Daily News Archive
Brought to you by Home Furnishings Business
October 2,
2008 by in UnCategorized 
By Home Furnishings Business in Furniture Retailing on October 2008
Connecticut interior designer Kat Burki announced on Thursday the grand opening of her flagship showroom, Kat Burki Home. Offering a full range of services, furniture and home accessories, the new showroom, located in Southport, Conn., will allow Burki to cater to the area’s high-end demographic.
“The premiere line is a culmination of my work as an interior designer,” Burki said. “I saw a major void in the home space when it came to finding luxurious furniture and home accents that reflected the grandeur of my clients’ homes, leading me to create original furniture designs. The new showroom is an extension of my services, allowing me to reach a larger audience in the community that has supported me throughout my design career, and to make my designs available to a larger audience.”
The two-story, 1,800-square-foot, colonial-style boutique, located at 35 Old Post Rd. in Southport, features a full range of upholstery, furniture, bedding, bath and accessories, all designed by Burki. The first floor showcases the full array of Kat Burki Home Bath and Bedding Collections while the second floor features the items from the Kat Burki Furniture Collection ranging from coffee tables covered in shagreen, sting ray skin, to chandeliers hand-made in their Paris workshop.
Each furniture item is handmade and carefully crafted, utilizing traditional methods of construction. The upholstery line is fully customizable from a selection of more than 200 fine materials including Kat Burki’s signature fabrics and prints. Customization requests are available within four weeks, and 16 weeks if from Paris.
October 1,
2008 by in UnCategorized
By Home Furnishings Business in on October 2008
New orders from retailers for residential furniture were down 17 percent in July compared to the same month last year, while factory shipments were off 10 percent. That’s according to the latest Furniture Insights survey of residential furniture manufacturers and distributors from the High Point accounting and consulting firm Smith Leonard.
The July decline in orders pushed the year-to-date orders to a 10 percent drop for the first seven months, up from a 9 percent decline through June and 8 percent through May.
For the month of July, approximately 77 percent of the participants reported declines in orders. Year-to-date, some 83
percent of the participants have reported lower orders compared to the same period last year.
Shipments in July were 19 percent below June. The decline from June is somewhat normal due to most companies taking vacation time around the July 4 holiday. Year-to-date, shipments are off over 8 percent. Year-to-date shipments were lower than the same period from last year for 83 percent of the participants, up from 81 percent last month.
Backlogs in July were 15 percent lower than last year at the same time, but fell only 1 percent from June levels.
Receivables were 7 percent lower than July 2007 levels, somewhat in line with the year-to-date sales decline of 8 percent,
but a bit lower than the 10 percent reduction in sales for the month.
“We continue to see news of more closings or bankruptcies at retail, so receivables need to be watched closely,” Smith Leonard Managing Partner Ken Smith said in a report on the survey.
Inventories were 4 percent lower than July 2007, the same result as June. Inventories did climb 2 percent from June levels. “Inventories will also need to be monitored closely considering the decline in orders,” Smith said.
The number of factory employees in July 2008 were 10 percent lower than July 2007 levels–the same as last month. The number of employees fell 1 percent from June levels.
Factory payrolls in July also were off 10 percent from July 2007. Factory payrolls were 21 percent lower than June payrolls,
but that is somewhat normal due to the July 4 holiday week.
“We almost decided not to write anything this month about the national scene as so much has happened since the information
was available for August data,” Smith said in his summary. “Yet, we decided to include the data at least for historical purposes. September 2008 will go down in history as a one of the worst from a financial institution standpoint. The U.S.
Treasury committed $200 billion to rescue Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They also committed to a $50 billion guaranty
program for money market mutual funds. The Federal Reserve committed to an $85 billion loan to AIG and the FDIC arranged for the bailout of Washington Mutual and the sale of Wachovia to Citigroup. ... Then the government suggested a $700 billion bailout legislation, which at the time of this writing, has not passed Congress.”
Smith also referred to stock market swings in the wake of the House of Representatives’ initial failure to pass bailout legislation, and gasoline shortages that have consumers “spooked.”
“The results for July were not good, and we do not expect August results to be much better based on most of the conversations we have had in the industry,” Smith said. “We did hear that some businesses noted a bit of improvement after Labor Day, but all the recent turmoil seems to have slowed some of the progress.”
October 1,
2008 by in UnCategorized
By Home Furnishings Business in Upholstery on October 2008
As California debates a new standard that would likely increase the use of flame retardant for some household products, a new report by a non-profit research organization finds that chemicals that were once used as a flame retardant for furniture are present in California homes—and in human bloodstreams—at far higher levels than other states.
Chemical ingredients of the flame retardant penta-BDE were found in the dust of California homes at four to 10 times the levels found elsewhere in the United States. The peer-reviewed study was published online in Environmental Science & Technology.
