When clients evaluate high-impact sale companies, there is a lot to consider.  One critical consideration is;  What will be left at the end?  Does the promoter “Guarantee” a broom-clean store?

In most of our programs, Planned Furniture Promotions has the ability to offer our clients a 100% “Broom Clean Facility.”  This means that every single piece will be sold or removed as required by the real estate lease, thus giving our client peace of mind and a clean slate.   In many states, the sales are limited to a certain window of opportunity to conduct an event.  When that window closes, no remaining goods can be sold.  We frequently hear about sales run by dealers or other companies that don’t sell all of the dealers original inventory, leaving the dealer in a very difficult situation, with few choices, and subject to significant losses on their original inventory.

These are before and after photos of facilities that were operated by PFP (Planned Furniture Promotions).  As you can see, every piece sold.

Fully stocked store throughout the event!

PFP Delivers a "Broom Clean" facility after the event!

The situation described above is common in liquidation sales today.  You get one-shot at success, trust the professionals at PFP.

Clint Engel — Furniture Today, April 12, 2012

RICHMOND, Va. — …………………………………..

RoomStore has been reorganizing under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection since its filing in December.

The bankruptcy court here approved a deal Wednesday to sell the retailer’s 10 remaining Texas stores to Seffner, Fla.-based Rooms To Go in a transaction valued at at least $2 million. RoomStore will need to file a separate motion to sell certain related customer information, the court said.

RTG CEO Jeff Seaman told Furniture/Today his company will hire Planned Furniture Promotions to run liquidation sales at the RoomStores in Temple and Waco, Texas, while RTG will handle closing sales for the remaining eight stores in the greater Dallas area. He said it’s too early to say how many of the stores the retailer will eventually convert to Room To Go.

The move will leave RoomStore with 28 stores in Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia.

Planned Furniture Promotions, Inc. (PFP) announced the addition of retail furniture veteran JR Diffee, the long-time President of Colony House Furniture, an upscale furniture showroom in Arlington, Virginia. JR joins PFP as its High End Event Consultant and will advise upscale retailers on how to use high-impact events to rejuvenate or reinvent their retail sales strategies.

Under JR’s stewardship, Colony House was widely recognized as one of the finest design-oriented retailers on the East Coast, as well as a company that consistently ranked among the top dealers of lines like Baker, Henredon and Hickory Chair. With an education and vast work experience in sales, marketing and insurance, JR joined his family’s business in 1985 and was appointed its president in 1991. JR successfully led the company in that role until last year when an offer was made on the company’s real estate. JR selected PFP—the leading specialist in high-impact, promotional furniture sales events—to conduct Colony Houses’ highly successful store closing sale.

After working with JR at the store closing sale, PFP’s team was highly impressed with his management and sales experience as well as his business and strategic acumen, and immediately asked him to join its team. “The high-end retailers have been some of the hardest hit by the economic downturn and many are in need of financial assistance,” said Tom Liddell, senior vice president, PFP. “We’ve successfully assisted many of the nation’s most well-known high-end retailers. JR has an intimate knowledge of their concerns and needs and will certainly be a huge asset in working with these clients”, Liddell added

JR is currently on the Board of Directors for the Arlington County Chamber of Commerce and is involved in the Leadership Arlington organization. He enjoys hiking, cycling and playing golf, and is a member of Congressional Country Club. JR is married and has four children.

PFP is a leading specialist in conducting high impact, promotional furniture retail sales. The company is responsible for developing and executing record-breaking premium store events for independent retailers including; Sussan’s in the Houston area, Bruno’s in Oklahoma City, Kornmeyers in Baton Rouge, Liberty in Jacksonville, Mastercraft Interiors in MD & VA, Homestead House in CA, Hitchcock Chair in CT along with others, such as Porter’s in Racine and Gabbert’s events in Texas. They’ve also handled many of the major-chain furniture liquidation sales in the U.S., including those for Wickes, Huffman Koos, Rhodes, Rosa’s and recently with RoomStore’s Texas outlets.

To learn more about Planned Furniture Promotions, please visit www.pfpromotions.com

by David McMahon, published by and for WHFA (Western Home Furnishings Association). Reposted with permission.

The slowing economy, as in many cases like this, was only one factor. In fact, in this case there was only a modest sales decline relative to similar businesses. The primary factor for their demise was an outright failure to be a student of their business.

