Agency creates ‘Angry Man,’ other harried folks who need to relax
\nBy Gary T. Pakulski Toledo Blade<\/p>\n
MONROE, MICH.: No one would confuse ”Angry Man” with designer Todd Oldham.<\/p>\n
”Angry,” a middle-aged shopper wearing the sort of short-sleeve, button-down shirt that was once popular among computer programmers and factory foremen, is soothed by an encounter with comfortable La-Z-Boy Inc. furniture in one of a series of new TV commercials.
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\nThe humorous spots scheduled to debut next month are part of a marketing makeover for the Michigan furniture maker.<\/p>\n
Struggling to boost sagging sales, the $1.6-billion-a-year firm has dumped its longtime advertising agency, shifted from a strategy that focused on a more stylish image, and will push to accentuate what executives see as La-Z-Boy’s biggest sales point: comfort.<\/p>\n
The campaign by the inventor of the La-Z-Boy recliner includes a new slogan: ”Comfort. It’s what we do.”<\/p>\n
Revenue fell 13 percent in the quarter that ended July 28 after declining 5 percent in the most recent fiscal year.<\/p>\n
”We think we have a campaign that will lift our sales,” Chief Executive Kurt Darrow said last week at the firm’s annual shareholders meeting.<\/p>\n
A company spokesman said later that J. Douglas Collier, vice president and chief marketing Please see La-Z-Boy, C10<\/p>\n
Continued from Page C9 officer, was unavailable for comment. Executives don’t want to discuss the new campaign until it debuts, said spokesman Kathy Liebmann.<\/p>\n
But Collier provided a preview during the shareholders meeting.<\/p>\n
As part of La-Z-Boy’s earlier effort to boost its style quotient, executives hired Oldham to create a line of hip, contemporary furniture.<\/p>\n
There are no indications that La-Z-Boy has ended its relationship with him. The Todd Oldham collection and the designer’s photo are featured in the summer catalog for the firm’s La-Z-Boy Galleries retail chain and on the company’s Web site.<\/p>\n
However, Stan Diroff, who operates La-Z-Boy Furniture Gallery stores in Toledo and Monroe, Mich., said some Todd Oldham lines have been discontinued.<\/p>\n
La-Z-Boy is in talks with Oldham about extending the contract, which expires at the end of the year, said Shannon Quinn, a La-Z-Boy spokesman.<\/p>\n
Recent research has prompted the company to redefine its assumptions about the type of people who are most likely to buy La-Z-Boy furniture.
\nIt now sees its target market as both men and women between 35 and 65 years old who live in households with incomes between $50,000 and $150,000, Collier told shareholders.<\/p>\n
Formerly, it defined its primary audience as women between 25 and 54.<\/p>\n
Collier said research determined that La-Z-Boy customers are ”relaxed, unpretentious. They value the home as a refuge from a hectic world.”<\/p>\n
Although most people are familiar with La-Z-Boy, the firm continues to wrestle with the perception that ”we are tired, we are dated, we are a ’70s brand,” Collier said.<\/p>\n
To try to win over buyers, the firm replaced its ad agency of 15 years, W.B. Doner & Co., of Southfield, Mich., last spring with RPA, of Santa Monica, Calif. The new firm has created campaigns for brands including Honda and Acura automobiles. The trade publication Ad Week reported that the La-Z-Boy account is worth $35 million a year.<\/p>\n
A series of seven TV spots, all set in La-Z-Boy retail stores, feature shoppers dealing with everyday stresses of modern life, including a woman talking to a salesman while carrying on a separate conversation on a hands-free mobile phone.<\/p>\n
The ads will be shown on both network and cable TV.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Agency creates ‘Angry Man,’ other harried folks who need to relax By Gary T. Pakulski Toledo Blade MONROE, MICH.: No one would confuse ”Angry Man” with designer Todd Oldham. ”Angry,” a middle-aged shopper wearing the sort of short-sleeve, button-down shirt that was once popular among computer programmers and factory foremen, is soothed by an encounter […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-furniture-indonesia-news"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4710\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/indonesia-furniture.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}