September 28, 2010

Dear Mark White and all the wonderful crew at Kitchen Encounters,
What can I say? You and your crew have enabled me to have the kitchen of my dreams. And you know…I had some pretty big dreams. I’m the type of person that wants to do everything herself. I had a vision. I knew exactly what I wanted. I wanted my kitchen to reflect me. Who I was, not what some designer thought I was. I also needed to be able to really cook in there…to become the gourmet chef and baker that I always dreamed of being. I also wanted my kitchen to be a place of welcome for all of our family and friends. To say, that you helped me achieve these goals is an understatement.

I knew from the beginning that I didn’t want a designer to come in and give me the same kitchen that I see everywhere else. I wanted something unique that reflected me. I also knew that remodeling the kitchen was a huge undertaking and I didn’t want to make any mistakes. I needed a professional to be able to take my vision and make it a reality.
I had a hard time finding you. Everyone I spoke with either tried to have me “go on faith” that they were the right designer for me. Pay them and they would give me just what I wanted…or I met with inexperienced people that had access to a computer and thought that was enough to go on. All they had to do was take all my ideas
and plug them into a computer program and poof…the kitchen of my dreams would magically appear.

You were different from the start. You sat down with us and told us that you don’t use a computer…you would sit down with us for hours and hours and gather all of our ideas and come up with several designs…then take the best out of all the designs and put them all together. You were customer focused, thoughtful and really listened to us. I knew coming in exactly what I wanted, but somehow you came up with other ways of seeing things. Things I never thought of. Not just with the look of the kitchen, but all the function. Who would have thought that a little pullout trashcan by my 2nd sink would end up being one of my favorite things in my kitchen!

Your hand drawings really made us being able to visualize the final product. In fact, they were pretty much spot on with the final product. Enlarging my kitchen window…who would have thought that small change would make such a huge impact? And don’t get me started on my island! Curtis and I had very huge aspirations for that island and wow did you come through! Not only does it have huge visual impact, but it’s also functional. The other thing we appreciated was at no time did we feel pressured to buy cabinets from you. We were simply going
to pay for the design and then we would see. Of course, you must have known that after we worked with you on the design we totally trusted you and wanted to give you our business with cabinets.

Then we had the hard decision of who would be able to install this kitchen. We needed people with experience and thoughtfulness and precision. We didn’t have to look far. You found the right contractors for us. And boy did they deliver!

Whew! I wasn’t planning on going on and on…just wanted to let you know how pleased I was…but, the truth is, you made me so happy! My kitchen is everything I dreamed it would be. My children are becoming pretty amazing chefs and everyone that comes over not only loves what we did, but they feel at home! You and Jim and Shane were wonderful to work with. Of course issues came up as they always do, but I never at any time became stressed out about it. I knew that you would fix everything. Curtis and I put our faith in you and you never let us down!

Someday, I’d love for you to come and get a picture of it…as soon as Curtis finds the time to install my mosaic, we’ll have you over. Unfortunately, its soccer season and nothing gets done during soccer season

Hope everyone is doing well…Please let everyone know how truly grateful we are to have worked with the best in the business and please know that we would be happy to be referrals for you anytime!

Thanks again!!!!