4 names, 7 stores, 1 strategy for growth
California retail chain finds success despite rocky times
By Tom Edmonds -- Furniture Today, January 25, 2004
Laguna Hills, Calif. — Laguna Hills, Calif.– Bryan White started riding the home office pony 10 years ago, and he's increasingly confident that he picked a winner.
In fact, White, and his partner recently increased their bet on home office furniture when they acquired two San Diego specialty stores to go with their five other oak and office shops south and east of Los Angeles.
White has heard all the reports about slowdowns in the category, and he acknowledges that his company has seen a few lulls since 2000. Nonetheless, he has also seen that people still want to furnish their home offices.
"People are still looking for solutions," he said. "That's why it's been a strong category for us. Office furniture is our No. 1 category pretty much across the board, even in the oak stores."
White and his wife, Christine, opened the first Oak Etc. in Riverside in 1994. He had started work at a furniture store right out of high school, and while he says sawdust doesn't run in his veins, he knew he wanted to own and operate a business rather than work for somebody else. With Christine's help, the store got off on the right foot, and by 1996, Bryan wanted to expand, but she wouldn't let him unless he found a partner. In fact, she knew who the partner should be: his cousin, Hirrum Shetrone.
Shetrone and White operate a total of seven stores under four different banners. These include three Oak Etc. stores in Laguna Hills, Riverside and Ontario; In Your Office in Laguna Hills, not far from one of the Oak Etc. stores; Glendora Furniture in Glendora; and Home Office Plus in San Diego and nearby Vista.
Home Office Plus was started and operated by Bernie Hoffman, but with Hoffman ready to retire, Shetrone and White acquired the two stores last year and conducted a retirement sale, without converting the store's name. "Bernie had done a phenomenal job to develop that name," White said. "It would have been stupid for us to change or do anything to diminish it."
Their purchase included the large unit on Miramar Boulevard, San Diego's main furniture row. At 17,000 square feet, that store has twice as much display space as any of the other stores owned by White and Shetrone, but the premium location, augmented by a selection of entertainment furniture to go with the home office program, justifies the departure.
"Out here in California, rent is astronomical," White said. "I read about these 300,000-square-foot stores opening in other states, but there's nothing like that out here. It all comes down to rent and what a business can afford."
White and Shetrone can afford to expand – and say they will continue to look for additional locations and/or acquisitions – because their company has established a value-added relationship with both its vendors and its customers. While that may sound fundamental to the point of being obvious, White says it's as simple as that.
"What we've always been about is building a relationship with the factories and getting protection in our distribution," he said. "It is a little more difficult to make money out here with the cost increases we've seen, so being able to work with a line that isn't going to chop your legs out from under you is a big help."
Less tangible but not unimportant, close working partnerships with vendors provide these retailers with insights on merchandising and marketing, White said, listing superior service as another benefit of strong business bonds with manufacturers. In particular, White cited Creative Ideas and its president, Steve Balsamo, as a resource that provides both distribution protection and business mentoring.
On the consumer side, Oak Etc. and the other stores take a consultative sales approach. "The process is definitely about education," White said. "Our salespeople will take that customer by the hand and really listen to what they want. Knowing the product as we do, we can make recommendations and get them into exactly what they want."
This process obviously requires salespeople who are both knowledgeable and caring. "It's about having those people who are excited about home office furniture and who enjoy having the solutions that people want," White said. "When we get a salesperson in there with expertise and the passion for what they do, the results really jump out at you."
Because they operate smallish locations and don't have a regional advertising campaign, Shetrone and White do not see the need to convert all their stores to one brand, although they have given some thought to converting Oak Etc. to entirely home office in order to cash in on their strongest category. "We do want to kick butt out there so that might be a direction we go in the future," White said. "We are looking for the right opportunities. We are wanting and willing to grow, and we are willing to change. Whatever direction the business takes us is the way we'll go."
The company has created its own in-house marketing department to produce the mix of direct mail and newspaper ads it uses to drive traffic. "And sometimes we stand outside and jump up and down. That's worked a few times," White said, smiling.
The entire process of finding good locations, staffing stores with creative and committed people, working with vendors, and selling and servicing consumers is proving to be a fun challenge for this young company.
"I like the game we play of trying to figure out how to sell more furniture," he said. "It used to be you could just throw furniture in a store, mark it up a bit, and you'd make money. Now it's a lot more complicated than that. But if you work it hard enough, it can be quite good."•
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