Floor first, then cabinets: planning both in one project

If you are planning new garage cabinets and a coated floor, the order you do them in matters, and the two are easier to plan together than one at a time. Done in the right order, both fit into a single project, and the cabinets stand on a finished floor for as long as they are there.

Rhino Coatings does both. We coat garage floors with a polyurea base coat and a polyaspartic top coat (we do not install epoxy), and we install made-in-USA melamine garage cabinets in two series. When a project includes both, the floor goes down first, so the cabinets stand on a finished floor instead of a bare slab. This guide covers why, and how the visit, the price, the timing and the colors fit together.

Why the floor goes down first

A floor coating is only as good as its bond to the concrete, and the concrete has to be reachable to be prepared. Before any coating goes down, we diamond-grind the slab and fill its cracks and control joints with polyurea. Once cabinets are standing on the slab, the concrete under them cannot be ground or coated, so a floor coated around existing cabinets has to stop at every cabinet base.

Putting the floor down first avoids all of that.

The whole slab gets coated, including the strip under the cabinets. If you ever move, change or add cabinets later, there is finished floor under them.
The coating runs under the cabinets instead of ending in an edge along the front of each one.
The cabinets stand on a finished floor. A bare slab sheds fine concrete dust onto whatever is stored near it, and a coated floor seals the concrete.
The grinding happens in an empty garage. For the floor install, the floor has to be clear, and it is never clearer than before the cabinets arrive.

One design visit, one crew, one price

Planning the floor and the cabinets together is simpler. One design visit covers both, one crew does the work, and you get one fixed, written price.

At the design visit, we measure the garage and walk you through the cabinet series, the run length, where each run goes and the color. For the floor, we check the condition of the concrete and lay flake and silica samples on your own slab, so you see them against your concrete in your own light. You get a fixed, written price before anything is ordered.

Having one crew do both means a coordinated install. The people who coat the floor are the people who put the cabinets on it, and you have one company to call with a question about either.

How the project runs

Our garage cabinets page lays the project out in four steps, with one crew for the floor and the cabinets.

Design visit and measure. We measure the garage, walk you through the cabinet choices and the floor colors, and check the slab. You get a fixed, written price before anything is ordered.
Ordering the cabinets. Your cabinets are ordered in the series and color you chose, after you have the fixed, written price. The lead time is in the timing section below.
The floor. We diamond-grind the slab, fill cracks and joints with polyurea, lay the polyurea base coat, broadcast flake or silica to full refusal, and seal it with the polyaspartic top coat. Most garages are done in one day.
Cabinet install day. The cabinets stay staged until the polyaspartic top coat has cured enough to take them. The install itself takes one day. The cabinets are leveled, anchored and tuned, the shelving is set the way you want it, and we walk through the finished space with you.

Cabinet-only projects skip step three.

Timing: what to plan around

Two things set the calendar: the cabinet lead time, and the time the floor needs before it goes back into use.

Cabinet lead time. From our Coeur d'Alene location, most cabinet installs happen 2 to 4 weeks after the design visit. Our Boise location gives you its lead time at the visit.
The floor install. Most garage floors are done in one day by our own crew.
Walking on the floor. You can walk on it in about 8 hours.
Driving on the floor. You can drive and park on it in about 72 hours, so plan on keeping the cars in the driveway for about three days.
Cold weather. A cold slab can lengthen the install day and the cure, so on cold-weather jobs we confirm the walk-on and drive-on timing before we start, or move the date.
The cabinets. They stay staged until the top coat has cured enough to take them, then go in on a single install day.

If you are working toward a date, such as moving in or the first snow, book the design visit with the lead time in mind, since the cabinets are ordered after it. If you are buying a house, right after closing is the best time to coat, before the garage fills up.

Getting the garage ready

Clear the floor. For the floor install, the floor has to be clear. If you need help moving things, tell us when you book.
Decide where things will wait. Much of what comes out of the garage will go back into the new cabinets, so it only has to move once if it waits somewhere else until they are in.
Sort before you store. With everything out of the garage anyway, it is a natural time to let go of what you no longer use, so the cabinets hold what you keep.
Tell us how you use the garage. A workbench, a freezer, bikes, a snowblower and a truck that barely fits all shape where the runs go. If you hose out the garage, tell us at the design visit so we can place the runs.

The cabinets also have to fit around the cars once everything is back. Our guide to garage cabinet sizes and parking clearance covers depth, height and how to test a layout with painter's tape before the design visit.

Choosing floor and cabinet colors together

Choosing both at once is easier than matching new cabinets to a floor you picked years ago, or the other way around. The floor comes in 13 flake blends and more than 1,700 silica colors, and the cabinets come in 18 melamine colors.

Flake gives the floor a speckled look and is the usual choice for a dry garage. Silica gives a smooth, paint-matched finish and grips better when wet. Flake blends mix several colors. Domino is black, white and gray, Gravel is light and dark gray with white, and Coyote is slate, charcoal and silver. The cabinet colors run from Arctic White, Bone and Storm Gray to Midnight Black, Steel Blue, Sage, Hunter Orange and Cabernet.

Let one of them lead. A busy, high-contrast flake and a bold cabinet color can compete for attention. A lively floor with a quiet cabinet color, or the reverse, usually looks calmer.
Pull a color out of the flake. A cabinet color that echoes one of the colors in your flake blend ties the floor and the cabinets together.
Match something already there. Our cabinet page suggests matching the cabinets to your floor flake, your wall paint or your favorite race livery, and any of those makes a good starting point.
Judge both in your own light. Floor samples are laid on your own concrete. On-screen cabinet swatches are approximate, and the final cabinet color is confirmed with you in person before your cabinets are ordered. You can also upload a photo of your garage to the floor visualizer on our site and try finishes on your own slab.

Cabinets only, or the floor later

Already happy with your floor? Cabinet-only installs are available, and they follow the same steps without the floor.

If you are not ready to coat the floor yet but think you will want it someday, weigh the order now. A coating added after the cabinets are in generally has to stop at their bases, and the concrete under them stays bare. If you expect to want both, the floor-first order is the one that leaves no bare concrete behind.

Questions to ask when one company does both

Does the floor go down before the cabinets?
Is it one crew and one fixed, written price, or two contractors with two schedules?
What is the cabinet lead time after the design visit?
When can I walk on the floor, and when can I park on it?
How will the cabinet install be timed around the floor's cure?
What does the floor warranty cover, in writing?

Here is how it works with us. The floor goes first. One crew does both, for one fixed, written price. From our Coeur d'Alene location, most cabinet installs happen 2 to 4 weeks after the design visit, and our Boise location gives you its lead time at the visit. You can walk on the floor in about 8 hours and drive on it in about 72 hours, and the cabinets stay staged until the top coat has cured enough to take them. Residential and commercial floors carry the same lifetime warranty against peeling, delamination, and hot-tire pickup.

What a combined quote depends on, from the run lengths to the slab, is covered in our guide to what a garage cabinet quote depends on.

Floors and cabinets in the towns we serve

Our Coeur d'Alene location coats floors and installs cabinets across North Idaho and the Spokane area, including Coeur d'Alene, Hayden and Spokane, and our Boise location does the same across the Treasure Valley, including Boise. How each layer of the floor goes down is on our garage floor coatings page.

The best place to plan both is your own garage. Book a free design visit. We measure the space, check the slab, show you floor samples on your own concrete and the cabinet colors, and give you one fixed, written price before anything is ordered.