Graebel Van Lines

I recently used this company moving from Ohio to Texas. The overall experience was not very pleasant, especially in Texas.
1. The delivery was late for a week. So our whole family had to stay in the temp housing for the Christmas.
2. The delivery and handling was rough. Movers cracked a door frame of our house while moving refrigerator and made several big dents and scratches on our hard wood floor.
3. They also missed a couple small items such that they couldn’t reassemble the refrigerator together.
The only reason that I am giving one star instead of zero was that their movers did things pretty fast (although not very careful).

This is for prepack/​packing/​pickup ONLY. Our stuff is in storage and I will update on the receiving end. We have moved more than a dozen times and have seen the good, the bad, and the criminal. This was a military storage shipment. The prepack survey went very well and the company rep listened to our concerns and answered our questions. The contractor who came to our home to fabricate crates was also very professional and built us some solid crates that we will be able to reuse. The packers encouraged us to go through each piece of furniture and photograph existing damage before it was annotated on the inventory. They heeded our requests to pack some fragile items in a particular way and using better materials that we provided. Each furniture piece was completely wrapped. They cleaned up after they finished and inventory paperwork was legible. When we move next time, we will be requesting Graebel for our HHG shipment.

Getting to this review a little late, but I wanted to put my two cents in about this company, and for the most part, it is all pretty positive.
My wife and have learned the hard way just how hard it is to find a good moving company for moving from state to state. It is really really hard, and a scary experience when you feel like a novice, or you are only experienced at local moving. There are way too many companies out there all to happy to scam you so you have to use your best judgement, and do not give in till you are satisfied you feel comfortable with your mover.
First off, we did a corporate move that her company paid for, and we chose a company called Virgin Van lines. Total disaster. Took us months to get our stuff, and sadly for other families, they are still tied up in court awaiting budget, who sued virgin, to find a way to get them their stuff.
I had to move my stuff that was left after her, since she had to leave first, and I had a few months left on my lease. This time I was determined to do my homework and not get scammed.
This time I had every company I was interested in come and visit, and if they refused, I crossed them off the list. I had about seven different companies come and visit, all of them with their own scheme, no matter how reputable they seemed. Even ones from moving
who came highly recommended were shady. All star movers wanted to charge my 7,000 dollars to move from NYC to Austin Tx!!!
Cut to Graebel, and a very no nonsense woman named Ann who phoned me at 7 pm at night because I had asked for a rep to call me. At first, I was deeply put off, as she suggested I might not be able to afford Graebel, and that if I was looking to cut corners, they were not the company I wanted. She also told me it might be a waste of her time if she came out to see me the next day. I know it sounds bad, but, something told me she was testing me. She wanted to see if I was going to balk at her price, which actually turned out to be the right middle number I was looking for based on prices that were low balls, and too expensive. I insisted she come, because I had a feeling she was the one I was looking for. Crazy I know.
After insisting for an hour, I got her to come down, and thank god she did. She was actually a really nice lady, smart, knowledgeable and frank. She told me how the business works, with no BS. I liked her already. And I knew that whatever she said, the company trusted her with 20 plus years on the job, so what she says and promises sticks.
My middle ground was about 2350, not cheap, but also not horrible considering NY to texas is about 6,000 miles plus. She mad sure it was binding, but a real binding, not a promise to bind. The difference, whatever she quoted was her responsibility, so if her estimated weight went over, and my items actually weighed more when it got to my home in tx, I was not responsible for any extra charges. However, if it came in below, I would get the refund. The trick to this of course, is that the company will at a minimum, want what is qouted, so even if it might come out to less, they will probably weight it in a way that ensures they get the quoted price. They tell you of course you can be there for the final weighing, but once you are getting your stuff, and just happy it arrived and you are on budget, you tend to forget and just want to get on with it.
The one thing they do do differently, which she admitted saves the company money, is on labor. They use 2 man, or in my case, for pick up, two women crews. For the drop off it was two men. This of course can be a disadvantage because it puts more work on one individual without a third man to help. The upside to it for me the tip is a little easier to figure out.
There was some hiccups. Once or twice I had to go back and forth with Graebel management about mis quoting the price, but it was fixed fast. Also, the guys who dropped of were nice, but a bit grumpy. It was specifically stated my bed would be put back together once they arrived, but they were not happy about doing so, and were told they were given no such directive. I insisted, and they let it go, and did it, but not happily. It gone done, that was all I cared about. The check was given over, and that was that, all was done. No surprise surcharges, no last minute demands, and they overall did a good job.
The moral here, do you homework. Nothing will be perfect, no moving company is, but it is as close to perfect as it could get considering the circumstances and nothing like the disaster our first move was. They kept me updated, and returned all my phone calls. They really did not do follow up to make sure I was happy, but I let it go, as the job got done on time and on budget, and just in under two weeks.
So I can recommend them. Be clear on what you want and do not take no for an answer. Moving is stressful, and if you do not educate yourself it will go wrong.
Jr from Round Rock Tx

