For high-end furniture stores, home office is still a must-have category, and after making recent adjustments in their merchandising, some retailers say it is showing renewed promise.
These stores indicate that their sales of executive desks and coordinating pieces have been building momentum. Some of this business seems to be coming at the expense of once-hot computer armoires, with affluent consumers now preferring to set up home offices that they don't have to clean up and fold away every time they are finished working.
As much as anything, today's high-end consumer wants eye-grabbing style, but function also must be blended into any home office configuration, according to Todd Banik, corporate buyer for Treasures, a San Diego store that also operates in Irvine near Los Angeles.
"We're furnishing large homes, and they want a look with a lot of show," Banik said. "That's the strength of our entire business."
Banik described his home office business as strong, particularly since Treasures moved away from modular collections and started focusing on executive-desk configurations.
Creating an identity
"Modular office furniture was a difficult category for us," he said. "All our competitors have computer hutches and wall-system configurations. We had to distinguish ourselves, and we decided to specialize with a distinctively high-end look, something that the low end can't match — yet."
Executive configurations also are working well for Toms-Price in Chicago.
"The desk, deck and credenza combination has been very strong of late," said Joan Franken, merchandise manager. "The (all-in-one) cabinets and armoires are not as strong right now, and modular is a category that has probably matured."
The continuing spread of telecommuting appears to be driving the change, Franken added. "I think more consumers are setting up true offices in their homes. They want to create the complete environment for the executive working at home."
Laptop units on the rise
At the same time, Franken is excited about a new generation of smaller desks designed for laptops that have been introduced by vendors such as Hooker and Sligh.
"Those should work very well," she said. "More and more people are using laptops, and they don't necessarily need large desks any more. But they do need a work surface where they can also store a printer and some supplies."
Home office tickets at Toms-Price range from about $4,000 to as high as $15,000, and the consumer who puts that kind of money down on the table for office furniture is not inclined to wait.
"More so in home office than in other categories, immediate availability is very important — having it in stock and ready to ship," Franken said. "For the most part, we've been pleased that our vendors have been able to support us that way."
At Dau Furniture in Ellisville, Mo., outside St. Louis, the SOHO category has not been working as well as Paul Dau, owner, would like.
"We're doing some things right now that I think are going to make it grow a little more," he said, explaining that he's incorporating some lower-priced imports and new modular lines.
"We try to use domestic as much as we can," Dau said, "but we're mixing in an imported pine office collection that should help us with the bargain shopper. We've already seen a little bit of a change, and it's helped us move people up to our better products."
Because so much of the home office business is focused on medium and low price points, there are some basic configurations that people simply won't pay much for, Dau added.
Price pressures
"It's real hard for us to get through all the price resistance," Dau said. "That's where the imports can help us get people in to see what we're doing. There's just a lot of price pressure right now. So when you're doing better-end goods you have to merchandise a little lower than you would normally."
In his 12,000-square-foot store, Dau shows five full office configurations and another nine desks. He said he has not seen a strong demand yet for executive desks: "Most people doing home offices don't do executive desks, at least not in our market."
Style is the best vehicle that Dau and other high-end merchants use to distinguish themselves. Toms-Price, which has recently expanded and moved its home office department to more of a featured area in its headquarters Wheaton, Ill., store, works hard to avoid a presentation of brown on brown. Toward that end, Franken folds in some French, contemporary and even Hooker's Faith Popcorn collection in white cottage styling.
Banik says he wants the accessories and chairs at Treasures to stand out: "Anything different I can find in a desk chair is what I go for. Our consumers don't want anything that smells like it might be comfortable in a corporate situation. This is for their home."
