Alera Elusion Review

So you’re searching for a new office chair? While it is easy to find a cheap but terrible chair, it’s much more difficult to find one that’s reasonably priced yet designed to resist all the daily wear-and-tear while also being comfortable and, more importantly, good for your long-term health. One product that claims to do so is the Alera Elusion – let’s take a closer look.

Seat style	Office chair
Upholstery	Polyurethane
Color options	Black, white
Dimensions	26 x 26 x 37”
Weight limit	250lbs

Design

First, notice the chair’s backrest: it’s higher than most and made of a highly breathable mesh, which provides not only excellent back support, but also better-than-average ventilation. And don’t worry – this is supported by a four-spoke frame guaranteed to redistribute your weight evenly throughout so you won’t wear through one spot.

See the tapered wings and that little lump in the center of the seat itself? Racecar drivers have seats like these; they’re designed to make you as comfortable as possible during extended periods of sitting, but it’s rare to see one on a traditional office chair. Better still, these serve a second purpose: they help spread your weight, preventing numbness, soreness, and muscle strain.

The casters seem a little cheap at first glance. Similarly, many of the supports appear to be made of plastic. This could be why the Alera Elusion has a lower weight limit than many office chairs: just 250lbs compared to 300lbs or more. Still, if you’re an average weight, you shouldn’t have any issues in this regard.

Comfort

You’ll notice that the seat is heavily padded. This can be a problem with some chairs since users tend to sink into them, but with the Elusion, this factor makes the chair comfortable, and it never compromises your posture. After all, that would defeat the entire point of its ergonomic design!

There are a couple of little features to ensure you’re as comfy as possible. First, the backrest can be adjusted for taller users by turning the height knob at the back of the seat. Second, this chair features 2D adjustable armrests that can be moved up, down, in, or out, thus permitting users of various shapes and sizes.

It’s easy to dismiss this as “just another office chair,” especially when you first see the mesh back. Against all the odds, though, the Elusion manages to subtly combine various ergonomic and health-inspired features with a seat that’s comfortable enough to sit in all day.

Functionality

For an office chair, the Alera Elusion offers a surprising degree of customization. For a start, there’s the ability to tilt back and recline, lock the seatback at whichever angle you like, and even tilt forwards – something most high-end chairs don’t even allow. This lets you reduce the pressure on your back and is ideal for people prone to muscle strain.

There’s even seat glide functionality built-in! If you have a stockier build, you’ll be able to slide the actual seat farther out from the backrest, so you don’t have to put up with an uncomfortable, unnatural sitting position. There are limits to this, but if you’re under the recommended weight, you should be just fine.

Now, there is one slight downside: the casters on the Elusion are very hard. As such, there’s a chance they could scratch or otherwise damage hard flooring. However, rubber-coated replacements are relatively inexpensive and easy enough to install, so it’s not a huge deal.

Price

Retailing for around $375, this isn’t the cheapest chair on the market. That said, it’s far from the most expensive, which is surprising given how much control and customization it offers. If you’re finding it hard to justify spending this much per chair, you might want to consider buying from a reseller or in Amazon instead – we’ve found places selling it for as low as $180.

We know, we know: you could get a perfectly good office chair for less than $100, right? And it might even be fine… for a few weeks. However, it’s far easier to cause a repetitive strain injury than it is to recover from one. With your employees’ health on the line, can you really afford to pinch pennies here?

Ultimately, choosing this chair makes financial sense. After all, a muscle strain can takes weeks to recover from, which means weeks working without one of your fully-trained employees. Although this might signal a higher initial investment, an office full of Alera Elusions will pay for itself in the long-term.

Support

While most manufacturers provide a year, or at most, two years limited warranty, Alera takes it one step further. All of its chairs are covered by a five-year warranty on the frame and a two-year warranty on the upholstery. That’s pretty good, but note that accidental damage isn’t covered.

There’s another major revelation in the warranty policy: it applies whether you bought the chair directly from Alera or a third-party reseller. This gives you the freedom to buy from whoever is cheapest, which is something you don’t see very often.

Unfortunately, other than general dimensions and assembly instructions, there’s no other form of support available. Usually, you’ll find in-depth specifications or at the very least, a line of contact in case something goes wrong. Not so here, though. As such, any communication you have with the company has to be done according to the warranty service policy.