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Business of Home Podcast
The Thursday Show: Houzz says AI can save designers $74K. Can it? Plus: Inside Perigold's first-ever store
01:03:48
Host Dennis Scully and BOH executive editor Fred Nicolaus discuss the biggest news in the design world. Later, Rebecca Ginns, global head of Perigold, joins the show to discuss the company's first brick-and-mortar store.
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- [00:00]
Dennis Scully
Foreign. This is Business of Home. I'm Dennis Scully and welcome to the Thursday Show. Later on, I'll be talking to Rebecca Gins of Paragould about the company's first store. But first we're going to catch up on the news, including an AI report from Houzz, Laura Piana's labor violations and a defense of the China cabinet. To do all that, I'm joined by Business of Homes executive editor Fred Nicholas. Hi, Fred.
- [00:35]
Fred Nicholas
Hi, Dennis. How's it going?
- [00:36]
Dennis Scully
Well, throat's a little sore. Hoping to get through the show okay.
- [00:39]
Fred Nicholas
But other than that, great listeners won't notice a thing. I think you're powering through it admirably. I don't know about this weekend, though. I hear you're Vegas bound. Will you have your voice back for Vegas?
- [00:51]
Dennis Scully
I hope so, because I'm hosting the Andy Awards this weekend in Vegas and so I'm looking forward to that. But yes, I will be at Vegas Market and I hear the envy in your voice, Fred. I hear you wishing you were going to be in the 104 degree temperatures of Las Vegas in July. I get it.
- [01:11]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah. Maybe put like 100 on red and we can use the money to buy the podcast studio. We were fetching them out last.
- [01:17]
Dennis Scully
Yes.
- [01:18]
Fred Nicholas
Last week.
- [01:18]
Dennis Scully
Yes. I'm going to make it happen at the win for us.
- [01:22]
Fred Nicholas
Excellent. Well, let's quickly look back on Monday's episode. A conversation with the team behind Cox London. Chris and Nicola Cox.
- [01:30]
Dennis Scully
Yes, indeed. Two incredible sculptors who built a business that is now a lighting business, a furniture business, and they are remarkable artists and now employ a whole team of artists and craftspeople. And I was in London, as you know, earlier in the summer, and I bumped into an editor friend and told them I was going to see one of the Cox workrooms. And she said, dennis, when I went, I cried happy tears.
- [02:04]
Fred Nicholas
I hope.
- [02:04]
Dennis Scully
I thought, wow, it was that moving. And when I went through it, I completely understood because it is a moving experience to see all of the things that they do with molten metal and it is pretty remarkable. So they are an inspiring couple. I was so thrilled to get to talk to them and what an incredible business that they have built, a team of over 100 working with them today.
- [02:31]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah, that blew me away. I mean, I sort of had heard of them and I'd seen some of their work. I thought they were a very small artisan workshop. When I heard over 100 people, I was like, wow, holy moly. I got to get over to England and get into the molten metal business. Because this is popping. Yeah. A lot of interesting insights from it. I loved. Actually, towards the end of the conversation, there was this really interesting bit where you're talking about, you guys have this incredible company, you've got this incredible brand. You're known for these, like a 12 foot chandelier that looks like a magnolia tree. Why don't you try and do some more accessible product to get people into the brand? And they were just like, no, we're not going to do that. And it was an interesting point about how scarcity breeds desire and sort of an interesting conversation about that side of the design business that I really enjoyed in addition to all the molten metal and tears.
- [03:17]
Dennis Scully
No. And I love that they know where they stand and what they want to do.
- [03:22]
Rebecca Gins
And.
- [03:23]
Dennis Scully
And so they said, no, we're not gonna create accessible price points anytime soon. And it doesn't sound like they're coming to America quite yet, but they did sound as if they have certainly been talking about it for some time, but they don't wanna be distracted and we.
- [03:45]
Fred Nicholas
Are very distracting here.
