The expanded Charles Home Furnishings shop in Urbandale offers unique styles and accessories in custom-made items.
By JOANNE BOECKMAN
Charles Home Furnishings in Urbandale was a new retail store in January. Only six months later, it tripled its showroom space by switching locations with Wags furniture store.
The move gave Charles more room to showcase its two specialty products: leather sofas, love seats and chairs and custom-upholstered furniture. With the move, the store also added wood furniture under the Charles name and accessories not commonly found in other stores, said Joe Miller, manager of the Urbandale store.
Charles Schneider, the founder of the retail store, has Charles Schneider Fine Furniture and Charles Custom Furniture, based in Council Bluffs. Miller said that even though Schneider is now in his early 90s, he began opening a string of retail furniture stores across the country this year. The Urbandale store was the first one.
Miller, 58, answered our questions last week.
Q. Who is Charles Schneider?
A. He’s been in the furniture manufacturing business 61 years. He’s 91 now, and to still have this ambition to set up quality furniture stores at a time when others are downsizing or closing is a testament to how he feels about the quality of his product.
Q. Where are the other Charles Home Furnishings stores?
A. A second store opened in Indianpolis in May and three weeks ago one opened in Madison, Wis. In August, we’ll open one in Spokane, Wash. and in Sept., one in Fargo, N.D.
Q. How would you describe the Charles style?
A. Historically, Charles had trended toward a more traditional style, but he understands the need for a more contemporary look. We cover a variety of styles – and we’re working very hard at that. It’s also one of the reasons for growing the way we have.
Customers can select whatever they want on their sofa, whether with or without a skirt, with decorator legs, whatever. Our company slogan is “The choice is yours.”
Since being in Des Moines, we’ve found 20 new products for the Charles line.
Another thing people should know is that it doesn’t take us months to get a product. In most cases, we can deliver it within 21 days.
Q. What about the price?
A. We’re not at the low end of the price points, where you can buy a sofa for about $599, $699 or $799, but we’re also not at the high end – $3,000 or $4,000. We fit in the middle, but quality-wise, I’d put us against anyone. We also offer a lifetime guarantee – as long as you have it – if you buy a sofa or chair from the Charles Schneider collection.
We have to be competitive with our pricing policies, our service, our quality and the choices we offer.
Q. What sort of fabric selection do you have?
A. We have over 12,000 upholstery fabrics exclusive to us.
Q. How can people envision the style they select with the fabric?
A. We have a big screen and software program so we can show a rendering of the sofa or chair with the fabric choice. The computer tells us the pricing and shows us coordinating fabrics.
If you need assistance with your choice, we have decorators and designers on staff.
Q. What is your background?
A. My wife (Linda) and I had a furniture and floor covering store in Kanawha for 29 years. In order to survive with that, we added an America’s Mattress in Mason City, about 40 miles away from where we lived. We opened a second in Cedar Falls and about the time that opened, we opened two stores here in the Des Moines area (Urbandale and Ankeny). We closed the furniture store in 2004, when we decided to take on the last two.
We sold those when we had an opportunity to come to work for Charles in the company’s first retail store.
Q. How long can people expect this furniture to hold up?
A. Well, the oldest one we know of is probably over 40 years old and it still sits well. It’s in Newton. It was a hand-me-down from a mother to her son.
Reporter Joanne Boeckman can be reached at (515) 284-8049 or jboeckman@dmreg.com
