Maple is notorious for being hard to stain but it is great thing to paint! If you like that stain have them try it out on a different species that takes to stain better like birch.

Agree with the other posters. Maple is extremely difficult to stain unless the person doing so is familiar. It requires a conditioning step so that it doesn't end up looking "deer camp". We had an entire kitchen and family room that the builder had to pay to have stripped and redone as a result (he agreed it looked like "deer camp".

What is "deer camp?"

When you see a lot of grain or "movement" on a small sample like that, and especially when you see uneven staining, keep in mind how that's going to look when it's on a big wall of cabinets. Maybe you like all that differentiation! I don't care for it. If you want grain in your wood and staining, why not pick white oak?

Thanks for all the thoughts!

I guess what confuses me a little is that I have lots of maple cabinet pics saved with similar mid to dark stain and the grain is not very noticeable and the stain color is more uniform. Any ideas what could account for the difference with my sample versus the ones I have seen? I am wondering what the cabinet maker would do differently to make it more uniform?

That’s not maple. Looks more like alder. Which is a lot softer than maple. It even has a walnut look in some of the pics. But it doesn’t look like maple in Amy of them. Try to dent it. Note what will dent it. Fingernail to dropped fork to dropped pan.

It could be maple. It can be hard to tell. There are harder and softer species. High end cabinetry that is maple and stained is usually sprayed with a very high quality hvlp mixed with drying agents because maple doe not like to take stain well or evenly into the grain. The stain is actually top coated just like a paint. If it is a softer species of maple, and it was hand wiped with stain, there is a chance you can get the result you have.

I agree with Sophie it does not look like maple cabs we expect (and you too it appears). If they have birch I encourage you to look at that.

Have you verified with the cabinet maker what species wood this is?

If you're opting for maple because of the hardness (which is why we chose it ourselves) your cabinetmaker will need to prep/condition the wood properly to end up with a more uniform stain.