Should It Cost This Much?

[Twistiva]

All -

Went to a car upholstery shop yesterday to look into what he'd charge me for re-upholstering my seats (both fronts and my single-piece bench seat) and new carpet with a plastic heel-pad.

$1000

When I asked how much just for the seats he said about $600. :bs:

Is this what you guys would expect? My front seats and carpet is trashed and it's ALL gotta be changed (so the back matches the fronts) but I don't want to spend more than I need to.

(BTW, I know there are some avenues to buy original carpet kits for far less than $400 but I always HATED the velcro-like power of my Festy carpet. Man, you could lose Jimmy Hoffa in there! Once something is in the carpet it takes an act of God to vaccum it out. Plus, the factory carpet front L/R corners would never stay tucked in under the trim pieces that were designed to hold them up. It's like Ford needed to spend a few bucks more to extend the corners a couple of inches so the trim could hold on to them better. Someone also said on a forum here that carpet kits typically don't ship well. There you have it...my rant against factory carpet. If any of my info is bad, pls let me know.)

[doylerl]

Remove the bench and throw in racing buckets... a lot cheaper... lol... As far as carpet, I think I read a post on here where someone just went to lowes and cut it and formed it themselves.

Not lowes, but still WAY cheaper...

http://www.fordfestiva.com/forums/showthread.php?t=28952&highlight=carpet

[link5186]

That's WAAAY too much! Do you need re-padding on the seats or just upholstery? There are guys here in Indiana who will do a single seat for $60-$90 depending on where you ask. I don't really know about the carpeting, but there's no way I'd pay $600 to redo seats.

[blkfordsedan]

Sounds like the guy is either really hurting and trying to make his mortgage payment off you, or he's really busy and doesn't want to mess with it!

[SimonTuffGuy]

Hitup the junkyard and find a good set of Festiva seats that you can swap in. There was a really nice clean set of seats up for grabs at Ohiostiva last year.

[JPT]

$1,000?!?

Rip off!

[crazyrog17]

My Dad had his own upholstery shop for years and now does all the seats for the Roush Mustangs/F-150s etc...

He said $400-$500 is more reasonable for custom pattern, reusing the stock foam. If he could find pre-sewn covers, it'd be considerably cheaper to just install them over the foam.

Making a custom pattern isn't easy, that's for sure.

[Aspire]

Hitup the junkyard and find a good set of Festiva seats that you can swap in. There was a really nice clean set of seats up for grabs at Ohiostiva last year.

x2. Just to give you an example, I pulled a nice set out of an 03 Lancer for $17 each the other week.

$1,000?!?

Rip off!

Well, the shop's work may be worth it. It might just not be the right shop to bring a Festiva to.

[Twistiva]

That's WAAAY too much! Do you need re-padding on the seats or just upholstery? There are guys here in Indiana who will do a single seat for $60-$90 depending on where you ask. I don't really know about the carpeting, but there's no way I'd pay $600 to redo seats.

Left seat probably needs to be re-padded; there was a cut in the factory fabric long ago and the sun started to decay the foam underneath. Other seats have had no fabric breaches so I would think the foam is still in decent shape? There's no lumps/holes, etc in the seat cushion padding on the right seat and bench seat.

[Twistiva]

My Dad had his own upholstery shop for years and now does all the seats for the Roush Mustangs/F-150s etc...

He said $400-$500 is more reasonable for custom pattern, reusing the stock foam. If he could find pre-sewn covers, it'd be considerably cheaper to just install them over the foam.

Making a custom pattern isn't easy, that's for sure.

Please define "custom pattern"....I take it you mean making a pattern outline of the seats from scratch, right? Wouldn't have thought what I need are "custom patterns" since it's a seat that was used in 300,000 cars sold in the U.S. Guess I'm learning....

[Twistiva]

Hitup the junkyard and find a good set of Festiva seats that you can swap in. There was a really nice clean set of seats up for grabs at Ohiostiva last year.

Good idea but the nearest junkyards that are possibilities are almost 100 miles away. Did go to one the other day, just to do some recon. One Festiva, pretty well stripped. In my whole town of ~45,000 there are only 4 Festivas that I know of. Not impossible for me to get seats, but not likely.

[Safety Guy]

Cheapest idea: Get good seat covers and take out your carpet and wash it.

Save some money: Find a seamstress who does heavy duty material and take your removed fabric to her to copy in whatever fabric you choose. Get a couple quotes and choose one to do the work. I bet it would be cheaper for you to take the seats apart and then reinstall new sewn fabric to fit. Shouldn't cost more than a couple hundred at most and you'll wind up with really nice new looking seat fabric.

As for carpet, either go the "new" route or find someone here who is selling his used (decent shape) carpet. I took out carpet from my '89L and washed it off with soap and hosed it off. It looks pretty good replacing the nasty carpet in my '91L. If you don't like Festiva carpet, read that "regular carpet DIY thread" and see what you think.

Find seats from another car that will fit and pay someone to weld them in with custom brackets to fit. Shouldn't cost more than a couple hundred, and you will have newer, better seats.

I would never spend $1000 on this stuff...unless I was dirty stinking filthy rich and had nothing better to do...which probably wouldn't happen because I'd have the time and money to do it myself "my way" in my voluminous spare time.

Karl

[crazyrog17]

Please define "custom pattern"....I take it you mean making a pattern outline of the seats from scratch, right? Wouldn't have thought what I need are "custom patterns" since it's a seat that was used in 300,000 cars sold in the U.S. Guess I'm learning....

Well, I don't think anyone's going to make the seat covers as an aftermarket item so it'd be a custom replacement job.

[Twistiva]

Well, I don't think anyone's going to make the seat covers as an aftermarket item so it'd be a custom replacement job.

Yeah, I understand "custom" in that respect. I just assumed that he'd have a ready-made pattern for a car in which 300,000 units were sold here in the U.S. Just wasn't thinking it through.

I do appreciate everyone's comments on here. You said what I suspected: $1000 is way too much for upholstery and custom carpet. I've had seat covers on my front seats for probably 6-7 years but I'm not a big fan of them because that just hides the real problem and I've never found any that really fit snug. In time I'm going to pursue upholstery (and maybe I'll end up going with OEM carpet) but not from this guy.

Thanks, guys!

[bastille10]

One last comment - seatcoversunlimited.com Custom seat covers (front and back for around $400.00). Guy said they could do Festivas no problem. Wide range of materials. I'm ordering next week. My seats are absolutely shredded.