- [03:46]
Dennis Scully
Exactly. America is nothing if not distracting. And heaven knows we need the distraction these days. All right, going to take a quick break and then we'll get into the news. This podcast is sponsored by June Laloy. You likely already know Laloy, a prominent name in the design world known for rugs, now made its sister brand, June Laloy, a total home furnishings destination that expands on Laloy's expertise, adding furniture, lighting, decorations, and, of course, more rugs. If you know Leloy, you know their collection leads with quality, craft and great design. And June Laloy follows suit. With June laloyloy's trade program, designers receive exclusive pricing priority, customer support, and a seamless online sourcing experience. Visit junelloy.com today to explore the collection and sign up for a trade account. That's J-O-O-N L O L-O I.com and now on with the show. And we're back. First up, Fred Houzz has an AI report.
- [05:05]
Fred Nicholas
Houzz and AI together in the same item. Yes, a rare pleasure. In a recent survey of construction and design firms, houzz found that 31% of designers are now using AI and in a bolder claim that it gives them an average productivity boost equal to $74,400 per year. Dennis, I know you use ChatGPT. Is that netting you 74 grand?
- [05:29]
Dennis Scully
I am thrilled that I am saving $74,000 a year. I don't know where that money's coming from, but I Use AI quite a bit. Perhaps I'm saving even more than that.
- [05:41]
Fred Nicholas
Now, Fred, I think we should sort of quickly caveat this by saying that, well, first of all, I'm very grateful to Houzz for doing this sincerely. Because there hasn't been a big industry wide study around AI adoption. FirstDibs has done a survey every year where they asked how many designers are dabbling with AI. But it's just one question on a longer survey. So it is really helpful to get a look at this data. But we also should say that Houzz is using this study to market their Houzz Pro software. They have a bunch of AI things that they've added to it recently. And I think that they've put out this survey to sort of draw attention to the fact that, hey, designers are using AI. We have AI tools.
- [06:17]
Dennis Scully
Hey, and did we mention AI?
- [06:18]
Fred Nicholas
Yes, exactly.
- [06:20]
Dennis Scully
We've got some of that. Come on aboard.
- [06:22]
Fred Nicholas
Exactly. But that being said, it is, I think, a very interesting look at how this technology is actually getting worked into the industry. I'm curious. The big finding was 31% of designers are using AI. How does that square with your. How does that compare to the mean streets of the design district? What are you hearing out there? Does that seem right?
- [06:42]
Dennis Scully
It's funny because I stopped asking a lot of guests about whether or not they were using AI because often it led to this awkward conversation where they suggested that either they were eager to learn more about it or they really didn't understand it at all, or it would inevitably lead to the oh, it's so scary, let's not talk about it conversation. And truthfully, I think it's come a long way since then, as this report would suggest.
- [07:10]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah, I feel the same. I mean, it's funny because, you know, first Dibs, as I mentioned, had a study where they would ask designers this question. And the first year, I think it was maybe 20, 23. So one year after ChatGPT kind of broke the world and it was only 9%, which kind of blew me away. Last year I think it was 14% or something like that. And it doesn't seem like a lot, but that is like an impressive rate of growth. Like you think about every year, usage roughly doubles. That's kind of impressive. And anecdotally I will say that, like whenever I ask designers about this now, there is that sense of it's gone from something that they've been meaning to look at to something that they are looking at, whether it's saving them $74,000 I don't know, I think that's maybe a little bit dubious, but I do really get the sense that it's actually getting experimented with a lot more in the industry. And I think the Houzz survey, I think reflects that accurately. I think a third sounds about right.
- [08:01]
Dennis Scully
Yeah. And I think what's interesting is when you and I first started talking about AI on the show and lots of people would respond in the cont of midjourney and image generation and those tools, what I find much more frequently, and I think this study suggests that, is that people are using it as a research tool. They're using it to help them with social media posts, they're using it for marketing efforts and things like that. Some people are using it in back of house training manuals and creating a consistent voice within the organization. So I think there's been a big shift in recognizing the many different ways that AI can be used to create that $74,000 worth of productivity. Don't get that new assistant, don't get that new office person.
