The intent and purpose of this website are to create more visibility in an ever-increasing environment of people that shop for products and services over the internet. Consumers can quickly see that they can save money and keep family heirlooms that have sentimental value rather than replacing them with modern “disposable” furniture. Website viewers can also see that services are available to refinish wood floors or trim in their house. The steps that are taken to get viewers to believe their old furniture can be refinished rather than replaced involved compelling before and after photos and written as well as video testimonials. The photos show very time-worn furniture and flooring that is brought back to life by refinishing. The written testimonials show positive reviews and photos of the reviewing people to make it seems more real. The video testimonials are meant to add another level of realism (even though the content of the videos is meant to be comical just in the sense of the school project) as we try to gain the trust of the viewer.
The Homepage is designed to have the name of the business as the main focus and a photo that spins when the cursor is over it to draw attention to the text. The background for the home page was my favorite, but I wanted to incorporate other colors as backgrounds for other pages. Originally the site had many different colors, and for the final project, I decided to limit the amount of color change throughout the site to a minimum. Originally there was a generic services page that branched off to the three services offered but for the final project I eliminated this “extra” page because the added layer of navigation seemed completely unnecessary. The Furniture, Flooring, and Cabinets & trim pages use the common continuous background throughout the site and have headline photos to support their theme. These three service pages have descriptions of their service limitations and a table for a general idea of pricing. Don’t be put off by the pricing, these charges/fees are all negotiable and just set in place to have a general idea of baseline standards. The contact page has the same background as most other pages and is simple at first glance. This is intentional so that the contact page does not feel intimidating or overly complicated. The contact page is meant to feel quick, clear and easy. The photo page has the same non-distracting background and photos of refinished furniture before and after. These photos are supposed to be interactive with the viewer because they scale up to see more detail when the cursor is placed over the photos. Each photo has a simple caption explaining what it is under the photo. The customer testimonials page was created as an opposite contrast from the other pages intentionally. The dark background for most other pages is now used as the container color, and the text has been changed to white. This extreme contrast from the other pages is meant to not only wake up the user’s attention level but also leave a strong impression. The impression to be left with the viewer is driven by the positive written reviews and the happy videos of past and re-occurring customers. The final page is the About page which originally only had small descriptions of the history of the company, the current position and the future goals of the business. Now, this content will still be on the page but bumped to the bottom to make way for this review.
In the future for this website, we would like to add much more relevant content to the website. As more furniture is refinished, the photo gallery will grow exponentially. More customer testimonials will be added as more people get their furniture refinished. If there were more time and resources, the website would have more original images for all the images on the site. Each and every photo would be a Rideout Refinishing success story other than free stock photos from the internet for the majority of the content outside of the Photo Gallery page. We would like some of the added pages and content for future updates to include a blog page and more developed photo collection. The blog page can keep the customers interested with “real-time” content, updates and answers. A further developed photo gallery can split different types of projects onto their own pages such as tables, floors, dressers, cabinets, etc..
Harold Rideout started refinishing furniture in his garage in 1994. Only using a palm sander, a paint brush, some stain and a sealant he was a able to transform dilapidated furniture back into the gems they once were.
As of today, Rideout Refinishing is working out of one brick-and-mortar location. We are able to service the local area of about any location from New York City to Boston.
Our goal is to build as much business in the immediate area as possible and branching out to other locations across the United States.