Their family had grown so there were more people to support. Between the various brothers, sisters, sons, daughters, and cousins, there were multiple people who relied on the business to pay for their mortgages and feed their families. On top of this, there was no clear leader. Every decision had to go through a sort of unanimous voting process. This slowed their speed to react and innovate. And the decisions that were made were often times on issues that were not of any great benefit to the business. They wasted time. It got so bad that there was one argument amongst the brothers and sisters on who was supposed to put the toilet paper in the bathrooms! They had little time to focus on what counted. They only tracked written sales. All the other critical measures were ignored.

Eventually they decided to take on debt to finance their growing accounts payable. They tried mass event sales to blow out their inventory. They were just able to break even. They repeated this strategy of refinancing debt and big event sales. Eventually they became insolvent. This meant that they could not pay for their short term obligations. Minimal profitability, missing sales goals, and rising debt put the nail in their coffin. Bankrupt.

Unfortunately, stories like this are far too common. If this company had a leader and a team who knew what red flags to look for and took action soon enough, they would have survived. In this article I’m going to show you the red flags to look for. If you keep your eyes on these, you will greatly improve your chances of success and you will be able to take corrective measures sooner. With you as a decisive leader of your capable team, your cash flow potential can be maximized.

• Sales to Plan.
  Sales drive everything. Your plan is your realistic projection of sales or your budget. It is also t dollar amount needed to produce your required profitability and cash flow. To calculate this, take your actual monthly sales and divide by monthly sales on your budget (your pro plan). For example, if sales were $550,000 and planned sales were $525,000, then sales to plan is 105 percent. This should be checked monthly, quarterly, and year-to-date each month Repeated under performance of sales to plan (under 100 percent) signifies either performance issues with sales or a budget that needs to be adjusted in its entirety.
• Profitability.
  This is the ultimate source of all cash It is sales minus all your expenses. To view as a percent, divide that number by sales. No operation can operate with a loss for very long and few can operate at average profitability (2-4 percent) and grow their business. Alternatively, healthy profitability (7 percent+) enables growth through reinvestment of equity into the business. This investment leads to expansion and takes the form of technology, train capital investment, merchandise lines, and human talent. Paying out all the profit to shareholders does little for the future of business. It is important to note that profitability needs to be consistent to really make a difference. It should be checked each month on certifiably correct financials b for the month and year-to-date.
• Quick Ratio.
  Also called the acid test ratio. It is a measure of the liquidity that you have in your business. It calculated by taking your current assets, less your inventor divided by your current liabilities. An even ratio of 1 is so Anything under .5 means your business may be in a dang area. Companies with very low quick ratios are at risk of insolvency.
• Cash to Current Payables.
  This measures your ability to pay for your immediate responsibilities. It largely indicates whether you can honor your short term loans from your vendors. The importance of this is critical to continue uninterrupted flow of goods. Many companies in the last few years have shut their doors because their vend simply stopped shipping. Track this monthly and seek to b consistently above 25 percent. Anyone under 15 percent is probably struggling to make ends meet and are most likely dipping into lines of credit.
• GMROI.
  Gross margin return on inventory. All your cash comes from selling inventory, right? And if you sell your inventory faster or carry less of it, you generate cash faster, right? That’s what GMROI is-the ultimate measure of your operations effectiveness at creating dollars! Figure this by annualizing your gross margin dollars and dividing by your average or current inventory on hand. Do it every month without fail. Seek to continually improve this number overall. I call a $2 GMROI a break-even GMROI and a $2.5+ GMROI an “in the money” GMROI.
• Inventory to Sales.
  This flag is your key to controlling new buying. Purchasing should follow sales results or realistic forecasts. You all know what could happen if you go to market and you buy without a plan. Only a certain percent of the new merchandise sells; the rest sits in stagnation. Obviously, invoices become due for that inventory whether it sells or not. Timing and the amount you spend on new merchandise is everything. In fact, most of the businesses that have gone out in the last few years were overbought when the economy was good. That’s why they could not weather the storm. Figure your inventory to sales by taking your average or current inventory that is in your possession and divide it by your annualized sales. I’ve been in the analyzing and advising business for over a decade and have never seen a profitable and growing business operate consistently above 20 percent. I call 15-17 percent the “sweet spot”. Faster turning categories such as bedding or appliances can be even less. Only purchase new merchandise if inventory to sales is in the “sweet spot” range.
• Gross Margin.
  How much money do you have left to pay for all operating costs and make a healthy profit after you deduct your cost of goods and freight from the sale of your merchandise? That is your gross margin. Figure as a percent each month and year-to-date by dividing by your sales. In retail furniture and bedding, most operations have two options, in my opinion: be above 46 percent or below 42 percent. The reason relates to sales volume and turns. There is just very little economies of scale with small and medium sized businesses. Fixed operating costs can eat profits unless the margin is appropriate. Unless you have a killer deal on rent and a great location, a store doing under $5 million will find it difficult to operate at under 46 percent margin on their financial statements. Alternatively, for example, a store with sales of over $20 million could operate at a lower margin and be a low cost seller and still be decently profitable. Below is profit matrix of where cash is typically made with respect to gross margin and turns. Avoid the “death zone”.
• Operating Costs.
  These are all the costs that you incur each month after your cost of goods. You should set target percentages of sales by department in your master budget so that you can avoid expense profit erosion. The commonly tracked departments in your operating budget are: administration, occupancy, selling, marketing, service, warehouse, delivery, and finance. Overall high profit operations seek to be under 38 percent. Be a student of your business. Watch for the red flags. That is the first step on your road to achieving a healthier cash flow position. It is the first step in giving your business longevity whatever your sales volume is. It is difficult to improve what you don’t track so doing this will help. The next step is to take the right decisive actions at the right time. The slowing economy, as in many cases like this, was only one factor. In fact, in this case there was only a modest sales decline relative to similar businesses. The primary factor for their demise was an outright failure to be a student of their business.