- [09:00]
Fred Nicholas
I think that's right. And I also think a lot of the early conversations were, oh my God, is this going to take away. Is this going to disrupt interior design and take away interior designers jobs? I think now it's kind of slowly morphed into, well, how can we actually use this stuff? What's actually useful? And as the study points out, it's largely for. It's not for design. If it's used for design, it's like to make a mood board or a very quick visualization. It's not to design an entire project for you. Largely what designers are actually using it for is it's such a chore to sit down and write another Instagram 10 Instagram captions for this week. Designers in general don't like writing. They're design oriented people, they're visually oriented people. And so AI tools can definitely help them write and do all the boring administrative stuff. I also found, and the Houzz study mentions this, but I've heard this anecdotally, a lot of designers to synthesize a lot of information very quickly, like a vendor contract. It's like 100 pages long. You put it in ChatGPT, you say, what are the key points here? What do I need to look out for? You kind of talk to the document and that's a really interesting use case. Certainly hope people aren't doing that with my articles. You need to read all 6,000 words to really get the nuance of my comments on tariffs. But I do think that is how it's getting used.
- [10:09]
Dennis Scully
I agree. It's a great data cruncher and that's very clear. Even though it can get a lot wrong.
- [10:16]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah.
- [10:17]
Dennis Scully
So I know, always do check those numbers.
- [10:20]
Fred Nicholas
All these caveats, but I think for, you know, like you put in everything that you source for a project along with the dollar values. Where am I really making my money? What should I be focusing on sourcing for my, you know, who's my most valuable vendor? AI is good at answering those questions. Now, we've been talking about this $74,400 number. I think we should just explain that. The way that Houzz gets there is that they found that I think interior designers who use AI a lot, which is, you know, only 30% of the. The total people that they spoke with something like the average was about three hours of their week saved by using AI. And if you multiply that across an entire team, across an entire year, you can get up to something like 74 grand.
- [10:55]
Dennis Scully
Now.
- [10:56]
Fred Nicholas
It sounds great and it's obviously a good hook and that's why they put that in there. And that's why I put that in the headline for the article I wrote about this. I do think it's a little bit, I don't know, a little far fetched to imagine that the supposed three hours you get back will really turn into billable hours on a one to one basis. I think people fill up that time with other kinds of busy work or they just go deeper than they normally would have. I think it's a little unrealistic to say that you get that much of a productivity boost. But what do you think?
- [11:23]
Dennis Scully
I'm usually pretty cynical about such things, but in this case, I've just found so many different uses myself that I can only imagine were I running a design firm or running an architectural firm or any of these construction jobs. There are just so many different ways that the ability to scan through all of this data and even just have someone to bounce ideas off of in that capacity is incredibly helpful.
- [11:49]
Fred Nicholas
This reminds me, Dennis, I was wondering if I could borrow $74,000 if you happen to have it lying around.
- [11:54]
Dennis Scully
As a matter of fact, I discover that I just happen to have it.
- [11:57]
Fred Nicholas
Okay.
- [11:58]
Dennis Scully
Thanks to AI. Yeah. So I'll work it out with you after the show. I'll venmo you. Up next, we're going to talk about Laura Piana. In a bit of hot water. Last week, an Italian court placed the luxury textile brand under judicial administration after uncovering worker exploitation in its Supply chain. This is one of those things, Fred, that I can't tell if this is just part of doing business these days. This seems to just be out there. But we should talk about what all this means.
- [12:30]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah. Kind of a sad story. We should maybe sort of break down precisely what's happening here. So Loro Piana, of course, is a venerable textile company, largely known for apparel, but they also have a lot of fabrics in home. And they're a big company. They outsourced to a lot of other smaller firms to do various aspects of their production. Apparently, they had been caught up in this situation where they had hired one firm who had hired another firm, who had hired another firm. And underneath all those layers of bureaucracy was essentially a sweatshop in the outskirts of Milan where these workers were making under $5 an hour, working 90 hours a week to turn around these jackets, which they would sell for €120. And then, of course, Lopiano would mark it up to €3,000 or whatever it was. So some very unsavory labor practices right in their own backyard. And this court found that they had been responsible and put them under what's called judicial administration. Essentially, they're going to be court supervised for a certain period of time. And as you said, you sort of expect these kinds of labor violations sort of cynically and sadly at the lower end of the market, but you don't expect it as much in luxury. And as Business of Fashion said in their great article about this, it was like, if you can't trust Loro Piano, who can you trust? Right. It was disheartening.
