Daily News
From Home Furnishing Business
Bassett Conference Takes a Service Turn
June 6,
2014 by in Community / Charitable Support, Industry 
Bassett Furniture turned its annual retail conference in Newton, N.C. into an afternoon of service.
Tuesday afternoon, Bassett dispersed almost 200 employees into North Carolina’s Catawba County. After being given matching t-shirts and handed cans of paint, tape measurers and tools, Bassett store managers, regional managers and licensee partners from across the country were surprised by an announcement from the company’s CEO, Robert H. Spilman Jr., who split them into groups and sent them out into the surrounding community, along with large trucks loaded with new Bassett furniture.
Eight non-profit organizations within a 12-mile radius of Bassett’s upholstery plant in Newton are settling into their new and improved spaces. The recipients of the company’s labor and thousands of dollars in new furniture included a fire station, a school for children with special needs, a city park, a shelter for homeless youth, an emergency shelter for battered women, a rape crisis center, a women’s resource center and a charity that provides transitional housing for homeless families.
“We’re honored to be able to invest our time and talent into helping the communities in which we do business, and we can’t think of a better way to celebrate our 50th anniversary in Newton where we employ almost 500 local residents,” said Jason Camp, senior vice president of retail at Bassett Furniture Industries. Earlier this week, Bassett completed an extensive makeover of its upholstery facility in Newton where it manufactures all of its HGTV Home Design Studio upholstery and 60 percent of what the company sells in the United States.
In addition to labor and design consulting services, Bassett donated tens of thousands of dollars in new furnishings. This afternoon of service is the latest installment in Bassett’s new Make(over) a Difference initiative which furthers the company’s commitment to creating fresh living spaces for charitable organizations that serve the communities where they operate. Before a Bassett Furniture retail store opens for business, the store’s manager and design team is tasked with planning a surprise makeover for a local non-profit. Since October, Bassett has opened seven new stores and donated hundreds of service hours and more than $76,000 in new furniture to help transform these deserving organizations. Next up is the company’s grand opening in Rockville, Md., scheduled later this month.
In April, Bassett launched a Community Impact page on its Web site where the makeovers are documented.