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COVER STORY
Now Showing . .
Windows, Floors and More opens a model showroom and looks
for big things to come.
Story by Howard Shingle
A $22 million a year
family business decides to take one of its more important departments
and give it its own separate space with the idea that it and the
parent company will both be better off. Good idea?
Jim Israels thinks so. He spent most of last year preparing Windows,
Floors and More, Grand Rapids, MI, to stand on its own. Now he’s
ready to see how well the idea will work.
The store has a lot going for it: a new showroom on a busy street
next door to the family business. Here Israels has brought together
only the best sellers: the top custom window coverings products,
floor coverings and custom bedding. It’s offered with the
industry’s top warranties and the kind of service customers
deserve for the price they are paying.
There’s one more thing Israels is relying on that’s
so important in custom window treatments: showing product.
ROOM TO BREATHE
Windows, Floors and More held its grand opening in late September
2005. It was the culmination of a hectic year of planning, designing
and renovation. “We acquired this building in January (2005),
and we didn’t know we were going to have a store in January
2006,” Israels says.
Israels purchased an existing building that he has completely remodeled
inside and out. The showroom is about 4,500 square feet with about
a quarter of the space dedicated to window treatments. The real
advantage to the space is how he displays products.
“Our window displays are actually on the windows,” Israels
explains. “When we designed the building we put large windows
all the way around the outer perimeter of the building so that we
can display product where people can easily walk inside and outside
of the building to look at windows for the curb appeal as well as
the interior.
“Our whole planning when we put this together was with the
idea that we would hang all of our products on the glass and not
have very many interior displays. This way people can see, like
for sunscreen, the way that the sunlight comes through them, how
much sun comes in—we’ve actually got them on a west-facing
window so that when they come in the summertime they can find out
what it’s going to be like in their home on the lake. It gives
customers an honest feel for what a window product can do. They
can also feel the difference on my cellular shades between the glass
and on the inside from the energy protection that they give. It’s
been amazing how well that has worked for my clients.”
Even with most sales completed in the customer’s home, Israels
cannot overstate the importance of his displays. “I show the
different qualities of the two-inch wood blinds starting with the
faux woods right on to the most expensive. I also have on display
the panel track from ADO.” Of special value are displays on
motorization and, particularly, motorization in plantation shutters.
The interior displays showcase Israels’ top suppliers: the
Mohawk Carpeting Color Center, which features Comfortex window coverings,
and the Hunter Douglas Alustra product line. But it’s the
Lafayette Interior Fashions window treatments that garner the most
interest. “Those are what encompasses all my exterior windows.
It’s probably the thing that most people that come in here
who are in the business say makes me the most unique in the field,”
Israels says. The window display is the thing Israels obviously
thought out and spent a lot of time on. He credits Charlie Kerrigan,
Leanna Samples, Marjorie Baal, Dick Leffert and, or course, Dennis
and Joe Morgan at Lafayette for their help.
What all the product lines offered at Windows, Floors and More have
in common is that they offer the best: best warranty, best delivery,
“the best sellers in all our product lines,” Israels
says. “We’re trying to deal with a quality, medium-
to high-end product that would be appealing to people on a busy
street.”
How busy? With 28th Street being the busiest street in Grand Rapids
and Grand Rapids being the second-largest city in the state, that
makes the road outside Windows, Floors and More one of the busiest
streets in Michigan.
“The walk up traffic here, the drive-up traffic, has been
great. Sometimes we get so many people in here we can’t even
handle it. The trick is to get to all of them and to make them feel
wanted, at home, because we are not a business that has anything
to do with stock. Everything has to be done custom,” Israels
says.
The genesis of Windows, Floors and More is the Israels family business,
Israels Designs for Living, a complete interior fashions store that
includes furniture and upholstery for to-the-trade, retail and contract
sales. “We have taken a department out of our design furniture
store, our gallery store, and placed it into a separate location
next door to the furniture store in order to let it stand on its
own and tap off from the traffic that we have in the furniture store,”
Israels says.
“We were in a position where we didn’t have enough of
one thing, and too much of another. By pulling it out of the main
store and giving it its own space, it allowed it to breathe,”
he says.
HAND-IN-HAND
Pulling window treatments, floor coverings and accessories into
its own space also allows Israels to offer a complete interior package
in a way that is helpful to all the customers the business wants
to attract.
“You don’t have people necessarily going to a furniture
store to buy window treatments,” Israels says. “On the
other hand, when they’re at the furniture store they discuss
that they need them. Having the department in the furniture store
could be good and it could be bad.” It could be bad, he explains,
because sometimes people are intimidated and don’t want to
walk into a furnishings store when all they want is to buy a window
blind. That would keep some business away. Those customers feel
more comfortable walking into Windows, Floors and More. The same
is true with carpeting.