- [13:44]
Dennis Scully
Well, exactly. Which is what makes me think that this is much more of an everyday occurrence than perhaps we were really thinking it was. And that they just go around and one company gets exposed for a little while, and then they kind of move on to the next company. But everyone sort of looks the other way and just imagines that everybody is doing this. It's the scene in Casablanca where they're shocked, shocked to find there's gambling going on here. You got the sense of that. Of course, they know there are these companies. To your point, they seem to outsource to these companies that don't manufacture anything. And then those companies go and find other manufacturing partners, and ultimately it leads to these. To these sweatshops. And again, everybody must know these places are there. They seem like they're quite sizable, and they're also dormitories. And these people were living there often in quite unpleasant conditions. And so you wonder what's really at play here and why this can't be eliminated altogether.
- [14:49]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah, I kind of wonder what the biggest bombshell from this is. Is it the labor violations or is it the fact that Loro Piana is getting a jacket for €120 and selling it for 5,000? But I mean, that sounds horribly cynical, but I wonder if that's on some level true, is that people are so much more suspicious of luxury pricing, especially because it seems like quality hasn't gone up commensurately with the enormous, you know, price hikes that have come over the past five or six years in the luxury market. The thing is, like, most of these conversations are happening around fashion, right? Like all the brands, you know, this, this is not new. The Italian courts have looked at Dior, Armani, other, other companies as well, but they're mostly fashion brands. I wonder to some degree whether this kind of skepticism and suspicion of the supply chain and the true costs is that has that crept over to the home side of luxury? Are there companies like Loro Piano that are home only that are getting the same kind of scrutiny? I'm wondering what you think about the line between fashion and home and how that interplays of this conversation.
- [15:48]
Dennis Scully
Well, I mean, it's a great point because you and I certainly know how much furniture is coming from various Asian countries and we know absolutely nothing for the most part about what those conditions are like. The only thing I will say with the furniture industry is that you get the sense that the, that they're visiting these facilities pretty regularly. Most of the big furniture CEOs that I talk to are over in Asia several times a year. And so I can't imagine that they show up there and have no idea if there are unfair labor practices going on. But it's hard to believe that it is contained just to fashion. If that's your point, Fred, I can't imagine.
- [16:37]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah, but I mean, I think that's a good point. I think that is a little bit of a difference. And there's maybe more insight into at least certain parts of the supply chain, you know, And I also think that it's like while there are, you know, markups or margins or whatever you want to call them in high end furniture, it's not quite the craziness of, you know, $100 on a jacket, sell it for 5,000. You know what I mean? That is a huge markup. And I'm sure a lot of furniture companies are thinking, well, how can I get to that level? You know what I mean? But I think that level of Marking up only comes this venerable luxury heritage that builds up over hundreds of years in marketing and fashion shows. I think the envy, furniture companies are envious of being able to do that. But I think it also puts a natural check on it. And I think people are, they may be skeptical of an expensive sofa, but it's not quite the same skepticism when you're paying $20,000 for $500 worth of leather. You know what I mean? I think that naturally gets your hackles up a little bit more in a way that doesn't happen as much in furniture. But I don't know. I'd be curious to hear what designers are experiencing out there. Is suspicion of high end brands or do they get the sense that there are labor violations when they look at their own sourcing? I don't know. The topic is live.
- [17:50]
Dennis Scully
It's interesting because we certainly have seen that many of these luxury brands have suffered in recent quarters. Sales have been hit around the world and there's been some skepticism more on the pricing side of how high the price has got in many of these categories. But you have to wonder if some of the skepticism around some of these labor practices, some of the supply chain issues, isn't part of the reason why some of these companies are being revalued in consumers eyes. And there does seem to be a shift in quite a meaningful way away from some of these big luxury brands. So we'll have to see how it plays out. But meanwhile, Fred, we've got to talk about tariffs. For heaven's sakes. Are they really so bad?
