Is Refurbished Furniture Right for You? Here’s What You Need to Know

Ida Gorecka • December 12, 2024

Your workspace needs an upgrade. Your team deserves quality office furniture. But when reviewing current market prices, the figures can be startling. Three months' lead time for office chairs? £20,000 for ten desks? There must be a more practical way to create a professional environment without compromising your budget. For forward-thinking businesses, there is - and it might surprise you. Let's explore a solution that could transform your approach to office furnishing.


The Truth About Modern Refurbished Office Furniture Standards

Forget any ideas about patched-up chairs or wobbly desks. Today's refurbishment transforms quality second-hand office furniture into pieces that look and work like new. Think of it like restoring a premium car - every part gets checked, tested, and either restored or replaced. Only the best pieces make the cut, and they're chosen specifically for their solid build quality and long-term reliability.



Skilled professionals take each piece apart, inspect every component, and fix or replace anything that's not perfect. When a chair or desk leaves the workshop, it's ready for years of daily use. Every mechanism, every adjustment feature, every surface gets brought back to original specifications. 



The Quality of Refurbished Office Chairs and Desks

Quality office furniture for sale is built to last - not just for a few years, but for decades. The best manufacturers like Herman Miller, Steelcase, and Haworth design their furniture knowing it can be refurbished later. They use strong materials and smart, modular designs that stand up to heavy use and make future repairs straightforward.



Look inside a quality office chair during refurbishment, and you'll find something surprising. Even after years of use, the core mechanisms often work perfectly. The gas lifts, tilt mechanisms, and structural components - the expensive parts that really matter - usually have plenty of life left. Once restored, these pieces perform just like new ones - especially those expensive ergonomic office chairs with all the adjustable features.


The Environmental Impact of Refurbishing Office Furniture

Here's a fact that might surprise you: every refurbished desk or chair keeps about 40-80 pounds of material out of landfills. Since most refurbishment happens locally, you're also cutting down on shipping pollution from new furniture made overseas. When you multiply this across an entire office, the environmental impact becomes clear.


Each piece of office furniture has an environmental cost from its original production - materials, manufacturing, shipping. When you choose refurbished office furniture, you're basically recycling all that embedded energy and preventing the need for more manufacturing. For companies tracking their environmental impact, these numbers add up to measurable progress toward sustainability goals. It’s possible to actually calculate the carbon savings and include them in environmental reports, just like we do at Coggin SOS. 


Contact us for more information about our savings reports and certificates here.



Availability of Refurbished Office Chairs and Desks

Need office furniture next week? While new pieces often have lead times stretching 8-12 weeks or longer, Coggin SOS maintains a ready supply of quality refurbished office furniture. We keep a comprehensive inventory of chairs, desks, and storage units on hand, and can quickly source additional pieces through our extensive network when needed.


This rapid availability makes a real difference. Whether you're expanding your team, relocating offices, planning an office clearance, or replacing damaged furniture, waiting three months for furniture isn't just inconvenient - it's costly. Quick access to quality pieces can keep your projects moving forward without delays.


Adaptable Second-Hand Office Furniture: Perfect-Fit Solutions

Need a desk that's slightly smaller? Want chairs that match your colours? Refurbished furniture can be adjusted to fit your exact needs. Whether you are looking to resize your desks to suit your new layout, or thinking about a new shape to match your new workspace identity, refurbishing your existing portfolio can offer a low cost, effective and environmentally friendly solution. Corner workstations can be adapted to fit tricky spaces. Chairs can be reupholstered in fabrics that go beyond the standard corporate blues and blacks - you get durability and style that matches your new workspace design.

This flexibility means you're not stuck with standard sizes or limited colour options. Your furniture can be tailored to your specific requirements while maintaining its professional appearance and structural integrity. 



How Choosing Refurbished Office Furniture Affects Your Budget

Outfitting an office with refurbished furniture can dramatically reduce costs compared to buying new. A complete workstation with a desk, chair, and storage costs a fraction of the new price. These savings can be redirected to other business priorities like technology upgrades or employee training.


The benefits extend beyond initial cost savings. Refurbished furniture comes with comparable warranties to new pieces and offers similar longevity. You'll often find maintenance costs are lower since these items have already proven their durability. Plus, you get the advantage of immediate delivery rather than waiting months for new furniture.


When considering quality, warranties, customisation options, and delivery speed, refurbished furniture offers exceptional value. You don't have to compromise between staying within budget and maintaining high standards - refurbished options often provide both.


Want to Choose Refurbished?

If you're considering refurbished furniture for your workspace, at Coggin SOS we can help you understand all your options. Our specialists can walk you through our refurbishment process, show you examples of completed projects, and help you evaluate what would work best for your needs. 


Visit our showroom to see the quality of refurbished furniture firsthand, or contact us to discuss your workspace requirements. Whether you're looking to refurbish your existing furniture or purchase professionally refurbished pieces, we're here to help you create a workspace that works for your team and your budget.


By Ida Gorecka September 8, 2025
Your office transformation is approved. Budget's signed off. New layout's finalised. There's just one problem: those 1600mm executive desks that worked perfectly in the old corner offices are now 400mm too wide for your new collaborative pods. The reception desk you spent £3,000 on last year? It's the wrong height entirely for your rebrand. Most facilities managers would see this as a disposal problem. Skip hire , landfill tax , 12-week lead times for replacements. But what if that's completely backwards? What if the furniture that doesn't fit isn't a problem to solve, but an asset to unlock? Every year in the UK, around 1.2 million desks and 1.8 million office chairs are sent to landfill and only 14 % of them are being reused (Source: WRAP , Lancashire Business View ). Those old, "wrong-sized" desks you're planning to skip? They can be professionally refurbished and resized to your exact specifications in 7-10 days , at 40-70% less than new , with zero waste and a 12-month warranty . This article is for facilities managers, procurement leads, and fit-out teams who want practical, product-focused solutions. You’ll see when resizing and repurposing makes sense, the savings it delivers, the compliance boxes it ticks, and how to roll it out step by step. Curious what your current desks could deliver if resized or refurbished? Book a free assessment - we’ll map options, costs, and timelines for you.
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By Ida Gorecka August 7, 2025
If you're here, you're probably managing a lot. A relocation, a refurbishment, or a growing ESG brief. Maybe you’re under pressure to meet sustainability targets, stay on budget, and deliver results your team and clients can actually see. And right now, office furniture might not be on your radar. But it should be. In most organisations, furniture is still treated as an afterthought. It’s functional, it’s bulky, and when it’s no longer needed, it’s often sent straight to landfill. But here’s the truth: when you start thinking of office furniture as a strategic asset within the circular economy , everything changes. For your budget . Your carbon reporting . Your project timelines . Your reputation . This article is for you if you’re tired of defaulting to skips. If you want smarter ways to meet ESG goals without blowing your budget. If you’re ready to make office sustainability a measurable advantage - not just a checkbox. We’ll show you just how much office furniture is wasted each year, what it’s really costing your business, and how the circular economy can apply directly to your projects. You’ll learn how organisations like yours are saving thousands, avoiding skips entirely, and turning unwanted furniture into reportable ESG wins - plus practical steps to get started today. Curious what your office clearance could be worth? Get in touch with our team for a free circular furniture audit.