Hi arlene11, we have Norcraft's Concord door in natural cherry purchased through buycabinets.com. They are not installed as we are still working on the kitchen. I am NOT an expert by any means but will answer any question you have to the best of my ability.

Linda

We got our Norcraft cabinets from buycabinets.com in November. By the way "Norcraft" is actually the Midcontinent line sold by Norcraft Industries. I am VERY disappointed. Buycabinets was fine to work with but the line we picked (or should I say was suggested to us) is a disappointment. I think they are poorly constructed and flimsy. They look pretty however. We picked a painted white finish and we upgraded to solid wood raised panel doors and solid wood drawers with dovetail construction and self-close like blumotion. The drawers and doors are nice but the cabinet boxes are flimsy! The sides are very thin-like 1/2 inch particle board. Our old cabinets, that we tore out, had really thick particle board construction and they were the put-together-yourself sort of cabinets-and I think they were made better/sturdier than the Norcraft. We went back and forth over particleboard construction and decided that we could live with particle board-but I never thought the cabinets would seem so flimsy and have such thin sides. We almost upgraded to finished plywood sides-but that would have brought our cost up considerably. I wouldnÂt buy them again-unless you just want cheap and pretty. I donÂt feel these cabinets are built to last.

Our cabs look great in our kitchen and we get lots of complements, but deep down I wish I had just bought Ikea cabinets and saved a few more thousand dollars.

Thanks for responding, Linda. We are looking at the Concord door style also in cherry but with the briarwood finish. You say the cabinets are not installed yet, but how does the finish look? Were you pleased with the price from buycabinets.com, and did you comparison shop? What made you decide to go with the Norcraft?
Our quote from them was about the same as a local store.
It seems like a decent quality cabinet. We just want to be sure before we order.

I'm sure you've read fighting's post. I'm not sure if I'd call them flimsy, but all I have to compare them with are the cabinets we're taking out which are not top of the line either. Like fighting we have solid drawers, dovetail, full-extension, soft-close with the upgrade for the not-flat front (can't think of what the term is). I'd use what fighting told you and take another look at the cabinets available locally.

I chose Norcraft because it was suggested to me by buycabinets secondary to my budget. We are reno-ing the kitchen before putting the house on the market. The old cabinets were sad and refacing/resurfacing wasn't feasible. If this were going to be my kitchen for the next 20 years, I wouldn't have chosen these cabinets (would have had painted white, inset doors and drawers) but would have made other drastic changes in my kitchen as well.

Have you had them send you a door sample to look at? That doesn't help much with the box construction.

We live nearly six hours from the closest IKEA and those had been our first choice. Despite the possible hassles I was willing to go with those but ultimately couldn't put my wonderful DIY husband to the test with trying to modify a cabinet for our farm sink. Unfortunately, as it is there will be a bit a that with the cabinet we have. That's going to be a long day when we get there. It wouldn't have been the same kind of price difference that fighting would have had.

These cabinets are for a bathroom remodel. I posted on the bathroom forum and got no response. From the feedback, I'm feeling uncertain about Norcraft. But my DH doesn't think the particle board sides are that significant. I think he likes the Norcraft price. When we looked at the local dealer, the cabinets didn't seem flimsy. Are the half inch particle board sides really a significant factor?

We got our Norcraft cabinets from Buycabinets.com a month ago, but they are still sitting in my living room waiting for the kitchen floor to be installed.

I wouldn't really call them flimsy, but they certainly aren't rock solid. We shopped around a fair amount and got many quotes that were way outside our price range. I think we got a pretty good deal for the price. Customer service has been great and have responded well to a couple of issues we did have with our order (the standard, non-dovetail drawer boxes are pretty crummy).

We'll see how I feel after they are installed, but as it stands now I would order these cabinets again. However. if we had a more higher-end home or a fancier kitchen, I would probably go elsewhere.

If the local dealer was the same price, why would you order from buycabinets.com?

Kompy,

The local dealer said he couldn't order the doorstyle we wanted in a painted finish and buycabinets said they could. We have two separate areas and thought we'd put the Concord with a painted maple finish in the bathroom and Concord with a cherry finish in the dressing area.
Now with all the discussion about flimsy, we're undecided.
In fact, just got an e-mail from buycabinets, and it said if we don't decide by Thursday, there will be no free shipping.

Excuse me, but I just HAD to jump in here...
I am in the middle of installing a couple of dozen MidContinent Signature series kitchen cabinets (not from buycabinets.com). They are the cheapest crap in the universe. The particle board is only 3/8" (you can crumble it in your fingers like coffee cake), glued with hot-melt and stapled (when the staples hit their mark). They have many badly aligned joints. We had to have many pieces reshipped due to damage and the replacements arrived damaged.
We were told by a salesperson (from a company that sold both brands) that side-by-side he could not tell the difference between these and Kraftmaids... then he must be an IDIOT!!! (Or the markup is just too good to pass up.)
We had no local outlet to inspect the MidContinent (Norcraft) cabinets before buying so we trusted that statement. Please do not make the same mistake unless you are sure you want junk in order to save a few bucks.
I do have to admit the doors look pretty good, but are a little splintery (beaded hickory Cottage style) around the beading and the face frames have some splitting where they seem to have had problems installing the hinges.
My last word of advice (to myself especially) would be don't buy anything you haven't seen first. You'll likely be disappointed with the quality.

PS. There were scuff marks on many of the doors. Most came off with a plastic scrubber pad, but some were actually under the finish. There were globs and glue smears all over the doors and face frames. It was hot-melt. Not very good for joining cabinetry, but easy to rub off (just time consuming). These weren't built on a monday or a friday, I think it was late saturday night. ;-)