- [18:38]
Fred Nicholas
Fred, just when you thought it was safe to move on. Last week we talked about all the new developments in trade policy. And then this week I checked in with a few sourcing experts to find out whether any of it really matters. It's interesting. Just this morning there was news that we may be reaching a trade deal with Japan, which I think is great and maybe doesn't affect the home industry that much. But it's certainly good news because they're a big trading partner. I know Indonesia, there's talk of a deal there. It seems like the EU is getting closer to an arrangement. There is stuff happening. But you mentioned this great article in the Wall Street Journal where the takeaway was sort of like, has anything actually happened here? What's going on?
- [19:18]
Dennis Scully
Yeah, I mean it's interesting because we keep, and we've talked about this. We keep waiting in the CPI and the ppi, the Consumer Price Index and the Producer Price Index numbers. We keep waiting to see some meaningful inflationary impact from all of these tariffs. And we're told that, oh, it's still too early because everybody bought all this inventory, and so they haven't had to place new orders yet with some of this new pricing in place. And of course, many of the tariffs have been delayed until the beginning of August, we're told. Meanwhile, as you say, various deals get worked out, and they all seem to be coming in at slightly higher tariff numbers than were originally thought. So we're feeling as though, for the moment, companies are either absorbing a lot of the pricing. Some companies designers are happy to tell us how many companies are passing along price increases to them. But as an economy as a whole, we don't seem to see a huge impact from this yet.
- [20:18]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah, I mean, I think this is one of the most complicated things to cover from a news perspective, because there's the big, explosive news that happens when Trump is like 300% on European alcohol. And you're like, my God, what would that mean? And you're kind of like, investigating all the implications. And then there's a big headline around 145% on China. But by the time the article is actually up and people have digested that information, it becomes clear that, well, that wasn't actually implemented. That was kind of a negotiating tactic. And then it's on to the next tariff threat. I did this little chart, if you follow me on LinkedIn, you can get it there. That sort of breaks down what the threatened tariffs are versus what the actually implemented tariffs are. And it's honestly like the actual implemented tariffs are much, much less than everything that's made the front page of the New York Times. It's significantly a different thing when you look at what's been talked about and what's actually getting charged at the ports. And so I think when we think about what's the actually economic impact of all this, it is significant, but it's not as catastrophic as it's been teased in the news, because a lot of what's gotten teased in the news is just something that the President said, not something that started getting implemented at the border. A lot of people were saying, like, September, October, that's we're gonna see what the real impact is, because that's gonna be stuff that people have to bring over anew with a tariff hike on it. And everyone was like, yeah, everyone's gonna raise their prices in September, October. Whether that comes to pass, I don't know. We'll see. It's. So engage in hyperbole or downplaying things But I will say everyone was saying more price increases are coming in September, October. So rest assured, we will come back and check in on that in the very near, very near future, if not sooner, which I suspect is probably the more likely outcome here.
- [21:58]
Dennis Scully
Well, and I will certainly be seeing the leaders of many of the high point brands in Vegas this weekend. So I have no doubt that we'll be talking tariffs and I have no doubt that we will likely be talking about, to your point, some kind of price increase coming, because it has to happen at some point. So we'll see. So I'll let you know what I learn in Vegas. It's not gonna stay in Vegas. What happens in Vegas in this case, Fred, is not going to stay in Vegas. I'm gonna share it with you and the listeners. But in the meantime, we're gonna move on to talk about the China cabinet for Untapped. This week, Sarah Archer wrote in defense of the China Cabinet, reminding readers that the piece was historically designed as a cabinet of curiosities, built to hold treasured objects.
- [22:45]
Fred Nicholas
This is why we need untapped, because the average interior design take on the China cabinet would be like, check out the hottest china cabinet core trend from TikTok, Whereas Untapped, this very academic intellectual journal published by Henry Built, is going into the history of the Wunderkammer and the 19th century. It's a very lovely, thorough piece that really gets into the history of the china cabinet. And I think it raises a good point because I feel like, as Sarah points out in her piece, even the phrase china cabinet feels a little dated, a little washed. It carries the association of a time in which you would have this collection of wedding china that you carried on, passed on to your offspring. But historically, even before that, it was something just to display the accumulation of the interesting objs of your life. And I think it's the idea of bringing it back to that tradition I think is a really good one. Although I suspect, Dennis, that you will defend even China, not only the china cabinet, but you're a china guy.
