HIGH POINT — Upholstery manufacturers are thinking about numerous issues that will impact their business strategies for 2025 and beyond, inside the factory and outside of their control.
Nearly unanimously, industry executives expect the coming year to be an improvement over 2024, and many said they’ve used the past few months to plan for growth and expanded market share.
Jeff Arditti, president/CEO
Aria Designs
We’re looking forward to more consumers returning to the retail market, after the COVID purchasing boom, we feel there is truly a normal demand returning. We’re seeing great values in textiles, better price points for consumer offering better fabrics on more new frame styles.
Adding occasional tables allows our customers to flow together with upholstery.
We’re listening to leading retailers around the world as we also develop designs that are in step with color and style trends. We continue to rely on our representative team for input relating to new programs and collections.
Luke Zei, vice president of business and product development
Dorel Home
The easy answer for Dorel Home is “bigger look, smaller box,” and by that, I mean bigger in the context of both an aspirational look, as well as furniture that is true to scale. This is where we differentiate ourselves from the competition, including overseas, because most e-commerce sofas are small with seat depths of less than 20 inches.
We’re launching new item platforms, i.e. Novogratz Modular that has the 26-inch seat depth that is popular in the full-scale lounge seating in brick-and-mortar. We’re also going to flow the goods through the supply chain better and make it more economical for our e-commerce customers because we understand their business models and their thresholds for FedEx and UPS charges. We deliver them better product which ultimately results in better value.
The strength of Dorel in the upholstery category is also the quality of the product and the diversity of its brands. We can pull levers in terms of overall aesthetics, as well as fabric, whether we’re designing collections for Novogratz or Mr. Kate or Dorel Home. We’re focused on delivering value to the consumer, from delivering a style/trend that they aspire to at a lower price point to functionality that is meaningful to their daily lives.
But there’s one thing that we do that is quite different, and that is we develop strong seating platforms from an engineering perspective that are efficient for a factory to make and proven to flow through the supply chain more efficiently than what is out there. A recycled steel frame is more durable than a wood frame for a modular, and we can make designs look incredibly different, tweaking them for the different brands from farmhouse, to uber-modern — and a number of them will be in the High Point showroom — all off the same strong platform.
This approach enables us to get double on a container without taking inventory risks at a time when container rates are continuing to go up with turmoil in tariffs and duties. And again, this is the beauty of Dorel, because we have multiple solutions out of multiple countries that fulfill our customers’ needs in the upholstery category.
This gives us the ability to plan for different scenarios to make sure that we’ve got the right product in stock or shipping to them on time. We also have our own factories, including our Montreal facility which core is mattresses, and we are expanding its capability to do upholstery. We’re showing a few items at the market that showcase that domestic product as well.
Dennis Hendriks, vice president of operations, Americas
Eichholz
We improved and increased our N.C. warehouse, which now has 1,200 SKUs in our quick-ship program (in stock). We have a 150,000-square-foot warehouse that is set up to be able to scale up our business in the years to come by changing the layout of it and create super-efficient picking lines. We moved our team to our new office in the Bedrock building in High Point, which helped us to expand our office team.
In other words, we started working backwards by making sure that the foundation of our organization in the U.S. is ready to scale up year over year.
From there we added branded stores and shop-in-shops to increase our footprint and brand awareness. Since we added the Miami store in May 2023, we are gaining more interest from retailers and designers in the U.S. Clear examples and proof points are our recently opened stores in New York City (Manhattan) and Long Island. Next, we will open our West-Hollywood store in January 2025 after a complete reconstruction of that retail store. Another example will be six new shop-in-shops with Cabot House in Boston.
Overall, we see that the number of customers is still growing, our average order value is growing, and our percentage of recurring customers is growing. All positives in a challenging market.
Ernie Rockhill, president
Hi-Rock Home
The continued growth of our Recliner warehouse program. With seven all-leather recliners and hi-legs in two fresh colorways each, the Hi-Rock Home recliner Warehouse Program offers retailers of all sizes a domestic quick ship opportunity in addition to container direct value. Its breakout success gave us the confidence to open an additional showroom in the design center D701 with a selection of additional styles slated for spring 2025.
We design all products ourselves and build them in a factory that focuses on quality and originality; nothing is off the shelf. This gives us a demonstrable styling advantage that can elevate a retailer’s entire motion section. People aspire to nicer things, and we develop products to meet that desire.
Our strength is not only in our ability to source the top leathers available, but in leather-to-frame applications. We offer a range of selections to suit the needs of the modern consumer. From rustic anilines to traditional hand-finished leathers to family friendly patterns, hi-rock home knows good leather value and we seek to offer our customers the best assortment in a good, better, best range.
Gabriele Natale, president
Manwah
New groups will cover all segments — good/better/best — and emphasis on casual contemporary with immersive sound integration. The new groups address voids and highlight new trends.
Tim Newlin, president/CEO
Norwalk Furniture
On-trend style, motion, swivel, lounge and curves that you can’t wait to relax in, with fabrics to deliver any lifestyle.
Adrian Parker, CEO
Temple Furniture/Parker Southern/Mantle Furniture
Our customers have been asking for soft, hi-low and quality textures. To answer that need we are so excited to introduce a new premium fabric collection of higher end solids. Our new “Bespoke” collection will be available on all styles including our DYO collections. The fabrics retail at $45/yard.
Robin Hoff, senior vice president of upholstery merchandising
Theodore Alexander
Our seating story is so important to our brand as it allows us to reach customers who value both form and function in their living space. This direction gives Theodore Alexander an opportunity to blend contemporary styling alongside our classic offerings while ensuring that comfort is never compromised.
You’ll see Theodore Alexander is also incorporating technology to allow our customers to visualize the furniture in their space prior to purchase on our configurator.
To support our pillars of style and comfort, we’ve invested in re-branded marketing materials to present a more modern and stylish brand image. Our end game is to provide a cohesive and stylish product with an amazing seating experience within each of our upholstery brands.
Rick Lovegrove, vice president upholstery
Universal Furniture
We always lead with design at Universal, but it felt important to really support our retail and design partners this market by significantly increasing our stock levels for the fall season and focusing on speed-to-market for both of our business channels.
In addition to an increased commitment to inventory, Universal dealers have the flexibility to buy as they need out of the N.C. warehouse and the Vietnam factory, whether it be from a single piece at a time, to flexible and mixable truck loads out of High Point, and the rare ability to flow direct containers with a product mix of case goods, bedroom and upholstery our of our Vietnam facility.
We are excited to launch for the first time, a fashion-forward and domestically made accent chair program and stocked sofa program out of our Conover plant. An expertly curated six-chair and four-sofa assortment, all domestically made, will be stocked in North Carolina in classic modern textures for immediate shipment, as well as offered for special order in a selection of our best-selling covers.
Taylor Helson, merchandiser and marketing coordinator
Violino USA Ltd.
In all of the trending motion subgroups, we find ourselves most excited for the pursuit of motion that can find itself in anyone’s living space. We like the challenge of going after the customer that has previously sworn off motion. We’ve heard every reason or excuse why one would not want motion, and time after time, we have converted that mindset.
Our motion category continues to expand in several different ways, and our product development team is to thank for that. They really are top-of-the-line when it comes to innovation and execution. We have always tried to stay on the front end of design, style and comfort and as we continue to do that, we find that we are able to create that excitement for retailers and consumers.
Over the past few years, as a company, we have seen our motion category expand and advance tremendously. We have continuously pushed the envelope in motion comfort and style, and I think we have landed ourselves in a new and exciting level of motion goods. We are super excited to introduce our retailers to this new level in Q4 and Q1.
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