Those devoted customers were left reeling when the couple announced last month that the sprawling, five-building furniture store, Larry’s Furniture, would close its doors at the end of the summer.

“We’ve been thinking about it for years; we’re both way past the age (when we could have retired),” said Larry Jones, now 88. “So this year we finally decided that we should stop.”

Their ages, along with the slow economy, helped them make the decision to close the store.

Now they’re using a months-long retirement sale to liquidate some of the merchandise — and more importantly, to give old friends and customers another chance to stop in and visit at the store that anchored downtown Winder and helped turn their houses into homes.

“It breaks my heart that they’re not able to keep on,” said JoAnn Morgan, a longtime customer who has never bought furniture from any other store. “Winder won’t be the same without this store. … I don’t know what Winder is going to do without them.”

Larry's occupies an entire city block with 5 buildings

Jones has been a part of the downtown business landscape since the late 1940s when he started a job managing the Easy Pay Tire Store after coming home from World War II. He was able to buy that store in 1948, two years after marrying Dot.

The couple renamed the store Larry’s Easy Pay Tire Store, and they soon expanded from affordable tires to home goods and appliances and, for a time, even sold Honda motorcycles. They opened Larry’s Furniture

in 1965 on North Broad Street.

Dot, always a fashion plate, loved furniture. When they started looking for a new venture, she began bringing pieces from Atlanta and dressing some of the store windows with furniture displays, Larry Jones said.

Her initiative helped the business grow into a five-building juggernaut that went head-to-head with big-box stores for years without flinching, he said.

Their secret to growing their business was that they loved working together, stayed involved in every aspect of the business and provided excellent service, Jones said.

“Our customer relations have always been excellent,” he said. “We’ve always tried to do the right thing for the right reasons.”

That slogan meant helping customers find what they needed at a price they could afford and generally treating everyone well, said Tommy Jennings, president of the Barrow County Chamber of Commerce and a longtime friend of the Joneses.

Jones even treated his competitors well, helping other furniture and home-goods merchants set up shop.

“They have just been the anchor of downtown Winder for so many years,” Jennings said. “He’s just a part of the fabric of the community who should never be forgotten.”

That won’t happen, said Morgan, the longtime customer. Almost every house in Barrow County has a couch or a dining room table that carries memories of the store with it, she said.

“It’s been an exciting journey for us,” Jones said. “We’re now doing business with the children and the grandchildren of our oldest customers. The older ones are gone, but the family still comes by when they need a piece of furniture or just to say hello.”

Bob Kaufman, Gene Rosenberg & Paul Cohen

The 24th Annual Bob’s Golf Outing at the Tunxis Plantation Country Club in Farmington, Conn., was followed by a dinner event, awards ceremony and auctions at The Farmington Club.

“This has become an annual tradition, and we’re so pleased with the turnout by our business partners and friends because the nonprofit organizations that will be helped by the event need it more than ever,” said Gene Rosenberg, co-founder of Planned Furniture Promotions and Bob’s Discount Furniture. “We’re truly gratified by the generosity of all of those supporting this year’s event.”

