Drink coasters aren't the kind of items that you give a lot of thought to; until someone puts a sweaty glass down on your expensive coffee table. Then suddenly you have to leap into panic mode, flinging a coaster like a ninja star and hoping that it will somehow stand between the eminent water ring, and your beautiful table surface.

However when your in a store shopping for home décor, such a scenario is a million miles away. Instead you are thinking about two things, price, and style. You want something that looks good, but you don't want to have to pay a lot of money for it.

The problem is you get what you pay for, especially with drink coasters. Since these items are supposed to be functional, you really have to consider one other factor, how well will they work.

The truth is that inexpensive drink coasters tend to be temporary in nature. These can include cork, paper, or even cardboard pieces. Available for practically nothing, at the time of purchase they might seem like a good idea.

Flash forward a couple of weeks to your big dinner party. Someone places a drink down on the table, but luckily, there is a coaster there, standing guard against the damage that moisture can bring. However its just a paper coaster, or maybe an old cork coaster that you picked up who knows when.

After the party is over your cleaning up, and as you remove that drink, and slide the coaster off the table you notice something; water, drips, splashes, or rings, that somehow penetrated the coasters defense to lay siege to the perfection of your table's surface.

Peering at the coaster you notice something. Maybe it's cracked a little, with a hairline fracture running down its middle, or maybe it has a hole, where degradation over time wore away at its surface, or maybe it's just starting to crumble, the cheap material it is made of falling prey to the ravages of time.

Whatever the cause, the damage is permanent. Maybe you can clean the tables surface quickly, hoping to treat it with specialty wood cleansers. However chances are hours after the damage was first begun, there is nothing that can be done.

The pennies you saved purchasing that cheap coaster, has cost you the perfection of your expensive table top.

While saving money is a wonderful thing, when it comes to preventative home décor such as drink coasters, its better to just go ahead and purchase something that will get the job done. There are a wide variety of steal, glass, and even wooden coasters which can easily stand between a sweaty glass and a table top. You also have the option of purchasing sandstone coasters, which will actually absorb the moisture, holding it beneath the surface of the stone until it can evaporate harmlessly away.

Whatever you choose, don't try to save a few pennies, to the detriment of a much more expensive piece. Choose coasters that will work right, every time.