Ashley retail concept enjoys early success
April 18, 2010 Ashley retail concept enjoys early success
Hundreds gather at market to hear about Furniture 123
AT THE MARKET — Enthusiasts of a new retail concept by Ashley Furniture heard a compelling story about it Friday night that almost took their breath away — if there was any breath to be had in a jam-packed meeting room where the presentation took place.
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Rick Cappola, left, of Ashley with Chrissi Kriner of Beiter's Home Center. Kriner said her store turned a "black hole" in the back of the building into a profit center with Ashley's Furnish 123 concept.
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A crowd of several hundred listens to a pitch about Ashley's Furniture 123 program.
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One after another, owners of the new stores told a crowd of several hundred people of early successes with the Furnish 123 brand — even though the program was just announced at the Las Vegas Market in early February.
The concept is based on categories of value-priced merchandise — stationary upholstery, motion, bedroom, dining room, rugs, top-of-bed, occasional — with a your-choice, one-price selection set in a no-frills space, ideally under 5,000-square feet. The business is run on a cash basis that discourages credit sales and promotes customer pick-up of merchandise, which comes from the factory so that furniture on the floor never moves.
Several speakers extolled the success of newly opened Furnish 123 stores, a brand that doesn't include the Ashley name. Joe Beiter and Chrissi Kriner of Beiter Home Center, with stores in central Pennsylvania said they put the concept in "the black hole" in the back of one of their stores and it is now averaging sales of $575 per square foot.
Others talked about the simplicity of shopping for consumers, who can easily go from category to category using the one-price concept to put together a room purchase.
And several speakers said they were attracting the 25 to 35 age group, which has been a hard group to get into the store.
Kerry Lebensburger, president of sales and marketing for Ashley, said Furniture 123's Web site will be geared to consumers who use social networking as their main source of communications, with ads spoofing the furniture buying business designed to create buzz and hopefully go viral.
Lebensburger said that commitments to Furnish 123 were moving so fast that he was having difficulty keeping up with the numbers.
"We were saying 500," he told the crowd Friday. "You-all are scaring me. Now, we're talking about 1,000 stores."
He said those opening stores are doing it "in multiples," inspired by low set-up and inventory costs. Licensing a store is on a first-come basis.
Robert Coles was one of the first to open one of the stores, in a Pottstown, Pa., mall, and plans six others this year. He says he is capitalizing on the abundance of vacant space available for rent and is paying no more than $12.50 a square foot and as little as $3.50.
Coles said 80% of his sales are picked up by customers. He said the consumer pays more to buy using a credit card, to cover the card fees.
"The key to these stores is that they're simple, simple, simple," he said.
- Published by Gary Evans -- Furniture Today, updated April 18, 2010 | 
