Luke Leather likes Mom and Pop

It’s no secret that small and mid-sized furniture stores – the “Moms and Pops” of the industry – have taken a terrible beating during this recession, but Scott Davis and his crack sales force at Luke Leather have developed a knack for finding the strong ones.

And that’s a skill that has helped Luke Leather remain healthy while a number of his peers have been relegated to the critical list – or worse.

“The Mom-and-Pop retailers seem to have a lot of confidence in our product,” said Davis, the president of the 4-year-old, family-owned company. “And they love the fact that we can ship them in 10 days with no minimum order.”

Although Davis does a modest amount of direct-container business with larger retailers, he says his business model is better suited for the smaller ones. That’s because he has a narrowly-focused product line – stationary leather sofas and chairs imported from Italy – and it’s all in-stock in the company’s High Point warehouse.

“We’re down from last year like everybody else, but our percentage (decline) is not as big as most of the others,” said Davis. “We’re still opening six to eight new accounts per month.”

And the majority of those are smaller, independent retailers that will remain the backbone of Luke Leather’s business in the foreseeable future.

“Our floor placements are strong …and we’ll start to see lots of re-orders when things start to improve,” he said.