Our new kitchen was pretty uncool.
I mean, it was a nice kitchen and all…but it didn’t have a place for cooling our sweet tea. and for chilling Will’s sippy cup. and for keeping my mustard nice and brisk. What can I say, I like my condiments cold. So the first thing on our to-do list was to pick out a fridge. We knew that there would be a slew of options…and we obviously wanted the best price but also wanted to get something that would meet our needs for a long time. So we headed to HHGregg. We bought our washer & dryer there ages ago and knew that they were the best priced for new appliances (because they will try to cut deals vs just listing a price and that being that).
When we got there, I had a mild heart attack over the number of options. The biggest and first decision that we would have to make would be this: sidebyside vs. french door. Jeremy wanted french door and I have always been a sidebyside kinda girl. The sales guy kept saying that the french door is actually larger and you can hold more stuff. I asked him “like what?” “Deli trays” was his answer. Seriously folks…how often do people buy deli trays? Am I the only person on the planet that doesn’t think you should buy a fridge based on a deli tray? I have never purchased a deli tray…so maybe I am missing out and just don’t know it yet. Plus, my thing is that I need condiment space. I don’t need a shelf for pizza boxes or pork roasts or obscenely long deli trays…I need condiment space. I think we have six types of mustard in our fridge right now.
So anyhoo…I told my darling boyfriend that if we were gonna go with the french door, I had a few requirements.
- it had to have a water & ice dispenser in the door
- it had to have the ice maker in the door and not like this one:
- the pull out deli drawer had to just be a drawer – not a half drawer with a flip up lid (my mom has one of those and it’s broken already)
- the freezer couldn’t be wire drawers (Hello leaky chicken juice – meet my Ego Waffles!)
So we narrowed it down to two options. The first being the Whirlpool Gold series (below left) – it had met almost everything on our checklist and had smart storage layout in the fridge. The second option was the LG (for all you detail people – it was the LG LFX28978ST). The later also checked everything on our list but boasted a little extra square footage (27.6 vs 27.0) and had solid drawers in the freezer (vs. Whirlpool’s wire drawers). Plus, the LG had a larger freezer (8.8 cubic feet vs. Whirlpool’s 7.0 cubic feet)…and when it comes to having a baby, we knew that freezer space is priceless. And it was just a bonus that we liked the handles better on the LG too 🙂
Oh and did I mention that Jeremy liked the LG’s mostly-stainless steel ice & water dispenser better too? I think part of it was because of that extra-tall space for his giant man-cups (yes, I just typed giant man-cups). it doesn’t hurt that the 96% of the finish is stainless steel – the material men would decorate an entire room with if possible.
After 13 hours of fridge shopping, we finally eliminated all the other very worthy options and got the quote for the fridge (I explain all the moolah-details when I tell ya about our new dishwasher – it makes more sense since they were a package deal!). Then we went home to sleep on it. Actually we slept on it after a lot of google-ing, review reading, and Consumer Reporting. We came to the conclusion that the highly ranked LG was in fact the best choice for us…
so we called them the Friday (the first morning we woke up in the new house), and got the delivery info for the very next day.
Oh how this delivery guy makes me smile. He struck this all stance by himself, by the way. I just said that I was going to take a photo of the fridge and he decided to make this cool new thing look oh so hawt. Of course, it probably didn’t discourage the posing when my sister and I started cheering/catcalling/instructing him when we saw that he was into posing with appliances.
Oh and here is the current kitchen (in total disarray) with the new and uber-shiny fridge installed in the cubby.
Oh and here’s a tip for all you soon-to-be-fridge buyers…ask the delivery guys if they can remove the handles for you to get the protective plastic wrap off the fridge completely. I would have had little bits of clear plastic sitting under the handles and in the nooks and crannies for years if I had not asked the HHGregg guys to remove the handles completely. Oh and make sure you dump any first gallons of water that come through your new filters….they need to be flushed before you can actually drink the water from the dispenser or use the first batch of ice.
Speaking of ice & water dispenser, this new fridge is newly fangled.
Many a time, we’ve had people do as this arm is doing. And many a time, I hand them a couple paper towels and tell them that it happens to everyone. It happened to me.
I walked around looking like I had an accident. And when I say “I”, I mean my bladder.