Penta-BDE production in the U.S. ended in 2004 following bans in several states including California. However, furniture treated with the chemical is still present in homes. The researchers also found double the amount of penta-BDEs in the blood of California residents compared to the nationwide average. The study was conducted by Silent Spring Institute in collaboration with the University of California Berkeley, Brown University, and Communities for a Better Environment, a California environmental justice organization. The PBDE study was funded by the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and the New York Community Trust.
“This study finds that if you live in California you are at far greater risk of exposure to penta-BDE flame retardants than if you live anywhere else in the country or the world,” said lead author Dr. Ami Zota, a scientist at Silent Spring Institute. “The health effects are of particular concern for babies, children, and pregnant women.”
The California legislature is now considering extending flammability standards to bed coverings and pillows, a change that could increase the use of flame retardant chemicals and materials the report’s authors call potentially toxic. The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) is also considering adopting fire standards for furniture and bed coverings.
In order to comply with California’s strict standards, furniture foam is now treated with chemicals other than the penta-BDE that was the focus of the study. The report’s authors say the chemicals now in use include tris(1,3-dichloro-2- propyl)phosphate (TDCP), which they label a probable human carcinogen.
The study compared dust samples collected from 49 homes in two California communities with 120 Cape Cod, Mass., homes, along with results from published home tests in Texas, Boston, Washington, D.C., Canada, the United Kingdom and Germany. The researchers also analyzed regional differences in human blood levels of PBDEs from more than 2,000 people in the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), a nationally-representative data set.
October 1,
2008 by in UnCategorized
By Home Furnishings Business in Upholstery on October 2008
Custom upholstery manufacturer C.R. Laine, Hickory, N.C., is the first company to achieve Sustainable by Design certification from the American Home Furnishings Alliance.
One of C.R. Laine’s first steps toward certification was to register its headquarters and manufacturing facility under AHFA’s environmental management system, EFEC (Enhancing Furniture’s Environmental Culture). EFEC requires a company to analyze and better understand the environmental impact of its processes, raw materials and finished products on a facility-by-facility basis. As a result of this analysis and subsequent improvements, C.R. Laine has made measurable environmental improvements over the past nine months, including:
• Reduced energy consumption by 8 percent.
• Reduced fresh water consumption by 5 percent.
• Reduced waste disposal costs by 20 percent through new alliances with local organizations for the recycling and repurposing of fabric, foam, cardboard, metal and wood scraps.
To attain Sustainable by Design certification, C.R. Laine was required to conduct a rigorous evaluation of its corporate environmental footprint, as well as its global climate impact. For each key area on a lengthy checklist, the company established numerical goals and a system for evaluating annual achievement and establishing new goals. These key areas include:
• Energy conservation, water conservation, recycling and solid/hazardous waste minimization.
• Use of low VOC/low HAP coatings, renewable fuels, certified lumber (minimum of 5 percent), low-emitting UF resins.
• Greenhouse gas emissions and carbon footprint.
In September, C.R. Laine’s documentation of the above systems and measures was audited by the Sustainable by Design Board of Examiners. The company also will be subject to an annual maintenance audit in order to maintain its certification.
“As a family-owned and operated company, we have always been committed to the preservation of the environment and community for future generations,” said C.R. Laine CEO and President Sonny Roseman Jr. “Our nine-month journey through the Sustainable by Design certification process provided us with a realistic structure for implementing sustainable business practices into our everyday processes. It has equipped us for a future of continuous environmental improvement.”
C.R. Laine now may include the “Sustainable by Design AHFA Certified” logo in its marketing materials. The company also will be promoted on AHFA’s consumer Web site,
www.findyourfurniture.com, in a new section designed to educate consumers about environmentally-friendly companies and products in the home furnishings industry.
“At the heart of EFEC is a corporate culture of conservation and environmental stewardship,” said Bill Perdue, AHFA vice president. “Sustainable by Design extends that culture throughout a company’s entire supply chain.”
October 1,
2008 by in UnCategorized
By Home Furnishings Business in Furniture Retailing on October 2008
Building on the success of a successful promotion that raises money to fight breast cancer, National Business Furniture, Milwaukee, Wisc., and its Officefurniture.com unit are selling pink chairs and donating 15 percent of the proceeds to breast cancer research.
The vivid pink chairs are being offered in the NBF catalog and Officefurniture.com Web site through the end of the year. In an expansion of the promotion, NBF is also offering a pink teacher’s stool that features a tablet arm and a pink round stool that is commonly used in medical offices. The program kicked off Wednesday to coincide with National Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
“The response from our customers to our pink chair program has been fantastic,” NBF President Kent Anderson said. “It’s fun to take an ordinary product like an office chair and turn it into something special. People love the idea of buying a pink chair because it’s unique and it helps a worthy cause.”