Archive for September 14th, 2007
By Ben McNeely
bmcneely@independenttribune.com
KANNAPOLIS - K-Town Furniture Co.’s building in downtown Kannapolis is for sale.
But owner and founder Melvin Vanderburg said the furniture store is not closing, just moving.
“I’ve always been hopeful that we could take all the stores and put them under one roof,” Vanderburg said. “We’ve had a lot of interest in the property, from other furniture stores and businesses.”
The store, sitting on about 2 acres beside the North Carolina Research Campus in downtown Kannapolis, is one of very few properties not owned by billionaire and campus developer David Murdock.
“There is a strong interest in a five-star hotel occupying this space some day,” Vanderburg said.
A hotel developer, Charles Johnson, from Statesville, has expressed interest in building a hotel there, Vanderburg said.
Johnson is co-owner of the Carnegie Hotel in Johnson City, Tenn., according to the hotel’s Web site.
Vanderburg said the hotel project could cost between $75 million and $80 million.
The K-Town property is listed at between $11 million and $14 million, and Vanderburg would not say how much he paid for it.
“That is a private matter,” Vanderburg said.
If a hotel is built in downtown Kannapolis, it would be “a complimentary and excellent use” of property in downtown, City Manager Mike Legg said.
“There is still a lot of homework to be done, but if the numbers work out, it would be a fantastic addition,” Legg said.
Vanderburg, 89, said he put the building on the market because of his age and out of respect for Murdock.
“With our respect for Mr. Murdock and the people of Kannapolis, with the wonderful things that he is building here, we felt he wouldn’t want a furniture store in his front yard,” Vanderburg said.
Murdock has not approached Vanderburg and his business partner, Fred Morrison, about selling his property.
Vanderburg opened K-Town Furniture in 1957 and has been in business every since. Over the past 40 years, he expanded his furniture business to Salisbury, Concord and Charlotte, as well as in Cannon Village.
He rents space in Cannon Village, where Carolina Interiors and Village Furniture House are located.
After Pillowtex closed in 2003, Vanderburg expanded Carolina Exteriors and Village Furniture House and markets all three stores as Cannon Village Furniture Mall.
Vanderburg closed his stores in Concord, Salisbury and Charlotte due to the popularity of the furniture mall in Kannapolis and because the furniture industry - both manufacturing and retail sales - have been in decline for the past six years, he said.
“It makes it rough trying to stay in business,” Vanderburg said.
K-Town Furniture owns 5 acres on Dale Earnhardt Boulevard, where its warehouse is located.
Vanderburg and Morrison said they purchased the property in 1984 in anticipation of future growth.
Plans are to build a new showroom near the warehouse and move K-Town Furniture, Carolina Interiors and Village Furniture House there.
“If we locate to that place, we have have the heaviest traffic coming through town,” Vanderburg said. “Our customers have made this all possible. We want to continue to serve the people.”
• Contact Ben McNeely: 704-789-9131.
September 14th, 2007
Owners refurbish furniture shops
Beach House in SLO and other furnishings stores change focus or location to survive the growing competition
By Dawn White
Growing competition from stores selling low-cost imported furniture has caused a San Luis Obispo furniture store owner to restructure his business.
Grover Cox, the owner of Beach House Unfinished Furniture, said his custom wooden furnishings can no longer compete against cheaper products, most of which are from China. He’s changing his “day-to-day” furniture store into a showroom where customers will essentially design their own cabinets and wall units and find “office-like” elements, he said.
“We’re not going to change our location, but we’re going to change how we do business,” Cox said.
A few years ago, there were more than 38 unfinished furniture stores in the state, he said. Twenty-six of those have closed in the past 12 months.
Two years ago, Cox closed his Grover Beach store in an attempt to salvage his business, which was being squeezed by growing competition. By evolving his store, he hopes it will allow him and his wife, Suzie, to stay in business.
Other furniture store operators also notice the industry change. Ken Brooks, longtime owner of Brooks Furniture in San Luis Obispo, said he gave up selling high-quality custom furniture to stay afloat.
