Burdines opens 7th furniture gallery store
By Carole Sloan -- Furniture Today, August 19, 2002
| The new Burdines Fort Lauderdale furniture gallery is the first to sport the new company logo. |
Fort Lauderdale, Fla. — Burdines has opened its seventh free-standing furniture gallery store, a 45,000-square-foot unit here and its first two-story furniture store.
The Federated department store division converted a clearance center into the store.
"It was a good location and the area became gentrified enough to support a furniture gallery," said Mike Nicotera, vice president of furniture, bedding and rugs at Burdines, based in Miami.
The new store expands the technique of using few permanent interior walls, an approach begun last year with the Clearwater, Fla., furniture store. The Fort Lauderdale unit has floor-to-ceiling windows lining one side of the building, increasing natural light, Nicotera said.
In visual presentation, the store uses high-tech projected graphics, including a clock on the floor at the front of the store, to highlight information and pinpoint special areas.
"Kids love to follow the clock's second hand around," Nicotera said, adding that graphics also are important in the mattress department.
The first floor follows an open plan with enhanced accessibility from one fashion feature section to another. The second floor features the more commodity-like classifications — mattresses, sofa-sleepers and recliners — as well as floor coverings.
The merchandise mix, Nicotera said, reflects the area's coastal lifestyle and includes such highlights as a collection of slipcovered furniture called UnderCovers from McCreary Modern. Chairs are hung on one wall, with more pieces on the floor.
Other highlights are Stanley's American View collection with its abaca bed, and a leather bed that's a Burdines exclusive.
Bedding from Sealy, Serta, Simmons and Stearns & Foster is offered, and the private-label Burdines Florida Collection is a growing segment, Nicotera said.
Latex is another growing part of Burdines' bedding business. The opening price point is $1,400 and models go to $4,000, with the upper end being especially strong.
"Latex is doing very, very well," Nicotera said. "Florida historically has been an important latex or foam area. Customers here like the comfort of latex."
Projected graphics in the bedding department include such slogans as "a better night's sleep guaranteed only at the Florida store," three rotating disks that highlight bedding features, and huge blowups of kids playing on a beach or jumping on mattresses.
Furniture business is good, Nicotera said, with July and August better than earlier this year. "We have to be aggressive, and that doesn't mean lowering price points but adding value," he said.
In addition to the seven free-standing furniture galleries, Burdines has two in-store furniture gallery formats and two in-store furniture departments. It also has bedding in 38 of its full-line department stores "and this is a real good business," Nicotera said.
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