Throughout the last few years, I have been looking at this Phoenix showroom on the way to Colombo. But never had a reason to stop by. But finally, we could create a reason to visit there last Saturday.
You can find this large Phoenix Showroom a few miles away from Panadura bus station. Phoenix is a plastic item manufacturer that is known for providing quality items. First I was really hesitant to visit after seeing their reviews because some had mentioned prices are too high.
But anyway finally we decided to visit the showroom with a budget of 5000 LKR(13.5 $).
We wanted to buy some dustbins as the first step.
Pheonix showroom had a huge billboard in front of. Huge means I think it is thrice as a cinema display. It displayed "Designed For Life" with white fonts in orange background. The outer design was also orange and white and had the exact text as the Pheonix logo which is also a text. Actually, this design is minimalistic and eye-catching. I love minimalistic designs. From the glass walls, you can see some items inside the shop even from the road.
They had very large parking which ia very comfortable to reach. It seems the place is less crowded and I am really not sure why.
We went inside and hopefully, some discord announcements were displayed at the entrance! They had 5% to 20% discounts on different items.
There were only two other customers inside this large showroom and about 5 employees. They seem very supportive and less disturbing. We took some time to adapt to the showroom and learn how the items are placed.
Just in front of the door, there was a table displaying discounted items. From the left side, we could see kitchen containers, bigger vegitable containers and then plastic pails, bedside storage, dustbins, laundry bins, boxes, plastic drawers, furniture, and also fish containers. There was a big collection of containers and other plastics in the showroom.
We wanted two smaller dustbins that can be opened by foot for bathrooms. There were too, one is for 1364 and the other for 1600 something. We purchase 1364 which was black.
For the office room and bedroom, we purchased two white color open dustbins one per 600 something. I don't remember the exact value but this price had given after the discount.
We wanted four more dustbins, two for the kitchen and two for the other bedrooms, but as we are sticking to the budget we didn't attempt to buy any other. As the total of the above 4 items are lesser than 5000 LKR we had space to buy one more thing. So I picked a plastic storage box that I can use to store laundry items.
They had a nice collection of colors which are very neutral and minimal. I picked an ash color one which seems very charming. It was a 10L box which cost us 930 or near. All 5 items had discounted prices and later I checked their site and found the following prices shown there.
All these 5 items cost us 4816.80 LKR which is a little lower than our budget. That's why you should stick to a budget!
They double-checked all the items for damages at the cashier and they packed all the items into a bigger bag. It's a lovely white bag that has written the same text "Design for Life" in orange letters. Items were again checked at the security desk, before releasing to us. Once the security gave the signature we could take the items out.
Actually, before visiting this show we checked the prices of some bigger household items shops at Galle and Ambalangoda. All seem unreasonably expensive so we thought it is better to directly buy from a manufacturer. For example, the box you see below is selling for 1500 LKR + 250 LKR delivery at an online store. Which cost only 1110 LKR in the Pheonix online store. Above showroom, we purchased it for 930 or something.
This discount may not be valid for a long time, but the fact is you can buy it for a lower price from a physical store.
There are plenty of good things I saw at this place.
We had enough freedom to pick what we need.
There is a decent set of colors that suits modern design needs.
You can find good quality items with no damage here.
The place is very clean and calm so it's so customer friendly.
Probably we can find something new on our next visit. We believe our visit saved us at least 1000 rupees rather than we made the purchase online.
This is all about our store shopping last Saturday. And there is more stories coming relevant to last weekend experience. So, Stay Tuned!