The worst moving experience I’ve had. The summary: company paid-​for relocation package across country. Graebel packed and loaded our stuff in Austin, then drove it to Seattle where most of our stuff went into storage and some stuff was delivered to us at our temporary housing. A month later, the rest of our stuff was delivered to our new home. A long complicated move with lots of hiccups, damaged furniture and one (maybe more?) item still missing.
The never-​ending story: In the beginning, everybody was nice and professional. The box packers (two women) did a fantastic job. Not one thing they packed was broken during the move. They should get five stars and a raise. In fact, they should be in charge of everything. Moving day arrives and from the driver to the movers, we started getting constant reassurances about our stuff. We were living in an apartment downtown with limited parking and loading. So they took our stuff in a smaller truck back to the Graebel facility to crate and load into a big truck. Given that we didn’t have a lot of stuff, we’d be sharing a truck with other customer’s crates. You can probably see where this is going. BTW, there is one special piece of furniture I showed the movers and the driver. Oh, hey guys, this one thing I really love, it’s antique, has sentimental value, irreplaceable, etc… I was told it would be handled with kid gloves and crated on its own. Yeah, not. More on this later.
The stressful move from hell begins as we drive across country with four pets and whatever stuff we could fit in our vehicle. Luckily, we didn’t break down in the desert or lose any pets, but will never do that drive again. We arrive at the temp housing and wait for our delivery. Of stuff we might actually need. Days follow of evasiveness and no shows. We figured they had lost our stuff. The driver would call and say he was going to be there, then not show up and reschedule for the next day, then not show. Repeat over and over. One day, I was in the apartment’s parking lot and, lo, there was the driver of the truck! OMG, my stuff! Well, no. Bizarrely, he was delivering somebody else’s stuff and would be back later. Uh, what? Finally, they deliver our stuff late one night. It was nice to have a hair dryer and warm clothes.
Weeks later, we move into our permanent digs and are surprised when Graebel actually shows up on time to deliver the rest of our stuff. The guys are nice, but immediately start complaining about the packing/​loading job of the Austin folks. The driver doesn’t seem to think we have to actually check off stuff as it’s unloaded because it’s all coming out of crates. I don’t tell him he’s insane, but, really? So, I start checking the labels. Luckily for some other customers because it turns out we got some of your stuff including a big flat screen TV. Whether or not you actually ever got your stuff after I pointed this out, who knows? I’m still waiting on an item Graebel has. They know they have it because they emailed us to ask if we were missing it. Anyway, delivery day was 7−2−12 and today is 10−10−12. It’s kind of funny, but not really. What are you doing with my fancy garbage can, Graebel?
Do you remember when they said they would handle that one piece of furniture with special loving care? What they meant was it will be shoved into a huge crate with heavy stuff that will fall over and smash it into pieces. Then, a mover on the other end will carry it like a sack of flour and break it some more and then deny it when you see them doing this. It’s still sitting in my dining room in complicated broken pieces. Parts are missing and the repair shops Graebel’s insurer recommends can’t repair a scratched table let alone a two-​hundred year old Chinese antique. ALL of our other furniture has scrapes, dings, scratches and damage. Except for the couch because they wrapped it like a baby. A soft, large, sturdy object. I have no words. Never again, even as part of a relocation package.