Tales From the Sales Floor

June 30, 2006  by in UnCategorized   

By Home Furnishings Business in Customer Service on July 2006 Home Furnishings Business asked some furniture retail salespeople to share their stories in the hope that their experiences might offer insights on dealing with customer dissatisfaction.

We talked with sales associates from three retailers representing a variety of store types and geographic regions: an independent retailer in the Northwest, a North Carolina “big box” and a contemporary specialist in the Mid-Atlantic.

Retail sales staff represent the front line of overcoming consumer objections and dealing with problems. Not surprisingly, a common thread emerges from these three stories—the need for clear and ongoing communication with consumers.

If you’d like “Tales From the Sales Floor” to be a regular feature in the magazine, e-mail Senior Editor Powell Slaughter at pslaughter@napco.com.

Be prepared to help out with your sales staff’s own stories.

As a publication for and about furniture retailers, the thought is that our readers will benefit from the object
lessons their colleagues have to share.

Here’s a lesson where a store owner backed up a sales associate in need of support with a problematic order.

Sherry Needles has been a sales and design consultant at Furnitureland South in Jamestown, N.C., for 16 years, and her husband, Todd, for 18 years. A graduate of High Point University’s home furnishings marketing program, Needles has rung up at least $1 million in sales every year.

Three years ago, Needles received an e-mail through Furnitureland South’s Web site from a potential customer who wanted to completely furnish a new 12,000-square-foot home in New Jersey. The wife, who was six months pregnant at the time, her husband, mother-in-law and two children, ages one year and two-and-a-half, spent all day at the store for a week, and ended up placing an order for around $300,000.

Part of the package was for a large outdoor kitchen and patio, and when the furniture arrived a granite table top for that area was broken.

“When one of those big stone tops comes through the warehouse, we typically don’t open that carton unless something’s obviously suspicious,” Needles said. “The suppliers use impeccable cartoning for that type of piece, and you stand a better chance of damaging it if you open it, inspect it, and re-pack it.”

Typically, the retailer opens and inspects around 90 percent of the goods coming through the warehouse, with the exceptions being items such as those stone tops where tampering with packaging can increase the chance of damage.

Furnitureland South ended up sending three granite tops in all—all arrived at the customer’s home broken—before the customer decided to go with another table.

“She also chose new chairs, and when I called the vendor, I was told the finish and fabric had been discontinued, but they assured me we could still get what my customer wanted,” Needles said. “When the chairs got to the customer, the fabric was the same pattern, but it was blue instead of taupe, and the finish was nothing like the original.”

The manufacturer “was not cooperative,” Needles recalled. Furnitureland South eventually bit the bullet on $15,000 worth of patio furniture for the customer and started over. Fortunately, winter had arrived, and the family wouldn’t be using the patio a lot anyway.

“I’m from New Jersey myself, so we’d developed a good rapport from the get-go,” she said. “They were very patient, and we let them keep the furniture that was there so they’d have something to use. They were understandably angry, but they didn’t blame Furnitureland South or me. I was more of a sounding board for them to vent.”

Furnitureland South ended up doing an in-home exchange.

“What I did, which I’d never done before, I went directly to Mr. Harris (Furnitureland South’s founder Darrell Harris), and said, ‘I need your help,’” Needles said. Harris and Needles worked with the customer and supplier to resolve the issue.

“My sales manager and I went to the warehouse before the last delivery to make sure every piece—30 pieces of outdoor furniture—was right,” Needles said. “We personally uncartoned and inspected every single piece.”

It was a happy ending.

“That customer has since ordered more furniture from us, and they’ve referred a number of people to me,” Needles said. “Their neighbor bought 16 barstools from me.”

Mike Orr, a sales associate at Gates Home Furnishings in Grants Pass, Ore., represents his family’s fourth generation in the business. Orr has been at Gates for 13 years. With strong back-up in the warehouse, and even a lot of the floor not nailed down, Gates has been highlighting same- and next-day delivery.

That comes at a price for customers, though, and that raises a common objection for Orr.

“My biggest problem with customers is that we had free delivery for what seemed like forever,” Orr said, noting that Gates Home Furnishings has been in business for 60 years.

In the past year, though, Gates instituted a $49 fee for regular delivery, $59 for next-day; and $69 for same-day delivery on orders closed before 2 p.m. for customers in Josephine and Jackson counties, Oregon.

Issues arose, Orr said, when long-time customers complain about delivery prices—it’s not much of a problem with more recent arrivals.

“I’ve had people who moved up from California tell me they can’t believe that’s all we’re charging for delivery,” he said. “We have customers who’ve been coming here for decades, though, and we’ll give a discount for seniors, a $20 flat rate. Those delivery charges are a lot more of an issue for our older, long-time customers.”

Another policy that allays customers’ objections to delivery fees is that Gates offers a two-week in-home “trial period” for delivered goods. Communication on the promotional end also has helped, Orr said.

“We lay out very clearly in our ads what the expectations are,” he said.

Fees for upholstery protection programs are another common objection Orr encounters on a regular basis. Gates Home Furnishings has effectively overcome that buy offering a store credit for unused fabric protection.

“If they haven’t used that protection plan after two years, they get a store credit for what they spent,” Orr said.

Consumer misunderstanding of industry-speak can lead to problems—after all, what in heck is an occasional table? Upholstery is another term that can cause confusion for those outside the furniture business.

If a consumer sees an upholstered dining chair that’s part of what the industry calls a “case goods” collection, they still see a piece of upholstered furniture.

Cameron Poindexter has worked in sales for nine months at La Difference in Richmond, Va., which sells contemporary home furnishings out of a 45,000-square-foot showroom. While still fairly new to the business, she got a first-hand look at how consumers and the furniture industry sometimes don’t speak the same language.

“There’s a particular customer that seeks us out; here in Richmond, we really rely a lot on word of mouth, so you want people to have a good experience,” Poindexter said. “Two guys had decided to create a home for themselves. The first time they shopped our store they didn’t buy. We’re constantly sowing seeds, and they’d received a card in the mail that was promoting our upholstery being on sale.”

The customers picked out a pair of upholstered dining chairs, and balked when they discovered the items weren’t part of the store’s sale on upholstery.

“I was able to talk to our buyer, and she offered 10 percent off on those upholstered dining chairs,” Poindexter said. “Seventy-two hours later, they changed their minds to a leather dining chair. The buyer gave me a resounding ‘No’ on a discount.”

The customers were ready to walk.

“They were pretty upset at that point,” Poindexter said. “They were going to pull their entire sale because the buyer wouldn’t agree to 10 percent off on the dining chairs they wanted.”

It was a tense couple of days, but the sale went through. Poindexter understood her customers’ feelings, though.

“You can’t expect people to understand the language of the furniture industry,” she said. “It’s really important to educate consumers about the language of furniture, and making sure they understand what we’re telling them.” HFB