Home office, your way
By Thomas Russell -- Furniture Today, January 22, 2006
High Point — Consumers seeking furniture with plenty of options surely will like the way some home office vendors are developing and merchandising their product lines.
Resources are developing products in a way that lets people custom order items with a specific footprint or configuration in mind.
CENTURY FURNITURE offers one of the best examples of configurable home office. Its line is a made-to-order vs. made-to-stock product that comes in multiple finishes, pedestal configurations and knee space and hutch configurations. It even comes with different color leather inlay tops and various hardware and lighting options.
"Each of our pieces is made to order," said Cale Knopf, product manager of Century's configurable office and entertainment products. "We don't assemble them until we get the order."
Unlike some manufacturers, Century's stock is not in finished product, but rather in the white woods that go into the product. That system gives the company extra flexibility when it comes to producing a product that suits consumers' wants and needs.
"Everybody's needs are different," said Ed Tashjian, Century's vice president of marketing "They are constantly in flux. Just try to imagine what kind of desk you will have 10 years from now."
Configurable product is similar in concept to modular. Both allow the consumer to build a home office suite to their liking and add pieces along the way.
Configurability takes this approach a step further by offering more finishes and other options, such as hardware, lighting, and pedestal and hutch configurations.
The model works particularly well for domestic manufacturers such as Century. Along with having plenty of space for white wood inventory, its case goods plant is set up to respond quickly to custom orders.
CREATIVE IDEAS is another domestic manufacturer that offers finish and wood options as well as different configurations like drawer and pedestal placement. It also has several sizes of cabinets and desk sizes between 42 and 84 inches, with every six-inch increment in between.
Other options include a variety of hutch and L-shaped configurations.
"It's for people that want what they want," said Steve Balsamo, president of Creative Ideas. "They just don't want to settle for this or that. Otherwise they'd be working at the kitchen table."
HEKMAN FURNITURE is another domestic producer that touts customization as part of its approach to home office.
Neil McKenzie, vice president of sales and marketing, said the company's home office program includes different finish options plus varying executive desk sizes and tops. "We found that was the only way to handle that," he said. "Otherwise, you would have to limit yourself to cookie-cutter setups and bring them in by containers."
But a huge assortment of configurations isn't always the best approach. Within the past two years, Hekman sought to make things simpler for the customer by reducing the number of SKUs in a given group from nearly 30 to 14. This model now applies to its five modular home office groups.
"It enabled us to be more efficient and more effective in keeping all the items in stock so we can service the customers better," McKenzie said.
The approach also makes Hekman products "easier to sell on the retail floor," he added. "We have made it a simpler selling process and have heard absolutely no complaints about pieces we eliminated."
JESPER OFFICE came out with a new modular home library and entertainment line this past October called the Jesper 1000. It is an extension of the Jesper 2000 line introduced in April 2005.
The lines allow the customer to build a library or home entertainment center the way they want, with many different configurations. Along with numerous shelf and door configurations, these setups are available in different veneers and matching finishes.
Jesper 2000 is available in cherry, maple, espresso and teak finishes, and Jesper 1000 comes in cherry, maple, walnut and espresso.
The products are made in Jesper's Denmark factory, which allows the company the flexibility to provide such options, said Joern Skarregaard, president of Jesper Office U.S.
"Just by the fact that we own the factory, we don't have to live with restrictions," he said. "We set the rules ourselves. The only restriction we have is our internal capacities. For now, that is not a restriction at all."
Along with producing the finished goods, Jesper also has its own veneer and edge-band facilities in Eastern Europe.
"The fact that we control the whole supply chain makes it possible for us to design and produce exactly the furniture we think that the market demands," Skarregaard said.
That doesn't mean configurable product can't be sourced from Asian countires. BASSETT FURNITURE, for example, is sourcing its successful Guilford home office group in China. While available in just one finish, this group takes modular a step further by offering three different crown and base widths to complement different bookcases.
Bookcase hutches also come in an open or glass-door format. And the group includes desks with right-side or left-side CPU storage as well with drawer pedestal options.
The crown and molding component is an aspect of the group that sets it apart from modular, said Martin Gardner, Bassett's director of merchandising for home office, occasional and accent furniture.
"The consumer is attracted to this because it doesn't look modular, but gives them tremendous flexibility," Gardner said of the group, launched in October 2004. "You can build very small solutions, or large walls of it."
The collection also has a simple design and a basic medium cherry finish that allows it to fit in most home environments.
"When we developed this, we went to market research and found that, although the way it looks is important, the consumer isn't going to make their style statement with bookcase and storage pieces, but rather with lamps and rugs," Gardner said. "This fits well in so many different interiors."
Currently, the group has 25 SKUs. Bassett may add more items, including home entertainment pieces. But it also wants to limit the number of choices in order to communicate the flexibility without making it confusing for the consumer.
"It needs to do that instantly with the consumer," Gardner said. "It's a challenge on the retail side."
Other importers agree that offering a lot of configurations and options can be a challenge.
"When you are importing, it becomes complicated because you have more inventory to deal with, and the issue of space consolidation on containers," said Jeffrey Pulver, manager of product development for SLIGH FURNITURE. "It's not as easy to do when you are importing as when you are manufacturing in your own facilities."
Before shifting to all imports in mid-2005, Sligh offered different pedestal options on its traditional Bradbury Cherry collection. But Pulver said that met with only marginal success.
Today, Sligh mainly offers two different finish options in a limited number of home office and home entertainment products.
Configurable or custom-built home office isn't a forte at KATHY IRELAND HOME by MARTIN FURNITURE, said Karl Eulberg, vice president of sales. The key, he said, is to provide the maximum number of options with the least amount of SKUs.
At the upcoming Las Vegas market, Martin plans to offer a return option on some of its writing desks. The L-shaped configuration allows for the placement of add-on items such as a lateral file or open storage cabinet.
A key goal with this format is to show retailers options without crowding their sales floor or warehouse. The company also wants to offer consumers as much flexibility as possible so they can maximize the use of the rooms in their homes.
-
Home office vendors tap core strengths
Oct 26, 2011 -
People on the move
Sep 3, 2011 -
Home office
Apr 5, 2010
Featured Company
-
Wright Labels
Bill and Tom Wright founded Wright of Thomasville in 1961 on the idea that printing was a creative medium and the belief that "a promise made is a promise kept." The Wright brothers focused their attention on providing exceptional printing for the... more
VIEW ALL GALLERIES
