Livingston buys chair line
Gary Evans -- Furniture Today, March 14, 2005
Livingston, Tenn. — Livingston Furniture, a 40-year-old upholstery producer, has acquired the assets of Cumberland Chair of nearby Gainesboro, Tenn., for an undisclosed amount.
Livingston bought the company's equipment and patterns, and has transferred the Cumberland line to its facility here. Cumberland was making chairs for Livingston on a contract basis, and the lines merge easily, said Livingston President Bill Fletcher.
Cumberland, once known as Memphis Chair, was owned by Gene Stephens, Wayne Gore and Cecil Heady, who have not announced their plans.
The promotional Cumberland chairs complement Livingston's promotional Samuel Deane upholstery line, which was introduced last year. "These chairs fit nicely into that division," Fletcher said. "We'll fold them in and put nicer covers on them and move them up to our midrange line."
The Cumberland line includes five Queen Anne chairs with cabriole or ball and claw legs, club backs, either skirted or unskirted, plus swivel rockers and slipper benches.
"We've never had a strong chair line, so we feel this will beef it up," Fletcher said. "We've never been the kind of manufacturer that people could call up and order 20 or 50 chairs because we were a special-order house. But they are indeed doing it with this line."
The acquisition will not require an expansion of the Livingston plant, he said.
Livingston sells in the eastern United States, Oklahoma, Texas and Montana, and exports to the Middle East.
