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ALLWEIN CARPET ONE TOUTS HOLIDAY SALES BUMP, YEAR-ROUND SUCCESS WITH AREA RUGS
Allwein Carpet One Floor & Home in Annville, Pennsylvania, promotes area rugs hard in Q4 to help the bottom line, and reports strong sales in rugs year-round.
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ANNVILLE, Penn. -- As hard surface sales continue to grow, aggressive flooring dealers find ways to bump up sales and offset the category's comparatively lower margins and reduced holiday season volume.
One retailer, Allwein Carpet One Floor & Home in Annville, Pennsylvania, has found area rugs a solution on both counts and reports great year-round success with rugs, crediting the category with helping them end the year on a high note.
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"Our area rug sales right now are stellar." -- Lauren Allwein-Andrews, Allwein Carpet One Floor & Home
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Since its founding in 1978, Allwein Carpet One Floor & Home has been a stalwart flooring dealer, known for its area rug selection and service. The retailer offers an extensive collection of rugs in its showroom, and also has a 12,000-square foot warehouse that houses over 200 carpet rolls, remnants and bound rugs. In addition to its area rug business, Allwein's offers a vibrant cut and sew program for custom rugs from broadloom, and an area rug cleaning service through Paramount Rug Company.
"Area rugs are a great add-on to a sale but you have to show enough of them in your showroom and be known in your community as having a large supply for customers to browse," said Lauren Allwein-Andrews, a manager at the business. "Buying from a catalog just doesn't cut it."
Above and below, Allwein's "super-binder" finishes cut-and-sew rugs from broadloom to customers' custom size and shape specifications.
Many years ago, the retailer would buy higher-end wool rugs but found that its customer base wasn't looking to spend an excessive amount on a rug that they would likely tire of. Instead, it has done exceptionally well with Karastan's machine-made rugs in synthetic fibers. Of late, the Spice Market and Euphoria collections are selling briskly. "Everything Karastan is putting out right now is killer," Allwein-Andrews said. "Their newer collections are on trend and affordable; add the Karastan brand name and it's a definite win for us."
HOLIDAY SEASON PUSH
The holiday season is not particularly meaningful for most flooring dealers, in fact, it is a time when volume often dips. There are few Black Friday sales, and Small Business Saturdays barely register an uptick in most places. Allwein's, however, leverages its rugs to generate traffic and drive sales in the final six weeks. "Around this time of year [late November], I like to offer extra discounts on all in-stock products and products that can walk out the door within a few days," Allwein-Andrews explained.
Allwein's calls attention to area rugs on signage and promotes its extensive in-stock selection with extra discounts to encourage year-end sales.
"We have been running extra discounts on all in-stock area rugs in addition to special order rugs because they are a quick sell, and customers can instantly upgrade their decor and satisfy their instant gratification fix. The same is true for all in-stock rems, bound rugs and anything else that we want to unload so we can get our inventory down before end of year."
As the weather gets colder in central Pennsylvania, Allwein's sees an increase in its soft surface sales, which is a welcome change considering the category produces higher margins than hard surfaces. And while many customers are looking for deals for broadloom carpet, it is rugs that are paving the way to success.
"Our area rug sales right now are stellar," Allwein-Andrews said. "This time of year, our area rug sales are always a little higher, as is our rug pad business. The extra discount really seems to help as well.
With the uptick in hard surface sales, we've put more of an effort in buying moderately priced, current-looking area rugs to help make up for the lower hard surface margins."
Carpet One's member sales tools include its fall 2017 magazine, 'Beautiful Design Made Simple', which includes rug images and room shots promoted by Allwein's on social media. Kaleen, Karastan and Surya are some of the featured vendors.