“By keeping us separate, yet close, when they are doing the
whole package they see the need for window treatments. When those
people who are buying furniture need to buy a floor covering or
window covering product we’re right next door and that goes
hand-in-hand. That has worked very well.
“You start talking about their color palette. They’re
picking out a sofa, well, what’s the rug look like? They’re
likely going to have to replace it anyway. Well, maybe they’ll
want to go next door and look at carpeting . . . we even can go
so far as have them take one of our samples next door and say this
is the carpet I bought and that helps them pick their sofa out .
. .
“Add to that the fact that we do custom bedding and reupholstering.
The reupholstering ties into the window treatments because we do
a lot of upholstered cornice boards. Many times people like to have
their draperies and their furniture match, or we can do upholstered
headboards and things like that. That’s very much a part of
what we do here. There’s your ‘and More’ part
of the store.”
The “More” extends beyond product and into service as
well. Most sales are generated through Israels; his wife, Laurie;
and son, James. But Windows, Floors and More also works with outside
designers, like Israels’ daughter, Jennifer. Outside designers
can come in and put a plan together, and Israels can work out the
details. Windows, Floors and More becomes the contact for service.
THE YEAR AHEAD
The year 2006 will tell the tale for Windows, Floors and More. “This
is going to be our year to figure out which way it is that we’re
going to make this location successful,” Israels says. His
long-term goal is to open more stores like this one, possibly in
different areas, even different states.
Jim Israels’ background in the furnishings market is a definite
advantage for making a success out of this venture. He was born
into the furnishings business along with his brother and has been
in it all his life. Israels’ father came to the Grand Rapids
area in the 1950s working as an independent designer. He began different
small business and eventually incorporated in 1959. Since then,
it has continued to be a family-run business.
“Customers come in here because they know the Israels family
has been around Grand Rapids. If Jim Israels sells you something,
I’m going to take care of you for a long time. I’m honestly
going to give you service on the product. If you have a problem
years ahead, I’m going to make it right with you.”
But Windows, Floors and More has to be able to stand on its own.
“In order for this to be successful I cannot rely on what
the rest of the company is doing. I’m lucky to have that backing
me up, but if I’m going to make this operation successful
and clone it—find another location and do it again, then maybe
do it again and keep on doing it—I have to make this work.”
There are some unknowns. The housing industry, for example. There
has been a lot of new construction in the Grand Rapids area, but
that has slowed lately. Although everyone Israels works with has
a very positive outlook for the future, it’s still uncertain
how that will translate into sales. “We have an awfully lot
of inquiries on draperies,” Israels says. “People have
had blinds for so many years that they can’t quite get into
the cost of draperies. They’ve basically set their budgets
at what it would cost to cover all of their main living area windows
with mini-blinds. But I do see people moving toward the softness
of fabrics and the softness of draperies.”
“I have had a huge amount of interest [in panel track systems],
I just haven’t had a huge amount of sales, yet,” he
continues. “We’re sending a lot of quotes out! But woven
shades and panel track and plantation shutters and motorization
are the things that really have brought people in. They know that
I am one of the few people that display and show this type of product.”
He sees these product lines as becoming a big part of his business
throughout the year.
Then there is advertising. Currently, Windows, Floors and More piggybacks
its ads with those running with the design furniture store. Israels’
plan is to put together a more specific marketing program—through
his main suppliers—for this year.
In the meantime, the company is refreshing its Web site, anticipating
a larger role for it in the store’s marketing this year. “We
had a downtown location for years; it was our flagship store,”
Israels explains. “That was a basis for credibility for Israels’
company. People would see that old store and know that we had been
there for years and we would be around for many, many more. We use
the Web site the same way, as an embellishment for credibility at
this point. People can look at what we do and how we do it. We are
working this year on marketing programs that we can use the Web
site to promote. It’s like a star on our credibility.”
And there’s one more avenue Israels is prepared to explore:
seminars. It’s common, he says, for fabric, window coverings
and floor coverings representatives to come in to help keep designers
abreast of the latest products, styles, trends and installation
techniques. Israels, with the help of Jennifer, hopes to create
an active schedule of free seminars throughout 2006 presented to
gatherings such as church groups and parent-teacher groups to show
them design trends and provide them an “interesting day out.”
After a rough year preparing to open, Israels’ Windows, Floors
and More certainly has everything in place. “My store, hopefully,
will appeal to most everybody from the people who just want to buy
one blind to a whole houseful of window treatments and also are
looking for the coordination of their design program. The key ingredient
is having the product and the people who know what it’s all
about and how it’s done.”
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