You’ve moved into a charming vintage 3rd-floor walkup and have picked the perfect sofa for your living room. But, now you’re worried that despite your careful measurements, the sofa may not make all the turns of your build- ing’s narrow stairwell or your doorway.
Furniture manufacturers at the recent International Home Furnishings Market, a twice-a-year unveiling of new furniture lines from about 2,000 manufacturers, showed there’s no longer a reason to put yourself through the worry of delivery or the expense of a $1,000-plus sofa.
Furniture companies under Masco Home Furnishings’ umbrella (Drexel Heritage Furnishings, Lineage Home Furnishings, Lexington Fur- niture Industries and BenchCraft Furniture) introduced ready-to-assemble upholstered sofas, chairs and love seats as an option.
These unassembled upholstery lines made their debut in fashionable looks that defy the defi- nition of ready-to-assemble (also known as RTA) furniture. Showing no kinship to the square, flat, boxy looks long associated with RTA products, the unassembled sofas, chairs and love seats come in curvaceous forms with soft, cushy seats and backs.
Modestly priced at $399 to $799, the upholstered furniture features skirted bottoms, tufted backs, rolled arms and bun or tapered wood feet. Cotton or cotton-blend fabrics come in about two dozen colors and patterns.
“Before, when furniture companies introduced something new in upholstered products, there was maybe a new cushion here and there to see, new fabric patterns in upholstery lines, but this is genuinely new,” says Randy Huff, director of upholstery merchandising at Drexel Heritage Furnishings. “Nothing like this has ever been seen before.”
These new RTA lines also made their debut with the promise of being easy to assemble–something people have heard many times before. But just maybe, this time, there’s something to it.
“It’s a lot like putting together a large puzzle that has a few pieces,” says Huff. “It stays together until you decide you want to take it apart and move it somewhere else.”
For example, sofas come in three boxes and no tools are needed for assembly.
Visitors to the Drexel showroom watched the clock as Huff demonstrated the ease of putting together a sofa within 10 minutes.
The young and the mobile
Linda Jones, executive consultant and director of marketing at Masco Home Furnishings, says RTA upholstered pieces are mobile and designed to reach a broad range of consumers.
Jones says these new upholstered lines are geared toward the young, mobile consumer furnishing a home or apartment for the first time, consumers who frequently relocate and the mature consumer who is shopping for a second sofa to add to the family room or home office.
“This consumer is a very value-conscious consumer,” Jones says. “This person has an eye toward style and flexibility in furniture and adaptability. The fact (these upholstered styles) can be assembled or disassembled is a nice feature, but also meets the needs of the consumer who is looking for a well-constructed sofa that has a strong steel frame and extra density in the foam for comfort.”
The RTA market, which largely consists of stereo cabinets, television stands, entertainment centers, desks, bookcases, microwave carts and computer tables, is the fastest growing segment of the U.S. residential furniture industry. Its sales have more than doubled in the last seven years from $700 million in 1986 to $1.45 billion in 1993, making RTA about 8 percent of the $18 billion furniture industry, according to a recent report by the investment firm Wheat First Butcher Singer Inc. in Richmond, Va.
“A large portion of this growth represents our increasingly mobile and flexible workforce with RTA products meeting the needs created by home computers, the home office and home entertainment centers,” says Christopher Rusbuldt, associate vice president and research analyst at Wheat First.
Rusbuldt says consumers are choosing RTA instead of traditional, more expensive, factory-assembled furniture because of its increased versatility, great design and value.
“People are shopping very hard on price points right now,” says Huff. “We (Drexel) wanted to be in a position to offer this price choice to consumers.”
Kathy Davis, Lexington’s director of marketing, says the options of upholstered RTA lines actually grow with consumers’ needs.
“You can add a sleeper unit to your unassembled sofa,” notes Davis. “In the past, if you needed a sleeper, you ditched the old sofa and bought a new sleeper sofa. With these sofas, you can add a sleeper unit by going to a store that sells them and put the unit in yourself.”
What’s in a name?
While the unassembled upholstered line seems to be problem-free, there is one sore point among manufacturers. They are not thrilled with its moniker-ready-to-assemble.
“One of the misperceptions of ready-to-assemble is that it is boxy, inexpensive and, well, cheap-looking,” says Davis. “Here, (Lexington Furniture Industries) we don’t refer to the unassembled line as ready-to-assemble or RTA because of the cheap, low-end connotation attached to it. We call it `modular upholstery.’ “
What’s in a name is also important to those who analyze the trends in the RTA industry.
John Baugh, managing director for Wheat First, concedes the ready-to-assemble name-once called “knock downs”-is due for an overhaul.
For many years, says Baugh, RTA products were viewed negatively by traditional furniture manufacturers because of the products’ poor quality and design.
But, Baugh says, “technological advancements, primarily in manufacturing and design, have improved the appearance and quality of the furniture.
Most RTA furniture is made of particleboard, which is molded fixtures of sawdust and glue coated with laminated, printed paper that gives the effect of various wood grains. Higher-priced RTA pieces are made of hardwood, but RTA manufacturers still use inexpensive raw materials compared to that of assembled furniture, according to a recent RTA report by Wheat First.
Jerry Eppersom, an independent analyst who tracks the RTA industry, says the Houston-based Bombay Company, which sells ready-to-assemble replicas of antique furnishings, has also helped elevate RTA’s reputation.
“I think we’re going to see more RTA in the form of an `a la Bombay’ look,” he says. “Companies are coming out with products that are not only easier to assemble but also look good. It’s not just something you put in a spare bedroom or den. It looks good enough for your living room.”
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Chicago-area stores that will carry the RTA upholstered lines in the fall include Plunkett Furniture Co. stores; Spiegel Inc., the mail-order home and fashion catalog based in Downers Grove; 800-345-4500; and J.C. Penney Co. Inc. stores.
