Design Within Reach sells modern furniture and home decor from designers like Herman Miller and Eames. This page aggregates customer ratings and reviews to help shoppers understand the buying experience, including delivery reliability, product condition upon arrival, and customer service quality.
Design Within Reach Reviews
What Shoppers Say About Design Within Reach
Design Within Reach has an extremely poor track record according to shopper reviews, with 24 customers rating the store 1.4 out of 5. The overwhelming majority of complaints center on delivery failures, damaged merchandise arriving repeatedly, and inadequate customer service responses. Multiple reviewers report items arriving broken or incomplete, with some experiencing the same issues across multiple replacement attempts. Customers describe lengthy resolution processes spanning weeks or months, difficulty reaching support, and inadequate refunds that fail to cover shipping costs for damaged goods. A small minority of shoppers report satisfactory experiences, though even positive interactions are limited to successful receipt of undamaged items.
The core issues hampering Design Within Reach are logistics and quality control rather than product selection. Reviewers consistently mention receiving furniture with structural damage (broken legs, cracked arms, missing hardware), wrong items shipped, or incomplete orders. When problems occur, customers report frustrating back-and-forth communications, unresponsive support, and staff who are dismissive of legitimate complaints. The pattern suggests systemic problems with the fulfillment process and customer service infrastructure that extend beyond isolated incidents.
Customer Reviews (24)
Sorted by: Most recentThis company is absolutely brutal to work with. I ordered two matching pouf and tray sets. Before ordering, the company sent fabric swatches so we could confirm the exact colors and styles we wanted. When we went to place the order, there were no colors or fabric details listed on the order form, and the trays weren't included on the invoice either. We flagged this problem before submitting, and they assured us the correct colors would be shipped and that the trays were definitely part of the order. When everything arrived, the colors were completely wrong and there were zero trays included. When the trays finally showed up months later, they were the incorrect dimensions and didn't work with the poufs. The whole thing was a disaster from start to finish.
I am absolutely furious. The delivery company working for Design Within Reach called and promised a three-hour delivery window from noon until three p.m., and they said they'd call thirty minutes before arriving. They never called ahead. Instead they called me from outside my house thirty minutes after the window had closed. I couldn't be there because I'm an attorney and had legal documents to submit to the courthouse before it shut down at four o'clock. The delivery driver lied and claimed he had no cell service (even though he managed to call me from my property, and somehow everyone else who delivers to my house has no trouble getting service), and he lied about the delivery window. They refused to leave the furniture and were rude about it. I lost half a day of work. I strongly advise against using this company because their delivery partner is unreliable and dishonest. Untrustworthy people shouldn't be entering customers' homes.
One year has passed since I placed an order with Design Within Reach, and I can say without hesitation that their customer experience is shockingly poorly managed. In December 2021, I purchased a sectional sofa with an estimated delivery of March 2022. While the wait seemed long, my wife and I were willing to be patient given supply chain issues at the time. By December 2022, we decided to cancel the order because it had been delayed so severely. The real problem was that Design Within Reach had somehow misplaced my $7,000 order in their system and didn't realize it was missing for nearly a year. As a customer, there's no way to independently track your order status online; you can only call or email the sales rep who helped with your purchase. This creates enormous confusion and makes the whole experience frustrating. My sales representative was personable and tried her best, but the entire company's backend operations are so disorganized that they can't keep track of high-value purchases. For a premium furniture company with expensive items and substantial profit margins, this kind of operational failure is hard to believe.
I placed an order and the shipping date got delayed again and again. I had to keep calling customer service to try and get updates, but they couldn't provide any helpful information. Even worse, they refused to cancel the order despite the constant delays. The customer service representative was condescending to me during our conversation. I'd recommend buying from another company that actually values its customers. There are plenty of better options out there.
Design Within Reach only delivered part of my order and I had to call multiple times just to explain that items were missing. A month later the rest showed up, but the box had a massive tear that went completely through to the furniture inside. They picked up the damaged item and supposedly replaced it, but what they brought back was completely different from what I ordered. Getting them to remove that wrong item took yet another month. In the end, I dealt with three incorrect deliveries, roughly twenty emails, approximately ten phone calls, and spent two months with boxes of wrong and damaged furniture sitting around. The delivery company was also shockingly incompetent, couldn't seem to locate my address correctly, and never arrived within the promised time windows.
I've spent over fifteen thousand dollars with DWR across three orders in the past year, and I've also been a repeat customer before that. My experience with their customer service has been the worst I've encountered despite my loyalty. My first order didn't get fully delivered until eleven months after I placed it. DWR provided absolutely no communication during that time, so I had to call their customer service department myself, which was painfully bad. Each call gave me different shipping timelines and promises about credits for the long wait that I never actually received. My second order arrived damaged, but they did eventually fix the furniture. A month after it was repaired, the legs broke because the base couldn't support the weight, and I was promised a ten percent discount. I only got that discount after calling four times and exchanging multiple emails with the service agent. I'm still trying to get a return authorization for an item from that first order that was only partially delivered after waiting nearly a year, despite being promised it would be processed. I'm genuinely sad about all this because I really do love their furniture designs. Unfortunately, DWR's operational chaos and terrible customer service have made this whole experience incredibly frustrating.
The whole experience was incredibly aggravating. I waited months to receive my order, and when it finally arrived, the shipping company delivered the wrong items. Their delivery partner was awful and acted threateningly when I refused to accept the incorrect goods. Weeks went by and I still hadn't gotten what I actually ordered. Design Within Reach seemed completely indifferent about the fact that their shipping partner was being hostile and clearly incompetent with their customers.
I've purchased furniture from DWR several times over the years and have consistently had great experiences. One time they did misplace a recliner during shipping, but they refunded it without delay and offered to send a replacement. Returns have always been hassle-free, and the furniture pieces I decided to keep are all beautiful. While mistakes do happen, particularly during challenging times, I've always been impressed by how professionally DWR handled these situations.
I've bought furniture from DWR multiple times and their service has consistently been excellent. A recliner was lost in transit at one point, but they refunded me immediately and even offered a replacement. Returning items has never been a problem, and the furniture I kept looks beautiful. Obviously mistakes happen, especially when global supply issues occur, but I've been really satisfied with how DWR handled the few problems that came up.
DWR's shipping and logistics operations are absolutely terrible. We've had problems with every single order from them. We ordered a bed in October 2021 with an estimated shipping time of four weeks. It didn't show up until the end of February 2022, and they forgot to ship the footboard. We've been waiting for replacement parts for over two months now and don't expect them until late May, assuming they don't delay it further. We've already paid in full for a three-thousand-dollar bed that we can't even use, and on top of that they're charging us another thousand dollars for the missing footboard. The frustrating part is we genuinely like the furniture and its quality, but the customer service team is slow to respond and provides vague information. All we want is to actually sleep in the bed we bought.
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