Ready Made Roller Shades -Futility at it's finest.

A few years back you could walk into a hardware store and get good quality ready made roller shades. Today don't even think about it.

In their quest to be the low price leader big box stores-walmart, lowes and home depot have taken the once venerable ready made roller shade and made it a worthless commodity.

In order to cut cost they replaced the straight and true wood roller with a cardboard roller that couldn't stay straight if it tried.

Cardboard roller will pick up moisture out of the air and warp in no time at all. If you live in Florida as I do you don't even have a chance to keep it straight.

You can buy a 36" ready made roller shade for $2.97. The price is cheap but believe me so is the quality. If you put them on a window where they will stay in one place-not be used- like a garage window or some place like that you could possibly get by.

If you want to cover a window inexpensively and have it useable try a good vinyl mini blind. These also are getting made cheaper and cheaper every day. I think the quality of the box stores is getting worse every day.

The least expensive blind I would recommend is the Bali 6 guage aluminum blind. This is made by a very reputable company and is built to last.

They even jazz up the ready made window shades by putting a row of gimp trim and a shaped hem which looks nice but the shades still have the cardboard roller which in my estimation makes them worthless.

Bottom line-I would not recommend any ready made roller shade as long as it has a cardboard roller. I hate to say that because roller shades are part of our heritage, look fine in a window and do a good job of insulating.

I will how ever recomend quality roller shades made from aluminum rollers and with a clutch system to help them raise and lower with ease. These are the type of product you won't regret buying a few months down the road.

I hope the next time I talk to you I will have some good news. To stay up to date on window blinds and what's going on in decorating just put you first name-so I can call you by name-and your email address in the box below and I'll get you started receiving the Pre-Decorating Course and the Decorating Coach e-zine.

Additional Roller Shade Information

Wooden Roller Shades
Wooden Roller Shades keep your shades at attention.