So take note my friends – if you come over to get a cup of water, please operate the fridge with extreme caution. And that is all she said about the new fridge situation. Oh and yes, the french door style is growing on me…even though I won’t get to see this again:
and no…I haven’t bought a deli tray even to try to fit it inside 🙂
What an awesome fridge!! And am I the first to comment? Couldn’t be…not possible:) Will’s little booty in the old fridge is too cute and I’m loving the new fancy fridge. Thanks for the late post, that was a perfect way to end my not so perfect day! Love ya KB!!
I love my French-door fridge (purchased a Kenmore in 2007). I think that side-by-side fridges waste too much space.
You may think you’ll never use a deli tray, but I also find it easy to store a half sheet cake (which you may use for a birthday party) or an entire tray of cookies or pizzas waiting to be baked (which happens often at my house) in the French-door fridge.
I opted to keep the ice in the freezer drawer because you lose storage space (for your condiments, etc.) by having the ice dispenser in the door. I do have water at the door, and it doesn’t have a ledge, so you can fill up anything from a glass to a pot.
I love the new fridge! Just a little FYI for all your readers… Best Buy is now extremely competitive with HHGregg appliance prices and sometimes with their rewards program you get even more savings! We buy a lot through HHGregg, but they do not have the new Samsung appliance set that I love!
Keep us updated on how you like the new fridge setup. My next step will be from side by side to french.
Looks like you got a great fridge! And the picture of the HHgregg guy is too funny!
We really, really need a new fridge, but with some things going on with my husband’s job it’s just not possible right now. I’m hoping to go with a KitchenAid (very similar to the Whirlpool Gold you looked at, since they’re the same company), my mom has one and it’s amazing. Yes, I just called a fridge amazing…
Good post Katie! I can’t wait to read about how you haggled the price 🙂
I hope you have better luck with LG service than I did and that you have no problems with your fridge. Our washer does not operate as it was intended (it’s no longer sold less than a year later) and bottom line, after much hassle….”.I’ll file a complaint for you.”
I do have a deli tray and I must say I dislike it. I hate having to open both doors to get anything out of it! I do keep our cheese/meat in there and since I typically use cheese/meat everyday both doors constantly need to be opened. Energy savings is down the toilet!
I’m loving the posts about how you’re settling in! Great to see it how it really is, and you’re process in how you’re making it work.
Also – off topic, I know, but I was wondering when you were going to post the results of the diaper cake giveaway?
That’s our fridge!!! Hahah I was reading thinking…I wonder if she had the same trouble as we did with using the water/ice dispenser wrong at first. Winner! You totally get used to it, but people using it for the first time are always doing the same thing 🙂
for all you stainless lovers who don’t want to shell out big monies for the cleaners a friend of mine shared this tip (he used to sell appliances)…. spray a little WD40 on a paper towel and wipe! brings out the shine and bye-bye finger prints.
anything sticky or spilled should be wiped with a damp cloth first, but the WD40 works like a CHARM. love love love
Now that is one shiny fridge!
Congrats!
I love my french door fridge, and as one commenter mentioned above, that drawer holds way cooler stuff than deli trays! We use ours to hold take-n-bake pizzas, and other delicious stuff (like the big packages of precooked bacon we get at Costco – you can never have enough bacon in your house!)
I love love love my fridge, and hope you love yours too!
And if you don’t want to use WD-40 to clean the front of your fridge, I found that Simple Green’s Stainless Steel Polish & Cleaner works wonders. It’s the bomb.com.
We just bought that exact same fridge a few weeks ago and we love it! It seems so huge compared to our old side-by-side!
Ha, the deli tray response from the salesman is priceless. I loved hearing all the details behind how you made your decision – looks great in there!
I have a 1939 house with a fridge that will NEVER DIE! It actually did die once, the repair man came (we had a warrenty on our very old appliances), he indicated that this fridge was extremely old (which I knew), but of course was able to fix it (a simple fix).
When it dies–I WILL BE GETTING A FRIDGE SIMILAR TO YOUR FRIDGE! Totally jealous! Love it! Thank you for doing the fridge research for me!
http://www.wom-mom.com
That fridge is awesome! and I love the shot of the delivery guy
Good Luck with the LG fridge!
We got one about five years ago and have had nothing but problems. Our freezer would stop defrosting (?) and you’d wake up to a warming freezer, about three tons of ice frosted to the walls and water dripping all over your floors. The only way to cure that one was with a hairdryer. But they did fix it under warranty (after having to wait two weeks!) – TWICE. Our second issue was the lights in the fridge wouldn’t go off. I came downstairs one morning to the smell of burning plastic. The lights inside had been on all night and had burned the plastic casing, plus, most of the food had spoiled because it had gotten so hot in there.
