A changing room bench is not one product with a length. It is a frame with a superstructure bolted to it, and the superstructure is where nearly all the money goes. Across the 22 Probe cloakroom benches we stock, two benches of exactly the same length, in the same room, can differ by £2,771.42 — 3.85 times — purely on what is fitted above and below the seat.
This guide is about that choice: which configuration to buy, what each one costs, and where the price ladder behaves oddly enough to catch you out. If you are still working out how many benches you need and where they go, our companion guide on planning changing room bench layout covers headcount, depth, circulation and fixing. Read that one first if the room is not yet drawn.
What you are actually choosing between
Every bench in the Probe cloakroom range is a welded tubular mild steel frame, powder-coated, with hardwood or polymer seat slats and full ironmongery and floor-fixing brackets included. That part does not vary. What varies is two things:
- Single sided or double sided. A single-sided bench stands against a wall and seats one row. A double-sided bench is an island: two rows back to back, in a 710 mm footprint rather than 310–375 mm.
- The superstructure. Five building blocks, used alone or in pairs — a low seat (bare bench, no upright), coat hooks on an upright frame, an overhead rail for hangers, an undershelf for shoes and bags, or baskets under the seat.
Two sides × eleven superstructure combinations is what makes 22 listings.
The full price ladder, at one length
To compare like with like, here is every one of the 22 listings at 2000 mm, Senior height — the most commonly specified size:
| Configuration | Price |
|---|---|
| Single sided, low seat | £971.76 |
| Single sided, undershelf | £999.79 |
| Single sided, coat hooks | £1,056.04 |
| Single sided, baskets | £1,097.41 |
| Single, low seat + baskets | £1,414.18 |
| Single, low seat + undershelf | £1,478.23 |
| Single, hooks + baskets | £1,498.44 |
| Single, hooks + undershelf | £1,562.50 |
| Single sided, overhead rail | £1,577.63 |
| Double sided, low seat | £1,694.51 |
| Double sided, baskets | £1,773.22 |
| Double sided, undershelf | £1,900.92 |
| Double sided, coat hooks | £1,908.69 |
| Single, overhead rail + baskets | £2,020.04 |
| Single, overhead rail + undershelf | £2,084.10 |
| Double, low seat + baskets | £2,579.33 |
| Double, low seat + undershelf | £2,707.46 |
| Double sided, overhead rail | £2,730.23 |
| Double, hooks + baskets | £2,793.50 |
| Double, hooks + undershelf | £2,921.64 |
| Double, overhead rail + baskets | £3,615.05 |
| Double, overhead rail + undershelf | £3,743.18 |
The single most expensive decision is hooks versus a rail
Compare two 2000 mm double-sided benches that differ in one respect only. Coat hooks: £1,908.69. Overhead hanging rail: £2,730.23. The rail costs £821.54 more — 43% — for the same bench. On the single-sided pair it is £1,056.04 against £1,577.63, a £521.59 premium (49%).
That is a bigger swing than length, bigger than adding baskets, and bigger than going double-sided. It deserves a real decision rather than a default, so:
- Hooks are right where garments are outdoor coats, sports kit and bags that will be hung for an hour or a session. They are cheaper, they cannot be removed, and there is nothing to bend.
- A rail is right where garments must not crease and users bring their own hangers — uniformed staff, clinical scrubs, suits, theatre or performance changing. It is also the only option if the same peg position has to take a hanger.
If in doubt, specify hooks. £821.54 per bay buys a lot of hooks elsewhere, and a rail that nobody hangs a hanger on is an £821.54 towel rail.
Double-sided is cheaper per person, every single time
An island bench seats two rows instead of one, so a 2000 mm double-sided bench gives 4 metres of seating where the single-sided version gives 2. It does not cost twice as much. Across all nine configurations that exist in both forms:
| Superstructure | Single sided | Double sided | Ratio | Cost per metre of seating |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Low seat | £971.76 | £1,694.51 | 1.74× | £485.88 → £423.63 |
| Undershelf | £999.79 | £1,900.92 | 1.90× | £499.89 → £475.23 |
| Coat hooks | £1,056.04 | £1,908.69 | 1.81× | £528.02 → £477.17 |
| Baskets | £1,097.41 | £1,773.22 | 1.62× | £548.71 → £443.31 |
| Hooks + baskets | £1,498.44 | £2,793.50 | 1.86× | £749.22 → £698.38 |
| Hooks + undershelf | £1,562.50 | £2,921.64 | 1.87× | £781.25 → £730.41 |
| Overhead rail | £1,577.63 | £2,730.23 | 1.73× | £788.82 → £682.56 |
| Rail + baskets | £2,020.04 | £3,615.05 | 1.79× | £1,010.02 → £903.76 |
| Rail + undershelf | £2,084.10 | £3,743.18 | 1.80× | £1,042.05 → £935.79 |
The ratio never reaches 2. It runs from 1.62 to 1.90, so a double-sided bench is between 5% and 19% cheaper per metre of seating than two single-sided benches would be. The saving is largest on the basket configuration (19.2%) and smallest on the undershelf (4.9%).
