Empire Today®

Their website has really good content and they have been responsive and professional with responsiveness.

He provided a professional bid and explained things well.

It went terribly. The sales person came to the house, she was nice, but as I learned later did not know what she was doing. I had a problem floor due to house settling and pet urine stains and smells. I wanted the old carpet removed, the cement leveled in spots, cracks and floor joints filled with caulk and carpet laid throughout my basement. The crew showed up and only one member spoke very broken minimal English. The other two crew members spoke no English. One member of the crew smelled awful. They did not bring the paint to seal the floor. The salesperson brought it by before they arrived. The crew did not arrive until 11:00 AM. My basement is 1550+ sq ft. Two bedrooms, one hall, and a large family room. The crew brought no paint supplies, only one small box of leveling compound, and no caulk for the floor cracks. I had to let them use my painting supplies and I happened to have some concrete caulk at my home that I let them use so the carpet could be installed. The sales person brought the wrong Kilz product, the crew got paint on my bar cabinets and bar refrigerator, along with several areas of wall surface. They destroyed or threw away my painting equipment. All of which could have been cleaned and used again . The crew brought nothing to mix the leveling compound in or the tools to apply it and smooth it out on the floor. I had to loan them that too and they threw those tools away too. The crew also tried to take all of the carpet remnants with them. I made them unload their van and leave the larger remnants behind in case I needed them in the future for repairs. I learned the paint was the wrong kind while I was complaining about the crew getting paint on my bar refrigerator and cabinets. The sales person said, "oh it will just wash off". That's when I knew they had purchased and used the wrong paint. You don't seal a floor with a water based paint. The crew did not finish until 9:30 PM. They told me they had to stay and finish that day because they didn't know when they could get back to finish the job. I learned later that was a lie. The actual installation was terrible. The seams showed and the carpet rippled all around the room especially around the edges. I called the 800 number the next day. A week later they sent a 2 man crew out to deal with the problem. This time they brought the right paint, and the necessary tools. One member of the crew spoke good English. The other spoke no English. They worked one complete day until around 6, and came out the following day to complete the job and worked until around 2. It is finally installed properly. I am relatively happy with the carpet. This crew told me the pad had not been trimmed properly by the first crew and that the carpet had not been stretched properly. The prep work was all done inadequately and incompletely. I will never use them again, nor would I recommend them to anyone. I am a disabled senior citizen and the stress this caused was enormous. Completely avoidable had the sales person known her product and job, and the first crew would have been qualified technically and qualified on a customer relations basis, primarily the ability to communicate with an English speaking customer. It's extremely difficult and frustrating to have people working in your home that cannot communicate with. It's hard to go through that much upheaval if you are in good health. When you are not in good health it is extremely difficult! It's been about six weeks since the final installation and so far no problems with the carpet as it is installed now. I had to touch up paint on my walls and wall boards in several places, but that damage was done by the first crew. Empire did finally correctly lay the carpet, and they did reimburse me for the painting tools the first crew destroyed and for the caulk I had at my home and additional caulk I had to purchase while they were here. I learned a lot with this installation. One is who never to use again and two, if things start to go wrong at the start, cancel the job and three don't sign off on a job when it's dark and hard to see, four, tell a work crew to leave when you are tired and it's too late to see very well. I felt I should have been reimbursed for some of the cost on the job. This was not only stressful but also a tremendous difficulty due to living with basement furniture on my main level for 2 1/2 weeks to accommodate the two installations. Lesson learned and hopefully this review will prevent others from having the same difficulties I did.