Hopefully they have fine tuned their appliances now and you guys wont have the same issues!
One of the first pictures that you rules out is the one we have–inherited it with our house. I would rule it out for the exact same reasons you did. I hate that the ice maker takes up so much space inside the fridge and the deli drawer is a waste of space–it’s where half used bags of shredded cheese go to die. Good job on the LG!
Wait–stop the presses. So in this new-fangled fridge gizmo the ENTIRE water and ice operation is IN THE DOOR so you don’t have to sacrifice condiment space or shelves on the inside???
You don’t need a French door fridge for deli trays, Katie. You need it for kid’s birthday cakes!
“Giant man-cups” just totally made my day.
I thought my husband was the only weirdo in the world who used cups that don’t at all fit in the top of the dishwasher. (I mean, he may as well be drinking out of a pitcher for the size of these things. And yet he still gets upset when I want to share the water. Yay marriage!)
Looks so pretty in your kitchen!
Ditto on the birthday cake comment^^^:) One day when Will graduates from high school you will need a deli tray. Glad you will be prepared:) We had a french drawer fridge at our last house. We opted for a standard freezer on top and love it! (Might be the way our kitchens have been configured though). I can’t imagine non wire shelves in the freezer. Hmmm. The bottomless pit of a freezer was what I didn’t like about it.
That is a very nice fridge, but goodness…. we just replaced our stove, dishwasher, fridge, and microwave for about slightly more than half the cost of that one fridge! That’s a pricey little bugger! We’re a young couple on a budget so we didn’t go stainless steel (I’m sure that is a big part of the price difference). It does look very nice in your kitchen. 🙂
Are you going to change the fridge surround since you opted not to buy a counter depth style fridge? Just wondering if it looks odd in real life that the fridge sticks out since most fridge surrounds cost big $$$ and you are lucky to already have one. My man of the house’s family owns an appliance chain in the 215 area and we have a Gaggenau p.o.s. fridge see linky: http://www.freezers-fridges.com/fridges/manufacturers/pos/gaggenau_ry_491-200 (we got the fridge for free so cant complain but really? a house with kids NEEDS a door water/ice dispenser and ours only has ice in the fridge- no water?! wheres a cheap-o kitchenaid to my rescue?) We then had ours built in,similar to yours. Other than having the worlds worst most impractical (musta been built by a man who only had beer in his fridge) I do love that is is flush to the cabinets and the giant stainless finger print monster “disappears” rather than sticking out like my built in is pregnant. Anyway, best of luck! And I know you can’t get a fridge from us but we can give you a quote to beat HH Gregg’s price and they have to match it since they are in our area too…. just sayin’ 🙂
Hi Krystle,
Actually the fridge surround is gonna stay as-is. We really don’t mind it at all 🙂 And the thing with price-matching is this – even if someone can price match, usually they don’t offer free next day delivery and installation. Maybe ya’ll do, but all the places we looked at didn’t…and since we were in such a time crunch that really mattered.
xo – kb
Ditto. Yay marriage 🙂
xo – kb
Can I just say that I LOVE your new fridge! I’m insanly jealous. I’m also happy to see that you guys also have a crazy amount of condiments in your old fridge. I always felt ashamed when people saw how many we have but I don’t feel so alone anymore. 🙂
I never thought I could be jealous of someone’s fridge…well done, it’s fabulous! 🙂
Haha! Our LG fridge has the same water dispenser. When we had a house warming party we just stood and watched EVERYSINGLEPERSON (35+) spill water all over themselves…it was hilarious:) And probably mean of us…hehe.
I really enjoy your blog! I also am a blogger, though I just have started and my blog is NOWHERE near anything yours is! But your blog is a great place to find inspiration. Your new home is amazing!!!
I love it! And although you may miss those pics of Will in the fridge, you will be so glad when he gets old enough to open the door himself that he cant reach! My 2 year old has recently taken to taking out the egg carton, cracking the egg, and putting it back in, and then repeating until the whole dozen is oozing in the carton! We had to rearrange the shelves to that the eggs were no longer in her reach!! I had to laugh! That’s what I get for letting her help bake!! Anyway, its a beautiful fridge and i am so glad you said that about wire shelves in the freezer, I don’t think I would have thought of that!!
My parents just got this same exact fridge! We LOVE it! When I saw the water and ice dispenser for the first time I stood there with a very confused look on my face for a good minute or two. Then I decided to just go for it… Luckily I figured it out the first time and didn’t get my pants wet! Lol. Hope you guys enjoy!