Guess we'll have to wade into this one since we studied both the Sears Pro and Gladiator wall cabinets yesterday and made a purchase. First of all, we'll say going into the "evaluation" we were already inclined to the Craftsman Pro because we wanted it to match the goodly amount of the better Craftsman tool chests, wheeled tool cabinet and work benches with drawers and doors we already had in the workroom.
The Pro presented an interesting design with the small storage areas in the doors. That's about the only positive we can give it. Having read this thread before we went shopping, we found ourselves amazed at the comment we had seen that the Pro doors flexed less than the Gladiator. That just ain't so by a long shot! Maybe the contributor was inadvertently comparing the Pro doors to the ones on the Stack-On line in which case the observation indeed would be correct. (Note: The Stack-On bear some resemblance appearance wise to the Gladiator, but they're way inferior). The metal used on the Gladiator throughout was heavier gauge than that used to construct the Pro. No question about it - it was very obvious.
Something that probably would not matter to many Garage Journal Board participants (since we think they probably enjoy building things) is the Pro requires a fair amount of assembly with some of it looking rather tedious from the instructions. The Gladiator is good to go straight out of the box with no worry about whether the doors will align or not after assembly. We also very much liked the firm grasp of the magnetic closures on the Gladiator versus the flimsy mechanical closure device on the Pro. The full-length door hinges on the Gladiator are clearly superior, including being more substantial, to those on the Pro which are not full length.
Now for the downside of the Gladiators. If you want to use the special mounting rails, which are pretty darn neat, they're expensive - they can add up to 13% to the cost of a 30" cabinet. The wall cabinets are made and pre-drilled so they can be mounted directly on a wall with 16" center studs. In our case, the studs weren't positioned such that we could get the cabinets symmetrically mounted on either side of a large double elliptical window. To make things align properly and have the attaching rails look the same on both sides, it was necessary to make the rails the full width of the cabinets. The rails are 48" and the cabinets 30", and therefore it took two of the rails per cabinet (one at the top and one at the bottom) at $12 each.
We should note that having the matching Gladiator 24" cabinet available is a nice bonus. It enabled us to neatly use a space on an adjoining wall that would not have been practical with the Craftsman Pro.
Best regards,
Ed and Sandra
Yea, that's what I should have said when I said I had both brands of cabinets and the Gladiators are a little nicer.