- [23:48]
Dennis Scully
Well, and of course, and I grew up oddly coveting my parents wedding china and crystal.
- [23:56]
Fred Nicholas
You were the one person.
- [23:57]
Dennis Scully
So. Yes. And that's what I think to your point, these china cabinets were all about. They were these boxes that captured these people's lives and their collections and their histories. A lot of these cabinets would have memorabilia and Uncle Jack's war medals, and there'd be a picture of him when he was a fighter pilot. And then they'd be. And I would love it if you'd go over to someone's house, and in these cabinets would be their salt and pepper shaker collection that they had accumulated from around the world, or some obscure thing that they had assembled that told you so much more about those people than you would ever probably learn on your own from speaking to them.
- [24:46]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah. I love the idea of the china cabinet as the sort of the window into the soul of the homeowner. I feel like if you get a look at the china cabinet and the medicine cabinet, you got two really interesting windows.
- [24:55]
Dennis Scully
Two of the first places I always look, Fred, when I'm at someone's house.
- [24:59]
Fred Nicholas
Yes, I know. But I do think that's very eloquently put and very poetically put. I do think. Think it is really profound to have a space in a home that is the repository of that kind of thing. I'm struggling exactly for the word. I'm sure there's a German word for it, aside from wunderkammer, to describe this place, to accumulate these little knickknacks and meaningful things, because it really does lend an enormous amount of soul to a room. And you can kind of tell when you look at a photograph in a magazine when knickknacks have been curated over the course of the past week versus a collection that's been built over a lifetime. There's. There's a real difference there. I think Sarah makes the point really well in this piece in Untapped. We'll link it in the show notes. But I feel like in modern life, so much of our life is spent worrying about all the clutter that's accumulated. You know what I mean? Home organizing is a huge sector of the industry. It's an entire business. It's been built up around organizing all your stuff. And I feel like a china cabinet is a place that reframes stuff as. This is magical. This is beautiful. This is me. I think there's something really nice about that. So, I don't know. I guess kudos to Sarah for the piece. And this is gonna. I don't have one. We keep our stuff on the mantel, but it's always falling off on the mantle. So I'm gonna hop on Facebook Marketplace right now and buy somebody's china cabinet. I think it's a great idea.
- [26:18]
Dennis Scully
Well, and I'm told that you'll be there with a lot of fellow millennials, Fred. That they're.
- [26:23]
Fred Nicholas
Yes, my people.
- [26:25]
Dennis Scully
That they are hunting for the china cabinet and all that it represents. So I want more people to have a cabinet of curiosities. And I want more people to have collections, individuals and unique, because that's what separates us from all the ivory boucle. All right, that's it for the news, but there's plenty more to check out on businessofhome.com including can't miss design events in August and the best outdoor debuts from Atlanta Market. We'll be back in a minute, but first, a quick break. We're taking a quick break to tell you a little bit more about June the Last. As a sister brand to Laloy, June Laloy maintains the same design acumen, high standards of quality and value, offering furniture, rugs, lighting, and decor. For today's home, the June laloy trade program is designed to make doing business a breeze, offering exclusive benefits to designers that include special pricing priority, customer support, and a seamless sourcing experience. Visit junelloy.com today to explore the collection and sign up for a trade account. That's J-O-O-N L O L-O I.com and now back to the show. And we're back. I'm joined now by Rebecca Gins, who is the head of Paragould, a division of Wayfair. Very excited to finally have you on the show, Rebecca.
- [28:00]
Rebecca Gins
Rebecca, thank you so much for having me. It's great to be here.
- [28:04]
Dennis Scully
Let's talk a little bit about your background before we leap into Paragould and what all of that is about, because you've got an impressive resume before you come to Paragould. Tell us.
