Though you are focusing mainly on looks here, I think there needs to be more that you look at. Looks do matter to me, but health matters more. I've been raising chickens for fourteen years now and I've bought most of my chicks aside from the few I've hatched over the years. Most of these chicks came from hatcheries and others came from breeders. I've also bought "ready-to-lay" chickens from both hatcheries and breeders. Out of my years of experience, I'll go with a hatchery over a breeder. Yes, I might not get quality and for some birds, I might still search for a breeder, but ultimately, hatcheries gives me that guarantee they have healthy birds, whereas a a breeder can't.
So, for starters, I have had some good experiences with breeders. My flock of Buff Orpingtons came as young adults from a local breeder and were quite impressive in both looks and personality. They were good mothers, and as far as health went, they were the healthiest despite having been exposed by a disease that came from a different breeder.
Next good experience was my Silver Duckwing Old English Game bantams. They were stunning. In fact, they were some of the best ones I've seen. I got them as chicks from a breeder. (They were actually a birthday gift.) Though I never showed them or dubbed them, they were close enough to the Standard that others took notice. They were very healthy, lived long lives, and were very intelligent.
On chickens, those were my only good experiences from breeders.
For bad, I'll start with a specific breeder who was showing their birds. I got a lot of birds from them, including Black Ameraucanas and Delawares. These birds were promising... until they started getting sick. The breeder, though showing in places where there was strict guidelines requiring disease testing, had sold me birds who had Marek's disease, which infected not only the birds I had gotten from them, but also birds I had gotten from other breeders like my White Rocks. (All but one of my hatchery birds who were exposed remained healthy.) Before I fully knew what everything was, they gave me a turkey (who also had a disease) that ended up dying a few days after. The Marek's disease ended up killing the whole flock with an exception of a couple of birds, plus put one of my coops and runs on quarantine for seven years.
Next bad experience was my last breeder experience. Because of the Marek's experience, I was determined not to buy from any breeder who wasn't NPIP certified. My Mom, who was on Facebook, was able to find one. I bought a baker's dozen from them, containing Lemon Cuckoo, Black Split Lavender, and Lavender Orpingtons, Black Copper Marans, Whiting True Blues, and Olive Eggers. I had nothing but troubles with these birds, and most of them didn't make it to retirement (three years old) for various reasons.
Starting with them as chicks, one struggled to breathe (though amazingly survived- she did develop a skull deformity), others had split wings, and the Marans had deformed toes. As they aged, my Marans didn't lay chocolate eggs, but instead, laid eggs with shells so soft that I couldn't do anything with them, and nothing I did helped improve their shells. Only one of the OE laid olive eggs (though I'm not fully blaming the breeder on that). One of the Whiting True Blues was crossbeaked, and another appeared like her skull was deformed and she never got to full size (this I'm not entirely sure if it was the breeder or the breed). One of the Marans even had an issue with her feathers, and an OE had an extreme hormone enbalance.
Then they started dying. Both Marans died, one due to the egg issue and the other (assumed) to the feather issue. One of the WTBs died unexpectedly, then later, my Black Split Lavender Orpington died (partly due to heat, but was having other issues beforehand, including fainting due to struggling to breathe).
Those are issues that I've had from breeder birds, and neither breeder refunded me on these issues and the second breeder wouldn't even respond to me when I asked questions afterward.
As far as hatcheries go, they guarantee healthy birds, and some will refund you. (They should say so on their website if they will, though may have requirements.) I buy them through my feed store, so I don't have to worry about the postage either. Most of my experiences have been good, with the exception of the occasional crossbeak with the EEs, which is almost expected.
My worst experience with a hatchery was through
TSC.
TSC was selling sick chicks (which I saw before I bought any), and I ended up witha sick one and it died. Then another experience was from buying a flock of started pullets and only two of them made it to retirement. Those came from my local feed store, and I had bought others from them in the past that gave me no troubles, so I was looking at breed more than anything. (High egg producers.)
Out of the two, I would rather pay less for a hatchery bird and it be healthy than pay more for a bird that might bring disease to my flock or have other issues. With a hatchery bird, if they do have issues such as crossbeak, it can almost be expected, therefore it doesn't hurt as bad as it does when you're expecting a quality bird but get something that doesn't even grow feathers right instead.
so, my friends ā do you go hatchery for the cute surprises or breeder for the wow-factor drama queens? personally, i want all the fluff and color i can get. 
Hatchery Birds
Breeder Birds