That is the price argument. It is not the whole argument — an island bench needs circulation on both sides and takes 710 mm of floor rather than 310–375 mm, which is exactly the depth-versus-seat-count trade our layout guide deals with. But if the room takes an island, the island is the cheaper way to seat the people.
Two listings where the 2000 mm bench costs the same as the 1500 mm one
Length pricing across this range is not proportional, and on two listings it stops entirely:
- Double sided with overhead rail — 1500 mm £2,730.23, 2000 mm £2,730.23.
- Double, overhead rail with baskets — 1500 mm £3,615.05, 2000 mm £3,615.05.
On both, the extra 500 mm — a metre of seating on a double-sided bench — is free. If you are specifying either of these and the wall will take 2000 mm, take 2000 mm. There is no price reason to buy the shorter one.
Elsewhere the cost per millimetre swings hard within a single listing. On the double-sided undershelf bench: 1200 → 1500 mm costs £131.22 (£0.44 per mm) and 1500 → 2000 mm costs £670.27 (£1.34 per mm). Three times the rate for the second step. As with the rest of our range, price the length you want against the length immediately below it on that exact listing rather than assuming a rate per metre.
Height is free — so do not under-specify it
Probe supply these benches in Infant, Junior and Senior seat heights. We checked every listing that offers more than one height at a matched length: the price is identical across all three, every time. A 2000 mm double-sided coat-hook bench is £1,908.69 whether it is Infant, Junior or Senior.
There is therefore no budget reason to compromise on seat height, and one good reason not to: a bench that is the wrong height for its users is uncomfortable for the whole of its service life. Specify by user group — Infant for Early Years and primary, Junior for upper primary and lower secondary, Senior for secondary and adult. Our school locker guide covers the same age-band logic on the locker side.
Frame colour, slats and baskets are also free
Seven frame colours (red, yellow, blue, green, black, white, silver), hardwood or black polymer seat slats, and black polymer or beech baskets — all at one price. Where two prices appear within a size in the data they differ by a single penny, which is rounding, not an option premium.
Since slat material is free, choose it on environment rather than budget: polymer for wet areas — poolside, showers, any bench that will be sat on by wet users — and hardwood for dry changing and cloakrooms, where it is warmer to sit on and wears well.
Undershelf or baskets?
Both put storage below the seat; they behave completely differently.
- An undershelf is one continuous shelf. Cheapest of the two on a single-sided bench (£999.79 against £1,097.41 at 2000 mm), easy to sweep out, and unallocated — anyone can put anything anywhere. Good for shoes in a school cloakroom.
- Baskets divide the same space into per-person units, which stops kit sprawling and makes lost property tractable. On a double-sided bench baskets are the cheaper option (£1,773.22 against £1,900.92) — the order reverses between single and double sided, so check the pair you are actually buying.
Neither locks. If anything needs to be secured, that is a locker job, not a bench job — see the metal locker range, or the vision panel lockers if compartments need to be checkable without a key.
Specification, and what the data does not state
Verified across the range: welded tubular mild steel frame, powder-coated; hardwood or black polymer seat slats; full ironmongery and floor-fixing brackets included; UK manufactured by Probe.
Note that the frames genuinely are welded — which is worth saying because the Probe lockers are not. Locker bodies in the same catalogue are described as cold-rolled and formed, with no welding stated anywhere. If a specification or tender asks about construction method, the honest answer differs between the benches and the lockers they sit in front of.
What the product data does not state, across any of the 22 listings: no load rating or seat capacity, no warranty period, no lead time and no stock status. Get all four in writing at quotation, particularly the load rating if the bench is going into a high-traffic public facility.
A quick way to specify
- Island or wall? If the room takes an island, double-sided is cheaper per metre of seating in every configuration.
- Hooks or rail? The single biggest cost decision — £821.54 on a 2000 mm double-sided bench. Hooks unless hangers are genuinely required.
- Anything under the seat? Undershelf for sweepable shoe storage, baskets for per-person kit. Check which is cheaper on the sidedness you have chosen — the order reverses.
- Length. Compare against the length immediately below. On the two overhead-rail double-sided listings, 2000 mm costs the same as 1500 mm.
- Height and finish. Free. Specify by user group and by wet or dry area.
Where benches fit with the rest of the room
Benches are half of a changing room; the other half is what locks. Browse the cloakroom bench range alongside the metal lockers, the full Probe collection, and the door counts that suit the user group — 4-door and 6-door for daily-use schemes, 10-door and 16-door where compartments are small and numerous. If devices need charging while they are stored, see the charging locker range.
For the wider decision, our guides on choosing metal lockers, gym and leisure lockers and staff and workplace lockers cover the locker side of the same room.