I rarely post product reviews on this blog. But every so often something comes along that I think has really great potential. When the makers of “Off The Floor” contacted me to review their new product, my eyes lit up. My son’s room is small – and there is always a mess on the floor. And the way it is set up, there isn’t much space for things like book shelves or organizers.
The Off The Floor concept caught my eye because it can be used on the back of a door – or attached to the wall. Since my son’s room has limited space, I was really looking forward to something that could take the clutter off of the floor without blocking his heating vents like traditional bookcases and furniture might.
Off The Floor Mounted to our door
Getting the unit over the door was easy too – nothing a mom (or dad) on their own can’t handle – no power tools required. All of the attachments snap on and stay in place. I did receive the wall mounts in the mail, but haven’t actually installed them (yet).
What I like about this unit:
– It comes in great colors
– It is easy to assemble and take apart as needed
– It is versatile and can fit into any space – as a complete unit or split apart into smaller sub-units
– It can hold up to 75 lbs of “stuff” – that’s a lot of organizing potential!
– It has so much potential to help get things off of the floor
– It can be hung over the back of the door or used as a wall unit – and I like it even more as a wall unit because you can separate it into different segments for even greater versatility.
When the door is opened, the attachments hit the wall, so we can’t even open our door all the way. For over-the-door mounting, narrower attachments would be a great option
– All of the pieces are proprietary – so you can’t just attach any old thing to it – it has to be something specifically designed to work with it. Maybe as the company gets larger, other companies will make accessories for it, but right now, getting things from Off The Floor directly is your only option.
– The number of accessories that can be attached to the unit currently is pretty limited – two different “bucket” like attachments for “holding” things and one hook. (Although the CEO of the company took the time to write to me and assure me that more are in development and will be available soon!!)
– Although it is designed to go “behind your door” it doesn’t work for all doors – in my house at least, the space between the door and wall behind the door is too narrow – so the attachments don’t fit well on the unit. I have to keep them all toward the outside of the door, but still can’t open my door completely with it attached. I recommend measuring the space behind your door to see if it will work for you. If not, order it with the wall mount instead.
What I would love to see them do to improve this unit:
– Make shelves. When I first signed up to review the Off The Wall, I envisioned having all of my sons books neatly organized on shelves. As I mentioned his room doesn’t have adequate space for traditional book cases – so having something above the ground that could still hold books would be ideal. It would be an easy attachment for the manufacturer to make as an “optional accessory.” When I proposed this option to Off The Floor they explained to me that books are heavy and require the type of on the floor storage provided by traditional book cases – so even though it is something that I wanted – it probably isn’t a practical option. (bummer).
– Make the attachments narrower for behind the door use so that the door can still be fully opened when the unit is attached – if your door is in the middle of a room it’s fine – but when your door is right up against a wall – it’s a tight fit. Decide which option (door hang or wall mount) is right for your space. On the plus side – you do have the option to choose prior to ordering and they provide all of the dimensions of the accessories on their website so that you can make an informed decision.
– Give more color options – Right now, you can choose the color of your panels, but all units come with gray accessories and gray connector pieces. I would love to have a choice of what color accessories my unit had. And I am pleased to announce that the CEO at Off The Floor has assured me that these choices are already in the pipe-line and will be coming out soon!! YIPPEE!
– Make the accessories easier to attach to the unit. While the panels of the unit are easy to put together and take apart, you have to REALLY PUSH hard to get the hooks and containers to attach to the unit – and once they are in place, it’s really hard to get them off and move them around – it would be nicer if they had a clip or something that could easily be tightened and loosened for easier rearranging, although the company explained this was intended for safety reasons.
– Make it so that attachments can be hung between panels. The unit consists of panels that are joined together. When you put an attachment on it – it has two hooks – which can only hook onto it within one of the panels – but not between panels. So you lose a lot of flexibility of where you are able to hang the larger attachments.
Over all, I think that the Off The Floor system has great potential. I’d love to see pages and pages of different attachment options – not just the shelves that I’d like to have, but all kinds of other attachments. The choice are endless – so give the consumer some more choices.
Would you like to try one out for yourself? Visit Off The Floor and choose your own accessories (starter kits come with set accessories, but you can choose additional accessories to meet your specific needs). For a limited time, they are offering free holiday shipping – so visit them today – no coupon required!
And finally, as I left my son’s room today (after taking his bath robe off of his Off The Floor unit for him to wear) he said to me “I like that thing on my door,” so I asked Why? and he said “Because it has a lot of places for me to put things.” So there you have it – out of the mouth of a 7-year old!
