All patio furniture covers are not created equal!  Of course you already know that, but do you know why?  We feel you have better things to do than to surf the internet and compare quality, so we've listed below some of the issues we've discussed with our customers over the years. While we take somewhat of a light-hearted approach to this, we do hope that you find the information valuable and use it when you make your patio furniture cover or grill cover buying decision.

About Polyester
In our opinion, properly treated polyester is the best material for patio furniture covers and grill covers, and it is our best-selling fabric. It's lightweight, but extremely durable so it's used by many customers year round. It stays soft to minus 40 degrees! It looks great on outdoor furniture too! Our CoverMates™ Elite polyester material is very unique. During production of the polyester into rolls, it is treated in two ways that make it special. First, the yarn is treated with a special chemical that coats it and makes the polyester highly water- resistant. This photo shows how the water just beads up on the material! Secondly, we apply two separate coats of polyurethane on the back side of the fabric. This creates a highly water resistant barrier and provides ultimate protection for your patio furniture. Without this special treatment, water will easily pass through polyester because it is a woven product. Our Elite polyester patio furniture covers are the most popular because they have all the features to protect your patio furniture and grill investment, and at the same time, are so easy to put on and take off. You'd get mad at us if we didn't tell you about our terrific 3-year warranty on this collection, so there...we told you!

Durable 12-Gauge Vinyl
Laminated polyester lining is the best material to use for vinyl covers. Vinyl must have a laminated lining or backing to withstand the normal wear and tear, tugging and pulling and other stresses that a cover goes through during the year. Vinyl alone has no inherent strength and will puncture and tear if not laminated to a stronger material. Be aware that there are thinner 10 and even 8-gauge vinyl covers available in the marketplace. Unfortunately, our customers have told us that these thinner covers haven't held up. Our CoverMates™ Classic vinyl patio furniture covers are a rugged commercial quality 12-gauge vinyl with laminated polyester woven lining. Our covers have what it takes to adequately protect your outdoor patio furniture and bbq grill, and we back them with an impressive 2-year warranty.

About Fleece Lining
This is not a good idea. Fleece lining, which is used with many vinyl patio furniture covers, falls apart leaving debris everywhere. In addition, when it gets wet it takes forever to dry out. If it stays wet, mildew thrives. Even worse, rodents love fleece during cooler months because it's warm. You don't want any surprises when you're pulling off your gas grill cover!

Our Lining
Lining is important because it allows the cover to be durable as well as tear and puncture-resistant. A vinyl or plastic patio furniture cover is useless without lining. Our lining is polyester and it is laminated to the vinyl which gives the vinyl strength and stability. Additionally, it will never fall apart and dries very quickly when it gets wet. Polyester will also deter small animals and they will go elsewhere to find warm places to hide.

Built-in Vents
Are very important because they allow air to move throughout the patio furniture cover. This eliminates moisture build-up which can cause mold and mildew, furniture rust, discoloration, and cushion damage. Vents also minimize ballooning on windy days, which can cause covers to blow away. Both our CoverMates Elite and Classic lines of patio furniture covers have the built-in vent feature.

A note about vents: some customers are concerned about mesh vents allowing water to pass through them. While this is possible during heavy storms we have positioned the vents on only vertical surfaces and most moisture from normal rain, snow and dew will roll over the mesh instead of through it. Since most outdoor furniture is designed to be weatherproof, it is better to have good air circulation to prevent mold and mildew than it is to have 100% waterproof covers.

Fitting
A cover without pull cords or a strong elastic bottom is a cover that's no longer on the piece of patio furniture it's supposed to be protecting. Some patio furniture covers are designed to just drape loosely over patio furniture or barbeque grills. Others have tie downs that always come loose when it gets a little breezy. Our CoverMates™ Elite outdoor covers feature an innovative elastic pull cord and locking system that creates a secure custom fit.

Our CoverMates™ Classic patio furniture covers feature a very strong elasticized bottom that hugs whatever it's covering. These features, along with the built-in vents, keep your cover exactly where it belongs and not in the neighbor's yard or up in a tree somewhere.

Seam Quality
Simply put, a single seam of thread is a lot faster to sew. Obviously, this reduces cost and that's why many manufacturers do it. Unfortunately, it also reduces the quality of the patio furniture cover. Our CoverMates™ Elite outdoor covers are double stitched with channel locking seams. One seam is visible, while the other is hidden and does a lot of the work. This results in a seam that is superior in strength. As a matter of fact, the cover material itself will tear before the seam will come apart. We take the extra time to reinforce the seams so that our satisfied customers will recommend our patio furniture covers and grill covers to their friends, neighbors, and relatives.

Surge Stitching
is rarely found these days in patio furniture covers. Woven fabrics, such as our CoverMates™ Elite khaki polyester have loose threads where the material has been cut. Left alone, the fabric will begin to unravel just like an old sock that has about a mile of thread dangling everywhere. We save you the nuisance of having to continually cut those loose threads by turning the ends of the polyester inward and stitching them down so they won't go anywhere. Why do we do it? It's because we want as many friends as possible!

Hardware
Some of our patio furniture covers are constructed with snaps and zippers (no Velcro for our customers), and our CoverMates™ Elite collection features draw cords and pulls that lock. To make sure that we were providing our customers with the best looking and well-constructed covers, we took the time to make sure that the color of the hardware matched the color of the fabric. While we were looking for the perfect color match, we also decided that all the hardware should be impervious to Mother Nature, so you won't find any metal hardware on our covers. Oh, and then we found auto-locking zippers and thought those were really neat so guess what? All of our covers that have zippers have auto-locking zippers! That makes you want to buy a cover with a zipper just to see how cool it is, doesn't it?