“I wouldn’t be in business if it weren’t for imports,” said Brooks, who said he now has to sell merchandise made overseas to compete.
Businesses being forced to evolve is yet another challenge to the local home furnishings industry, which has struggled in recent years from an oversaturation of stores, increasing rents in downtown San Luis Obispo and competition from national retailers.
Eva Young recently moved Meridian, her furniture and décor store, to the outskirts of San Luis Obispo. She said cheap Chinese imports, too much competition and high rent forced her to move from downtown to an enclave of home design stores. The move decreased her costs, increased her showroom space and kept her business sustainable.
Evolving one’s business plan may be the only way to survive in an international marketplace, Brooks said.
“The change has been gradual,” he said. “But with the cost of doing business, a lot of (furniture stores) have already left. I think the end of unfinished furniture is on the horizon.”
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September 14th, 2007
A longtime Ethan Allen furniture dealer in Kettering will stop selling the manufacturer’s products this fall to bring a new furniture maker into the store.
Owner Bob Day plans to convert his store, Ethan Allen of Kettering, to the Drexel Heritage furniture line in November. A sale on Ethan Allen furniture begins Sept. 18, he said. Drexel Heritage has a much broader selection than Ethan Allen, he said. Drexel’s brands include Lillian August, Postobello Home and Vera Bradley.
Day, who owns the store with his wife Susie, said he and other independent Ethan Allen dealers are growing unsure of the manufacturer’s direction. The product selection has shrunk over the years, leading to a 3 to 10 percent yearly decline in store sales, he said.
“We just don’t seem to know what direction the company is headed,” Day said. “It seems like we’re always changing and going into different directions. It used to be we catered to a very large section of the community … in the last several years … selection become limited.”
Day is the second generation of his family to sell furniture in Dayton. His parents became Ethan Allen independent store owners 68 years ago. He has 17 employees and could potentially another five workers after converting to Drexel.
Day estimates that the store, located at 1000 E. Dorothy Lane, will be closed for one to three weeks, likely beginning in late October, for interior remodeling. The store will reopen as Drexel Heritage of Dayton.
“It was tough leaving Ethan Allen because we’d been with them for a long time,” he said. “It’s still a good product.”
Danbury, Conn.-based Ethan Allen Interiors Inc. (NYSE: ETH - News) sells furniture and accessories at 313 stores, of which 158 are company-owned. The company has nine U.S. manufacturing facilities including two sawmills.
High Point, N.C.-based Drexel Heritage Furniture Industries Inc. is part of the combined operations of HDM Furniture Industries, Inc., a subsidiary of the St. Louis, Mo. based Furniture Brands International.
Published September 13, 2007 by the Dayton Business Journal
September 14th, 2007
Patricia Maganu
Francistown furniture business pioneer Bernard Balikani is growing his empire. Furniture Embassy, also in Francistown, is the latest addition to his chain of three retail stores.
Furniture Embassy is meant to cater for the upper class, Balikani reveals to Mmegi. The man, who is perhaps better known for staying the hog of opposition politics, says that he has always had a passion for the furniture business.
“I have worked in almost every furniture store in this town. That is all I have ever done in my life.”
Balikani says that it is a deliberate strategy that each store under his Classic Holdings has its own dedicated market.
“We went for the upper class with Furniture Embassy because other classes have been catered for. We purposely avoided the middle class because it has already been catered for.”
The idea is to avoid engaging in an already saturated market. “We wanted to be different,” he says. “With Furniture Embassy, we did not want to compete in an already over-traded market.”
Balikani points out that with regard to furniture, Francistown’s upper class has been neglected. “Premier Furnishers has been around since 2005. But it has always catered for the lower income bracket, while Imperial Bedding has beds for just about anyone. We have beds from the cheapest to the most expensive; we are trying to embrace people from all walks of life,” he says.
The politician, who is progressively becoming a prominent businessman, says the reason why Furniture Embassy was launched in Francistown first is that Gaborone is well covered.
“It is only fair to open a prestigious store here in Francistown; Gaborone has already been catered for in as far as suitable furniture for the upper class is concerned.
