Furniture retailers Luxe Home, DOTI team up

Will cooperate on merchandising, marketing, franchising

Gary Evans -- Furniture Today, May 18, 2009

Debbie and Daryl Smith of Bend, Ore., are among a number of store owners who have converted to the Luxe Home Interiors name.

TULSA, Okla. —- Luxe Home Interiors, the design-oriented furniture chain that grew out of the former Norwalk stores, has joined forces with Florida-based Design of the Interior (DOTI) stores for merchandising, marketing and future franchising.

Luxe will be the managing entity for the two groups of independently owned stores, with headquarters in Tulsa. Luxe and the Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.-based DOTI will have a total of about 35 stores.

Both groups carry upper-medium to high-end merchandise, and both provide design consulting. DOTI stores use a wider assortment of vendors than Luxe, whose leaders say they have limited the number of sources the stores use in order to become more important to the suppliers. In addition, both the DOTI and former Norwalk stores had been franchise operations but have reverted to independently owned stores.

"We felt like the combination of these two systems, and emerging with the strongest entity possible, was the right thing to do," said Jim Evanger, who with wife Michele are DOTI's founders. "It will give us more buying power, more opportunities for scale and more name recognition, and we can work on advertising and marketing programs together."

Luxe came into being last summer after manufacturer Norwalk Furniture closed and left its chain of Norwalk - The Furniture Idea franchise stores without an inflow of product. (Norwalk has since re-emerged as manufacturer Norwalk Custom Upholstery, and the new owners say they have no plans of getting in the retail business.) DOTI also is a young company, with its oldest stores about five years old.

While the merchandise and marketing of the two chains will coalesce, not all the stores will be branded as Luxe.

"For the time being, the DOTI brand will still exist and the Luxe brand will exist." said Evanger. "Over time, Luxe will be the name that has the long-term strategy."

"We want to essentially unite the two," said Greg Wyers, president of Luxe Interiors in Tulsa, Okla., a former Norwalk store owner who organized the Luxe group.

"Whether we share the same name won't matter so much," he added. "We may bring in other stores which may ultimately share the Luxe logo. But it's not essential up front. The common denominator is merchandising and marketing."

Under normal economic conditions, the new group could reach annual sales of around $50 million, Wyers estimated.

With 35 stores, Luxe and DOTI already are involved in joint efforts. According to Wyers:

• Frank Goldoni, a vice president at DOTI, has become part of the Luxe management team and will be involved in helping stores implement a new business plan.
• Luxe is finalizing an agreement that will put two sales trainers in the field for store support.
• Five Luxe TV spots have been completed, with a butterfly as a symbol.
• Web sites are being designed for Luxe stores, patterned after the DOTI site but expanded to include unbranded product from major vendors. To see a site under construction, go to www.luxetulsa.com.
• Plans are under way for floor display and presentation of product.
• There is an emphasis on digital catalogs over paper ones.

Storeowners held an all-day meeting the day before the High Point Market to map out strategy and discuss product.

Wyers said the group is pursuing "a continuous effort" to define the new retail model.

"In addition to using what was a pretty proven model with Norwalk, there are changes that I feel really strong about that are taking place in the industry that we want to embody at retail," he said. "What we think is there is a much more forward concept in retail."

The two companies plan to have their business plan together by the end of the summer before taking more stores into its fold.

"After that, we'll start setting our sights on growth," said Wyers.

"Right now, it's stability. We wanted to get our feet under us before we let any independent join."