TUPELO, Miss. —
With retail business off to a reasonably good start in 2013, motion furniture producers believe they were able to sustain the momentum during the Tupelo Furniture Market’s four-day run here late last month.

Producers said traffic was about even with, or slightly below, the February 2012 market, but said order-writing was strong and retailers were positive about business.

They said the vast majority of dealers they saw were from the Southeast, which is typical for Tupelo, but said a fair number from Midwestern and Western states also shopped their showrooms.

“Based on what we are hearing, retail is off to a good start … and that always is a good sign for this market,” said Gene Gathagan, vice president of sales at glider rocker resource Brooks Furniture. “People came in and they placed orders.”

Gathagan and other executives said most retailers were looking to fill an immediate inventory need, which is why market specials and other promotions were just as popular as new products.

“This has always been our best market for order-writing,” said Jerry Baker, executive vice president of PeopLoungers. “And people usually want their goods right away.”

Before the market opened, Baker said he predicted showroom traffic and order-writing would be down because many dealers opted to shop the recent Las Vegas market.

However, he said he was happy to report that wasn’t the case.

“We wrote as much business as we ever do,” Baker said, and the PeopLoungers  showroom was busy.
Larry Daigneault, president of glider rocker producer Newport Gliders, said he too was concerned traffic would decline significantly.

But as it turned out, the decline was a modest one.

“Most of the people who come here don’t go to Vegas,” Daigneault said. “And our business has been good since the first of the year.”

While producers such as Brooks and PeopLoungers had only a handful of new products at market, Ashley took the opposite approach,  aggressively trying to grow its motion furniture and recliner business.

Kerry Lebensburger, president of the company’s upholstery division, said seven motion groups were introduced in Tupelo — on top of the nine new groups unveiled in Las Vegas — and all appeared to be hits with dealers.

“Motion is our big push for the year, and so far it’s going great,” he said.

Catnapper also had good results from a pair of  introductions, a $499 retail recliner and a sectional at $1,899 that featured three reclining seats.

Don Hunter, senior vice president of major accounts, said the sectional could be used in a home theater configuration since one of the reclining seats is in the wedge — an area that is little used in most sectionals.
“We had good traffic … and we wrote a lot of business,” Hunter said.