“People have been having to order furniture from Gaborone, which comes with additional expenses like transport and the risk of damage. So we are trying to bring good furniture nearer.”
He says he hopes Furniture Embassy will raise the standards of interior decor and furniture in northern Botswana. “It will not serve only Francistown. It will serve even places like Orapa, Sowa Town, Masunga, Tutume, Maun and Kasane. This is one more service people in northern Botswana will benefit from Botswana’s second city.”
At present, Balikani’s small but growing furniture empire employs 33 Batswana and two expatriates from South Africa. “We also try to contribute in the fight against unemployment. That is why I have almost a 100 percent local employment situation.”
Balikani says he has worked in the furniture retail business from 1989 to 2006.
“Hence there are no surprises for me any more. The big difference is that I am now the one in control.
“I have worked for most furniture retailers in Botswana, rising through the ranks from salesman to branch manager to regional manager. I have worked for Furnmart, Barnetts, Supreme Furnishers, OK Furnishers, Protea and Carnival, to name a few.”
What are the man’s future plans? “Branding Botswana,” comes the answer right away. “‘Buy Botswana’ died a natural death. South Africans have introduced ‘Proudly South African’ and it’s working wonders for them.
“Batswana should have the same passion for products and services made and offered in Botswana.” Classic Holdings, the parent company Balikani registered in 1995, may just lead the way to branding Botswana.
September 14th, 2007
By Seth Nidever
The man doesn’t even stop to put socks on.
Trying to get a fix on Craig Johnson as he dashes around Salmon’s Furniture Galleries is as difficult as trying to figure out how his elaborate, 35,000-square-foot store dropped into the middle of downtown Hanford’s small shops and bars.
Accomplish the first and you’ll figure out the second.
Behind the recliners, sofas and rich decorations is the 50-year-old Johnson, apparently a near genius at persuading people to purchase chairs, beds and other home furnishings.
But he can’t afford to spend much time in the recliners he recommends to others for relaxation.
It’s exhausting keeping up with Johnson as he grins at customers, shows off furniture and shoots off rapid-fire observations on Hanford and the rest of the universe.
He’s a human business tornado that works in reverse: He brings profits out of seeming chaos.
The evidence is the gallery on Seventh Street in Hanford, destroyed in a raging 2001 fire that wiped out $2 million worth of furniture.
Undeterred, Johnson vowed a comeback.
Today’s rebuilt store is the measure of how successful he’s been.
A large fountain greets visitors in the entryway. Employees invite customers to eat cookies baked in the fully-functioning kitchen at the back.
Sometimes, employees serve up home cooked meals to anybody in the store.
Johnson, pursuing his own vision against the recommendations of some of the furniture lines he represents, included the kitchen in the redesign, along with showers in his private office.
“I figured when it’s done, I would owe a lot of money, so I’d be living here,” said Johnson, sporting fashionably spiked gray hair, a rich tan and sockless leather dress shoes.
By day, Johnson and his workers sell furniture to a customer base that mostly hails from outside Kings County. By night, Johnson and his wife, Lisa, design ads, tinker with the decorations and do the bookwork.
Sometimes, it’s 10 p.m. or later before Johnson goes home to put in a few hours of sleep before the whole cycle starts again.
“This is my home. This is me,” he said.
It’s something that Paul Dombrowksi, a friend who owns Steeplejack Roofing, can understand.
“I think the main thing is perseverance, going at it, because you have your good times and your tough times, and being able to weather through the ups and downs of a business is probably the most difficult thing to adjust to. I think he’s done a pretty good job with that, kind of reading the economy,” Dombrowski said.
Business savvy and ambition seems to run through Johnson’s veins.
His father used to own the now-defunct Buick/Oldsmobile dealership in downtown Hanford.
Johnson said he grew up in a “blessed life” of material comfort. He vowed to continue living well as an adult.
Working at Winchell’s Donuts when he was a junior high school student, Johnson said he came up with the idea of selling the dough left over from the donut holes. For that, he got a few extra bucks a day.
