Manufacturer springs from humble retail beginnings
By Jeff Linville -- Furniture Today, January 5, 2003
Boone, N.C. — Before building a successful manufacturing company, Charleston Forge owners Art and Susan Barber operated a small but profitable retail business.
Fresh out of college in July 1975, the young couple began selling high-end fireplace accessories in a store here. Seeing a need for customized work, they also offered fireplace screens that Art made himself.
In 1980, the Barbers bought some metal furniture equipment from a company that was going out of business. They tried to start a small manufacturing division, making patio furniture under the name PatioCraft, but ran into troubles and expenses and soon faced a mountain of debt.
A year later, they changed their approach and looked into using the equipment to make indoor furniture such as baker's racks. For three years, the Barbers and a handful of workers struggled to get out of the red, despite profits coming from their retail fireplace operation. During this time, the company changed its name from PatioCraft to Charleston Forge, drawing on the metalwork seen in the historic South Carolina city of Charleston.
Art Barber heard about the International Home Furnishings Market and, desperate to generate revenue for the manufacturing side, decided to try his furniture products there. On the Wednesday before opening day in October 1984, he drove two hours to High Point with four baker's racks in a pickup truck. He didn't have a space rented, nor did he know anyone who would let him put his goods in their showroom.
Instead, he moved his furniture to an unoccupied area of hallway on the third floor of Market Square. He decorated the racks with leftover props he found lying in the hall.
Because he didn't have a lease and hadn't paid any rent, Barber spent the 10 days of market avoiding building management, who didn't seem to notice the small, illegitimate display. He sold to only 15 buyers, but said he became friends with each of the retailers.
The break for the fledgling company was that one of the buyers was from Spiegel Catalog. A few months later, a Charleston Forge baker's rack was pictured on the inside front cover of the catalog, and orders poured in.
At the next High Point market in April 1985, the Barbers negotiated to share a 1,000-square-foot space with a man selling furniture from Mexico. The man split town before the end of market without paying his share of the rent or even taking his samples. The Barbers sold their own samples to pay the rent and took the Mexican furniture home with them, where it remains today.
From those inauspicious beginnings, Art Barber said the company soon became a buyer destination, putting the couple in the good graces of the Market Square ownership. In 1995, Charleston Forge celebrated 10 years at Market Square with a party, at which the building management presented the couple with a reserved parking space and a condo in the building as a perk.
Charleston Forge remained a fixture at Market Square until April 1999 when it moved to its current location at 1690 English Rd.
The couple left the fireplace store in the 1980s, but they still dabble in fireplace goods. An 8,000-square-foot company outlet store here carries fireplace accessories along with its seconds and discontinued items. A hallmark of the store is a large rock chimney with a fireplace on both the first and second floors.
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