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Art Van to Take PureSleep Retail Concept Nationwide

Clint Engel -- Furniture Today, September 24, 2011

Art Van Art Van has opened several PureSleep stores, including this one in Troy, Mich., and is looking to franchise or license the concept nationally.WARREN, Mich. - Art Van Furniture, which will soon open its fifth stand-alone PureSleep store in Ann Arbor, Mich., has big plans to expand the concept nationally through franchise and licensing agreements.
     Kim Yost, CEO of the Top 100 company, said the retailer will open a dozen more of the bedding specialty stores in Michigan over the next 12 to 24 months. National expansion of both in-store and stand-alone formats by license and franchise will begin in 2012.
     Armando Murillo, who joined Art Van early this year as director of PureSleep development, has been working to develop a PureSleep franchise that Art Van could roll to other markets.
     Yost said the company was sidetracked briefly by its acquisition of the 29-store Mattress World earlier this year, but has since perfected the PureSleep model and already is talking to potential franchisees.
     "We have done all the groundwork for taking our PureSleep ... national," Yost said.
     "We are in conversations with select retailers with the potential of adding PureSleep (stores and departments), adding tremendous value to their brand," Yost said, although he declined to identify the retailers Art Van is talking to. Yost wouldn't disclose sales figures, but said PureSleep is beating most competitors in key performance measures including average sales per store, sales per square foot, average selling ticket and add-on sales.
     "What makes it so attractive is that we have perfected the in-store model, which mirrors the freestanding model," he said. He said the parallel concepts offer consumers an identical store experience, which gives retailers a proven model that can be rolled out two ways - something no one else is offering, he said.
     Warren, Mich.-based Art Van launched PureSleep in 2009, opening its first store in Canton, Mich.
     Earlier this year, it announced that it had completed a $6 million investment in expanding and renovating nearly 34 bedding departments within its full-line Michigan stores to the PureSleep format as well as the opening of three freestanding Art Van PureSleep stores.
     In May, the Top 100 company acquired the more promotional Mattress World, a 29-unit chain with stores in Michigan and Indiana. At the time it said it may convert some of the Mattress World units to PureSleep.
     While there is some overlap in brands between Mattress World and PureSleep, the stores target different consumers.
     Mattress World "is all about price, brand and speed," Yost said. "PureSleep is all about wellness and profiling the guest using (diagnostic) technology" to determine the best mattress.
     He added that Art Van also has perfected the selling process at PureSleep, from the greeting through delivery - something else that will be shared with franchisees and licensees, along with research on the number of stores each market can support based on demographics and population.
     PureSleep's key brands include Kingdown's Sleep to Live, Natura, Sealy, Stearns & Foster, Tempur-Pedic, Comfort Solutions, Laura Ashley Home and Simmons. Yost said the company is also testing high-end product from E.S. Kluft & Co., which has been successful.

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Art Van plans to franchise PureSleep concept nationally

Sep 14, 2011

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