Guided Ergonomic Chair/ Keyboard Choice

Picking Ergonomic Equipment Easily

Ergonomic office chairs, ergonomic desks, ergonomic keyboard and mice - is there a way to pick them easily and without having to do much research?

In May, we published an exhaustive series reviewing ergonomic online stores. The winners were outstanding stores for ergonomic furniture and ergonomic accessories, with a great amount of choice in their inventory, and a very large amount of product and information data, allowing the customer to make an informed choice. There were, however, some stores who focused on offering a very easy picking process to customers, rather than giving them an abundance of research information. Where do you go then, when you want to solve an ergonomic problem quickly without doing extensive research? We found three stores which provide you with a quick and guided process to pick ergonomic equipment.

#3 Ergo4me (chairs only). Ergo4me is the direct marketing arm of the manufacturing company for Bodybilt, ErgoGenesis, already reviewed here. By selecting a "Build my chair" button in many places on the front page or on many other pages, you are led to two builders, a basic builder, which takes about one minute and proposes a chair, or an advanced builder which takes about 5 minutes and builds a custom chair. With the description of that custom chair, you can call ErgoGenesis, and ask for a quote along with options. Bodybilt makes good ergonomic chairs, and the average price of these custom chairs, according to Ergo4me, is approximately $850 - although the ones we built were higher. Perfect Back Chair is another site operated by ErgoGenesis in the same manner - there are several such sites.

#2 The Human Solution. The Human Solution, reviewed here, was already #2 in our ergonomic furniture store review, and #1 in our ergonomic accessories store review. It scores high again in this category, by providing two thorough self assessment evaluations, one for chairs, and one for keyboard trays. Both of them are PDF documents, that are to be downloaded, filled (it takes approximately 10 minutes), then sent back to the store. They are then evaluated by the store's ergonomic advisers (i..e ergonomics trained sales people), who come back to you with a proposal and discuss your choices. It is possible to get instant advice through chat (or phone) as well, rather than waiting for the result of these assessments. Because these sales people are agnostic with respect to brand, and because the store carries a very broad choice of brands, we like this process a lot, and feel that you get, at once, the benefit of professional advice with the brad range of products from a solid retailer. The sales people you talk to can also dispense advice on other issues such as footrest, keyboard, pointing devices etc., although the self assessments are focused on chairs and keyboard trays.

#1 Ergonomics Simplified. Ergonomics Simplified, already reviewed here, opens up as a clean site with a simple interface. It provides you with three primary guided self-evaluation. The most significant is the interactive evaluation, available from the upper right hand corner of the screen, which takes you through a 10 minute questionnaire and ergonomic guide, which also dispenses good advice on the way, and ends with a diagnostic of all your ergonomic problems, along with equipment proposals to alleviate them, goling from chairs to keyboard trays, keyboard, tracking devices, and footrest - very broad. You also have access to simple chair and keyboard choosers, which, based on a much simpler set of facts about you, validate which chairs or keyboards might be best for you. We really like the site and the evaluation, because the diagnosis and proposals are automated on line, and therefore instantaneous, and because the advice provided goes beyond chairs and keyboard trays, across all accessories that the assessment is programmed to cover, which is a broad range. We also like the fact that the store will put you in touch with local ergonomic consultants to evaluate your set-up in situ as needed - a nice touch, beyond what other stores provide. We have two significant concerns, however. The chair choices, and the range of options for some accessories, are limited, though - are they really broad enough to encompass all your needs? And - Ergonomics Simplified is the only store where you cannot reach the store on the phone, which we find inadequate - it would be better to raise prices and allow for a more complete range of interactions. Yet, despite these significant weaknesses, we find the broad range of automated diagnostics a compelling choice with great usability and immediate satisfaction online.