Planned Furniture Promotions Honors Customer Deposits

 Buffalo, NY, December 23, 2010 –-  Rosa’s Home Store, a leading home furnishings appliance and electronics retailer operating four stores in Western New York since 1981, filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection on December 9, 2010 in the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Western District of New York.  As a result of Tuesday’s bankruptcy hearing, the company will begin Going-Out-Of-Business/Bankruptcy Liquidation sales managed by the foremost furniture event company, Planned Furniture Promotions, Inc.

All customer deposits made prior to the Chapter 11 filing will be honored. “This was the most important aspect of the bankruptcy filing”, said Dean Rallo, president, Rosa Home Store. “Rosa’s didn’t want this bankruptcy to negatively impact our loyal customers, so we worked very closely with our legal team and the bankruptcy court to put our customers first.” Store customers with open orders will receive instructions for completing their orders.   

 “We’re proud to have been chosen by Rosa’s, an institution in the community, to assist the company in this difficult time,” said Tom Liddell, senior vice president of Planned Furniture Promotions. “We look forward to assisting Rosa’s complete the many customer orders that were placed prior to the Bankruptcy filing and conducting a sale that  will benefit the company, its vendors and creditors, and many local customers.”

Rosa’s Home Store operates three locations in Buffalo and one store in Niagara Falls, a region of the country that has been in economic decline for three decades.    The stores will be closed for a short period, to complete an inventory and prepare for the liquidation, followed by the public sale early next year.

Will Resume Role with Executive Team

ENFIELD, CT—Planned Furniture Promotions, Inc. (PFP) welcomes back Mark Bannon as Sr. Vice President of Sales.

Bannon rejoins PFP’s executive team, which includes industry veterans Roy Hester, Sr. Vice President, Sales; Burt Homonoff, Sr. Vice President, Merchandising & Operations; and Tom Liddell, Sr. Vice President Sales and Marketing. Resuming his role as Sr. Vice President, Sales, Bannon will work with the executive team as well as Regional Managers Andrew Winans and Eric Rowles to coordinate details for client events.

With over 35 years of experience in the sale promotion and retail furniture business nationwide, Bannon’s responsibility includes interfacing with PFP clients and formulating marketing plans for retail client promotional events.

“Mark’s substantial experience and long history of producing successful results is widely recognized in the industry and is why he is regarded as such a valuable member of our team,” says Gene Rosenberg, co-owner, Planned Furniture Promotions. “We can count on Mark to deliver his essential expertise, energy and passion to every project and retail event which will prove highly beneficial to our clients.”

 PFP is a leading specialist in conducting high impact, promotional furniture retail sales, having partnered with clients on major furniture liquidation sales in the U.S., including those for Levitz, Wickes, Huffman Koos and Rhodes. The company is also responsible for developing and executing record breaking events for independent retailers Oskar Huber in Pa. and N.J.; Michael’s, Boise; Direct Furniture, Clarksville; along with premium stores such as Kornmeyers, Baton Rouge; Porter’s, Racine and Gabbert’s events in TX.

When you invest in a stock, you look for indicators that your investment will increase in value.  Once you make your purchase, what if that stock tumbles and shows no real signs for recovery, what would you do?  Or better, what if it goes up and looks like it will continue to increase in value?  The answers to these questions are simple.  If the stock has looks solid, you keep it.  If it has no promise of increasing its value, you would sell it, probably without a second thought.   Then you would look for a better investment.

It’s really not that simple when evaluating the value of your business.  There are many other considerations, right?  After all, it’s your career, not to mention, the income you provide for the families of your employees.  You probably have years, possibly decades, invested in building your business.  A lot of planning, sweat and tears and possibly prior family generations started the business, so you have a history to protect too, correct?   You have to make it work!

The problem with the prior statements is this… this personal connection is what can end up costing you your entire lifetime investment.  We see it almost every day.  Business owners see declines in their sales and profits.  Many retailers that have been profitable for years are now losing money.   Many seek help in the form of bank loans.  Unfortunately, in most cases this is like putting air in a tire – without fixing the leak.  In other words, they continue to lose money, but now it’s the banks money and the hole they’re in just keeps getting deeper.

One possible solution

Reinvent your business, with a Planned Furniture Promotions “What If” event!  We can help you get a completely fresh start.  We frequently ask retailers;  “What if you could start over, what would you do?”   We’re talking about a completely fresh start.  Bills paid, new investment money and a clean slate to develop a hot new business plan!  For many retailers, this is possible and many have already accomplished this exact goal.

If you’re interested in finding out how a “What if” promotion can help you, contact a PFP consultant today.