A Haworth vs Teknion Office Furniture Comparison That Started With a Tape Measure

When I took over purchasing in 2020, I thought I had office basics figured out. I could read a spec sheet, compare prices, and spot a vague delivery date from a mile away. Then, in fall 2024, our facilities manager asked me to help pick replacement task chairs for 60 workstations. What looked like a simple vendor comparison turned into a project that made me relearn the basics of how to read ruler markings.

Why we needed a Haworth vs Teknion comparison

Our old chairs were nine years old and past the point of honest repair. Employee complaints about back pain and wobbly bases had been piling up since spring. My HR contact said the biggest sourcing request of the year was “chairs that don’t hurt.” So I scheduled demo sessions with two brands that fit our budget and lead-time needs: Haworth and Teknion. I called it a Haworth vs Teknion office furniture comparison, but at first it was mostly paperwork.

I read every brochure. I compared “ergonomic” features until my eyes blurred. The marketing language was almost identical. Per FTC guidelines (ftc.gov), claims have to be truthful and substantiated, but that doesn’t make them easy to translate into a decision. The rulebook doesn’t tell you which chair fits a 5-foot-2 employee or a 6-foot-4 one.

FTC advertising guidelines require that claims be truthful and not misleading, substantiated with evidence, and clear about endorsements and testimonials. — ftc.gov

First mistake: trusting the spec sheet instead of the space

Spec sheets list things like seat depth range and back height. Useful. But they don’t tell you whether a chair will fit your desks, your employees, or the glass wall system we’d just installed in one wing. We’d put sit-stand desks in two departments and kept older standard desks in another. I assumed the dimensions were close enough. They weren’t.

One afternoon, an employee said her demo chair wouldn’t slide under her desk. We measured the desk height. It was two inches lower than the “standard” spec I had been using. “Do I need to quiz you on how to read ruler markings?” my operations manager joked. He meant well. I realized I hadn’t actually measured a workstation in four years.

That was the trigger event. I blocked out two mornings, grabbed a tape measure, and measured 40 desks and 58 chair mats.

Why I used a median calculator

One executive desk was 32.5 inches high. A few creative workbenches were 26 inches. If I used the average, the number would suggest a desktop height that almost nobody had. I wanted to know the most typical working height, not the arithmetic middle. I opened a median calculator and entered all the desk heights. The median was 29.25 inches—much closer to the desks most people actually used.

Everything I’d read about buying office furniture said the most important factor was brand reputation. My experience with this project changed that: the most important factor is fit, and fit starts with measurements. At least, that’s been my experience with mixed-age workstations and an open-plan office.

The demo: Teknion Around Task Chair

Before we tested anything, I had a moment of hesitation. The upside of spending one more week on testing was a decision employees wouldn’t resent. The risk was losing our budget window. I kept asking myself: is one more week worth potentially missing the PO deadline? The answer was yes.

We parked three chairs in the break room for a week: one Haworth model and two Teknion models, including the Teknion Around task chair. I asked people to sit in each for at least an hour, not just lean back and nod. I thought the flagship chair would take the top score across every group. That’s not what happened.

People at sit-stand desks tended to prefer the Around chair’s balance when the seat height changed. People who wanted fewer controls often liked the simpler Haworth chair. A few people loved the other Teknion model because of the lumbar support. The Around chair won because it had enough intuitive adjustments for people who don’t want to read an instruction manual, and the seat edge felt right for people who sit with one foot tucked under them (you know who you are).

I also tried to turn everything into a scorecard. I even used an online simplify calculator to reduce the fraction-based measurements on the spec sheets. That part worked—it’s nice to know that 19.5 inches is 19½ on a tape measure. But the calculator couldn’t tell me whether a slightly wider seat would make a difference for our largest employee, or whether a shorter back would annoy someone who sits eight hours a day.

Look, I’m not saying brand reputation doesn’t matter. It does, especially for durability and service. But in a real office, with real bodies and mixed desk heights, the winner isn’t always the one with the most impressive brochure. If I remember correctly, the Around chair quote was not the cheapest or the most expensive. It was just the best fit.

What I’d tell another buyer

If you’re just starting out, don’t feel silly asking basic questions. An informed customer asks better questions and makes faster decisions. If you’re about to start your own Haworth vs Teknion office furniture comparison—or any brand comparison—here’s the framework I wish I’d had from day one:

• Measure before you search. If you don’t know how to read ruler markings precisely, take ten minutes with your facilities person. A quarter-inch matters when a chair has to clear a handrail or fit under a sit-stand desk.
• Find the typical, not the average. Use a median calculator when your spaces aren’t uniform. One odd conference table can drag the average away from what most people actually need.
• Ignore the adjectives. “Ergonomic” appears on every brochure. Compare adjustment ranges and measurable specs instead. And if a vendor says a product is recyclable, ask for documentation—FTC Green Guides exist for a reason.
• Demo in the real space. A chair can feel amazing in a showroom and wrong in a cubicle with an undersized desk.
• Don’t ask a calculator to make the decision. Even a reliable simplify calculator can’t capture whether your finance team and your employees agree on what matters.

In the end, we ordered a mix: 48 Teknion Around task chairs for the sit-stand desks and 12 drafting-height Teknion models for the high benches. The Haworth chair was a good option for a few people who wanted almost no adjustment points. For our office, though, the Around chair was the practical winner. That said, our sample was one office and 60 chairs. Your mix may change the answer.

Fit starts with measurements. That’s it. If you take anything from my story, measure twice, calculate the median, and then let real people sit in the chairs before you spend a dime.