Painting kitchen cabinets

[Kristen Buckley]

I just found you guys, what a great community!

I've been running a successful cabinet painting business in Raleigh, NC for the past 5 years or so and have seen varied advice and suggestions about how, when and when not to paint kitchen or even bathroom cabinets. I'd like to add my 2 cents in here and see what everyone else thinks as well.

I've done work in inexpensive homes and very-expensive homes, and sometimes I wonder what the person who picked the cabinets was thinking! Especially in homes built between 1990 - 2010 there was apparently a bunch of designers who thought they should spec out dark wood floors and dark wood cabinets. The problems with that are 1. It makes a kitchen feel dark and heavy unless it's flooded with light. 2. There is no defining line between the cabinets and the floor and it can look muddled.

I would say 95% of the cabinets we paint are dark-ish and the homeowner wants them to be some shade of white. We're usually in the $2K to $3K range for medium to medium-large kitchens and we're in and out in 7 days. All we've ever used is water-based products, the lower the voc rating the better. We spray the doors and drawer fronts at our shop, and our crew of talented ladies paints the face frames by hand. That means the homeowner never loses the use of the kitchen! They like that.

I'd love to hear what you think of when you hear someone say "painted cabinets", what your feeling is on the ROI of painted cabinets and if you've ever done it, recommended it or warned against it (and why).

Thanks!