“I’ve always been a kid that’s looking for an opportunity,” Johnson said.
Johnson was working at Kings
September 14th, 2007
Associated Press
BUTTE, Mont. (AP) - Furniture owned by three families was destroyed when a moving company’s semi-trailer truck burst into flames on Homestake Pass, east of Butte on Interstate 90.
Highway Patrol Trooper Mark Hall says the semi-truck was westbound on the interstate Wednesday and traveling uphill, when the driver of another vehicle noticed smoke on the right side of the trailer near the tires.
The driver of the semi-trailer pulled over and flames erupted. Trooper Hall says the fire completely engulfed the Atlas Van Lines trailer.
He says more than half the load was destroyed by fire, and the rest was lost to smoke damage.
The Whitehall Volunteer Fire Department responded and no one was injured.
Hall says the fire most likely was caused by mechanical failure.
Information from: KXLF-TV, http://www.kxlf.com
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
September 14th, 2007
MONROE, Mich., Sept. 13 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ — La-Z-Boy Incorporated today announced that it has reached an agreement in principle to sell its Clayton Marcus subsidiary to Rowe Fine Furniture, Inc. (”Rowe”). Working terms of the agreement, which is expected to be finalized later this month, were not disclosed.
Founded in 1960, Clayton Marcus is a well-established, niche manufacturer of medium to upper-medium priced upholstered furniture, headquartered in Hickory, North Carolina. Its product collections cover a broad variety of style categories including casual, classic, and cottage and are distributed through hundreds of independently owned retailers throughout the United States and Canada and around the world.
Kurt Darrow, President and Chief Executive Officer of La-Z-Boy Incorporated, said, “While Clayton Marcus enjoys an excellent reputation in the market, the company does not fit with La-Z-Boy’s overall long-term strategy. We are confident that Rowe will be a synergistic owner for Clayton Marcus and that its customers will continue to be well serviced.”
Rowe, a manufacturer of upholstered furniture, is under new ownership by an affiliate of Sun Capital Partners, Inc.
Please refer to Rowe Fine Furniture’s news release for further information.
Background Information
La-Z-Boy Incorporated is one of the world’s leading residential furniture producers, distributors and retailers, marketing furniture for every room of the home. The La-Z-Boy Upholstery Group companies are Bauhaus, England, La-Z-Boy and La-Z-Boy, U.K. The La-Z-Boy Casegoods Group companies are American Drew, Hammary, Kincaid and Lea. The La-Z-Boy Retail Group consists of 69 stores operating in eight metropolitan markets.
The corporation’s proprietary distribution network is dedicated exclusively to selling La-Z-Boy Incorporated products and brands, and includes 333 stand-alone La-Z-Boy Furniture Galleries(R) stores and 281 La-Z-Boy In-Store Galleries, in addition to in-store gallery programs at the company’s Kincaid, England and Lea operating units. According to industry trade publication In Furniture, the La-Z-Boy Furniture Galleries retail network is North America’s largest single-brand furniture retailer. Additional information is available at http://www.la-z-boy.com/.
September 14th, 2007
David Perry — Furniture Today,
Park Place principals launch Mattress Works
GREENVILLE, S.C. — The principals of Park Place Corp. have launched a new bedding company called Mattress Works that has begun selling its mattress line in Wal-Mart Super Centers.
The first three independently operated sleep shops are in Wal-Mart Super Centers in South Carolina, where third-generation bedding maker Park Place is headquartered.
The Mattress Works line, retailing from $299 to $1,299, includes traditional innerspring and memory foam models. It is sold in “vestibule” space at the front of Wal-Mart stores acquired through a master lease with Wal-Mart.
Mattress Works officials said the program has considerable growth potential but declined to estimate how many stores will open. They described the program as offering “a new dimension in mattress retailing,” which
will be national in scope. The initial rollout will be on the East Coast.
The program targets Wal-Mart Super Centers, which typically attract 40,000 customers per week.
Mattress Works sleep shops offer “a full-service mattress shopping experience,” said David Karr, CEO of Mattress Works, who also is chief financial officer of Park Place and president of Park Place’s airbed company, Comfortaire.
