Is 1k for this chair saving my back in medical costs in the future?
Yes. I wanted to give my 2 cents on the topic because I spent a lot of time asking that same question (I tend to lurk more than post, but here I go.) I had quite bad lower back aches a few years back due to sitting for long hours gaming, working, coursework (I am 27 now) which lead me to look into chairs to help not have my back be completely gone by the time I'm 35.
Trying to be frugal and not spend any money to stay out of student debt I saw ergonomic office chairs, but saw the price tag (close to a grand for a chair was a solid pass for me.) That was till I found out about the used Herman Miller market (others in this thread have been recommending.
I would not at all recommend that option.) Seen the Madison Seating on Ebay that others have recommended on this site in similar threads to this one. Decided to bite the bullet and try the Aeron for $500 open box thinking Madison Seating supplies a warranty on it to repair it so I it doesn't seem like that bad a risk to take for my health.
The Herman Miller Aeron chair was phenomenal, and legit completely eliminated all my lower back aches that I didn't think was even possible because I had been dealing with it for so long I believed it was just a chronic pain I would have to some degree for the rest of my life. I do not any lower back pain at all anymore after using that chair (So yeah I am sold on ergonomic chairs.) The issue is that chair broke after a year and a half. I thought ah well thankfully i got this 10 year warranty from Madison Seating (all these Herman Miller resellers "warranty" are the same.) So uh Madison Seating is in like Jersey or something half way across the U.S. They don't pay for return shipping nor do they have local repair shops to take the chair to be fixed (both of which Herman Miller do for their official product warranty.) So Madison seating said sure we will fix it for only $50 as per your warranty, but uh you have to pay to ship it. Shipping was $430 for an item that big and heavy across the U.S lol. So I would be better off just buying yet another used chair and their warranty isn't really usable for most people that don't live right next to the reseller. So I decided well maybe I can take it to a overall furniture repair shop around here, but found out from that store that when they opened the gear box on my chair to see what parts had broken that the resellers Madison Seating had purposely removed the manufacture info inside the gear box under the seat so that you can't tell the manufacture date. Based on the parts my chair it was an over 20 year old used chair that Madison Seating listed as "New – Open box."
So never again would I do the reseller chair thing and was even put off ergo chairs a bit and started using a fairly standard OfficeMax chair on sale. My back issues slowly came back, and from there I decided OK, the chair was legit but the reselling was not. Looked into Herman Miller's official warranty and I realized why they sell the chairs for so much money... I called Herman Miller to verify the warranty they offer based on the info on their site. They have repair stores all through the U.S that you can take the chair to fix free of charge to have repaired for failures, and if there is not one near you they pre-pay a shipping label for you to send it to them. I decided to save and get the standard Embody this time from Herman Miller to have peace of mind that this chair should last me 10 years no extra charge.
Side note the Aeron is a bit cheaper than the embody, but I think I liked it better overall. The Embody is better on my back since I can sit in it for 12 hours and not even feel like I sat down which is great for working on my PC or gaming on my PC, but it doesn't have the same features I had gotten used to on the Aeron. The Aeron has this thing that like you could tilt it into a position then lock it in that position to where it would not come back up setting that tilt as the default position (not to be confused with the tilt lock mechanism that reduces how far back you can go.) I would use that for when I wanted to relax and use my TV for movies or games. That was more relaxing then now always being at 90 degree attention or using my muscles to hold a tilt. The Aeron still felt like a chair so I did need to get up and stretch ever hour (probably should do this with the embody as well you just feel the urge to wayyyy less), but the more features made it do legit everything well even if the Embody does normal work use better over the Aeron.
Get an ergo chair, but I am sure their are options out there that are not a grand that would save your back all the same, and at a certain point it just becomes personal preference of features and slight shape differences. Additionally considered when buying a used (and not being duped into open box new) that you get what you get and there are some great deals for failry new chairs (offices relocating and getting ride of inventory for cheap), but that its a dice roll that can break in 5 years or 5 months. Which means taking that roll again if you keep going with used chairs, but that can work out for some (or even most people just fine.)
Alright back to lurking.
