictures

Customer Service: Lamar provided a description of work to be done and a cost estimate to me via email following delivery of my chair to his workshop. That estimate matched the cost requested when the work was completed. Lamar was friendly and helpful when I spoke with him by phone or in person.

I had trouble communicating with Lamar. • When I first contacted Lamar, he was on a job and offered to call me back the next day. He never called back and I had to call him a few days later. • Lamar gave me an estimate of 2 weeks to complete the work and said he would call or email me when the chair was ready. He never called or emailed and after 3+ weeks I called and was told that the job had been completed a while ago.

I have concerns about how this repair but would give Lamar another chance for chair repair work in the...

I had two broken chairs that our teenagers romped on top of...oh I was so sad...because they’re part of a beautiful farmhouse set. I found Lamar “The Chairman” Spalding on Yelp. I sent him pictures because I truly thought they were beyond repair. Lamar emailed me that he could restore them! All four legs were cracked and the beautiful scrolled arm rest was broken in three pieces..also one teen had carved chunks out of the arm rest and I was kind of ashamed of that. Lamar restored my chairs to BETTER condition than they were before!!! Less than three weeks and the chairs actually look like nothing ever happened!!! Lamar even repaired the gouges in the arm and you cannot tell that anything was ever wrong with it!! It’s like I have two NEW chairs! These are sturdier than the ones I have at home. I’m very impressed with Lamar’s quality artistry and repair work! His work is impeccable and the repair was so quick! I really thought theses chairs were destroyed. I’m just thrilled with my experience. Lamar expertly matched the woods and the color of stain and I can’t even find the broken seam. Thank you...

Quick work and easy communication! I brought Lamar a very sentimental item, my grandmother's chair (she recently passed) to fix. Past attempts to fix the detached leg join had resulted in lots of glue residue and, despite all that, the chair was still regularly coming apart.

Lamar removed the glue and repaired the join. I've had the chair back with me for only a few days now, but it's held strong with no issues so far! See the attached photos for a before and after, no glue residue left at all and it's looking much better. Please note that the scratches and wear marks on the chair were there before. I just asked for a repair, not a restoration, as I wanted my grandmother's chair to continue telling the story of how many of her children and my cousins had used it before me.

I appreciate Lamar for getting this fixed faster than his estimate and for a very reasonable price. I paid just over $100 for this fix and hopefully will be able to continue using my grandmother's chair for...