That experience includes knowledgeable sleep consultants, a value-priced line and services like layaway, financing, home delivery and removal of old bedding, Karr said.
Here’s how the program works: Mattress Works, which has signed a supply agreement with Park Place, is looking for Park Place customers who are interested in becoming “operating partners” in the program, who would own and operate Mattress Works units in markets served by Wal-Mart Super Centers.
Chad Hill, who runs Spencer’s Mattress in Myrtle Beach, S.C., is the operating partner for the Mattress Works in the Wal-Mart Super Center in North Myrtle Beach, S.C.
“I am very excited to be a part of Mattress Works,” Hill said. “My sales volume is going as expected, and the daily traffic through my store is unbelievable. Even though we are very early in the game, I am already making plans to accelerate the growth of this business.”
That Mattress Works store has been open for about a month. The two other units now open are in North Charleston and Travelers Rest, just outside Greenville.
The logo for Mattress Works has echoes of the American flag and features red and blue lettering. It includes the tag line: “Work hard, sleep easy.”
Jimmy Orders, president of Park Place and a partner in the new Mattress Works venture, said Mattress Works represents “an all-American mattress program,” one that should resonate with Wal-Mart customers.
Edwin Shoffner, chief operating officer of Mattress Works and a vice president with Park Place, was involved in an earlier company, American Mattress Centers, which also sold mattresses at Wal-Mart. He and a partner launched the venture in 2001 and were operating more than 100 bedding departments in leased space in Wal-Mart stores within a year, but the company ran into financial difficulties and liquidated in 2002.
Shoffner said Park Place officials learned valuable lessons from the earlier program and have a different strategy with Mattress Works, relying on local retailers to operate the bedding departments.
The Mattress Works locations will occupy footprints of 450 to 1,150 square feet at the front of Wal-Mart Super Center stores. Wal-Mart leases that space to a variety of companies.
The first three Mattress Works sleep shops carry eight or nine beds.
Mattress Works, a management and marketing company, is owned by Jimmy, David and John Orders, all members of Park Place’s founding family, and by Karr, Shoffner and Darrell Miller, vice president of operations at Park Place. The six are equal owners.
September 14th, 2007
Furniture Today,
New beds, marketing efforts paying off
MINNEAPOLIS — Sales trends so far this quarter have improved since the first half of the year, airbed manufacturer and retailer Select Comfort said Wednesday in a business update to investors.
Jim Raabe, chief financial officer, said that based on results for the first 10 weeks of the quarter through Labor Day, the company is “currently on track to achieve the low end of our full-year sales and earnings targets,” or 87 cents per share.
“However, sales improvements are not likely to be sufficient to achieve the current third quarter consensus estimate of 27 cents per share,” he said. Raabe said earnings should be approximately equal to the figure reported in the 2006 quarter, which was 25 cents per share.
He added that although the company was not yet achieving positive comparisons in same-store sales, “results suggest we will reverse the six-quarter declining trend in same-store comps when we report actual third-quarter results next month.” Raabe attributed the improved sales performance to what he said were the compelling features of new beds, especially high-end models, and better sales and marketing efforts.
Gross margins also are improving, he said.
He said the company’s continues to generate significant cash flow, and has spent $37.6 million so far this quarter to repurchase 2.3 million shares of its stock at an average price of $16.65 per share.
September 14th, 2007
Furniture Today,
Will be merchandising manager for leather
TUPELO, Miss. — David Wormald has rejoined Lane Home Furnishings as merchandising manager of leather furniture.
An industry veteran with more than 20 years of retail experience, Wormald was upholstery product manager at Natuzzi before joining Lane as merchandising manager of leather furniture, a post he held from 1998 to 2002. He then went to Palliser as general manager of case goods.
Wormald also has worked with several smaller companies designing and sourcing product from Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and China, most recently as vice president of design and merchandising for a Chinese manufacturer.
He reports to Gentry Long, vice president of upholstery merchandising.
September 14th, 2007
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