- [28:15]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah, so I joined Paragould and Wefare in 2017, and prior to that, I had spent some time in management consulting at the Boston Consulting Group. And then when WeFair called, I was actually spending some time in New York at FreshDirect, which is online Grocery delivery.
- [28:33]
Dennis Scully
Comes to my home multiple times a week.
- [28:34]
Rebecca Gins
Well, there you go.
- [28:35]
Dennis Scully
So you got the call from Wayfair and they said, come on over.
- [28:38]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah. And it sounded a little bit too good to be true. Launching a luxury brand in a space that I had no experience in but was very much passionate about. So home design and. Yeah. And now I've been here eight years, which is hard to believe.
- [28:54]
Dennis Scully
Well, so that's what they said to you. We're launching a luxury side of this business and we want you to come and head out.
- [29:00]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah. In not so many words, but yes. I mean, that was the gist. And it was very nascent at that point. The website was essentially like a skeleton, and you still needed an engineer to change an image on the homepage and it hadn't launched yet. So I joined, I think in June 2017 and we launched in September of that year.
- [29:21]
Dennis Scully
So Wayfair launches Paragould and I remember in the beginning they didn't really tell us too much about it and I get it, they needed some time to build it out and see what it was going to become. What has it become?
- [29:37]
Rebecca Gins
That's a big question. We've enjoyed steady growth since launch in 2017. And so today within luxury home, we are one of the bigger players and we offer a broad selection for the customer that's looking for high quality items for their home across styles and every space and now pretty much every category. Historically, a lot of the brands we worked with were to the trade only or sold in small assortments in regional retailers. To a large extent.
- [30:10]
Dennis Scully
A lot of what has been going on in the furniture business in recent years, unfortunately is a lot of heritage family run furniture chains around the country closing up shop for lots of different reasons. Right. We had the big boom during COVID and then business dried up. Online has certainly been competition for many of them. Has that been a big driver of more business coming to you? Have you found, is there a connection, a correlation with that?
- [30:44]
Rebecca Gins
I can't say specifically, but what I can tell you is yes, that was a concern that we heard early on. But what we always shared with our supplier partners and what has proved out to be true is that we are trying to reach a customer that was shopping online anyway or doing research online. And if they wanted that convenience, we wanted to make sure that these brands were available in that channel. We never were undercutting on price or winning in a way that was incongruent with what the physical stores could offer. And so this was more about just meeting customers where they wanted to shop and helping them find the best design brands in those channels. And what we heard from, you know, the suppliers that had those concerns initially was it actually didn't play out in those markets where, you know, they didn't actually see that competition.
- [31:40]
Dennis Scully
Yeah, I mean, and lots of companies struggle with this issue of, listen, I've got certain geographical arrangements with partners and I don't want to appear to be in competition with them, which, which is why many of these companies, I, I joke, but many of them have been slow to have their e commerce strategy evolve because it's a highly charged issue with some of their longtime retail partners. And I get that.
- [32:09]
Rebecca Gins
So that has certainly evolved in the last seven years. And I won't name any names of who the slowest was.
- [32:15]
Dennis Scully
Oh, really? You don't want to call that.
- [32:17]
Rebecca Gins
But they know who they are.
- [32:20]
Dennis Scully
They'll be listening to this show, I'm guessing, and they will know who they are, I bet. But so. So to that point, so hilariously, there's the famous story of the founders of Wayfair not even being allowed into High Point. In the beginning. They had to create a fake company to say they had a store and all of that. Right. Because they didn't want online companies coming into High Point. Obviously, High Point has evolved a great deal and Niraj and the rest of the team are more than welcome at High Point. And in fact, red carpets are rolled out where' er they go. No, no doubt. But interesting to see that evolution and how it was perceived. And even in 2017, there were a great many people who weren't ready to do business with you.
- [33:04]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah, I would say, I guess that's a rite of passage then. And I'm honored to have followed in similar footsteps, but we certainly had a similar experience early on.
- [33:14]
Dennis Scully
Well, so what was that like when you would call and say, hi, we're launching the upscale part of Wayfair. Can we sign up you up? What were those conversations like?
- [33:24]
Rebecca Gins
You know, there was a ton of hesitation, but we were, I would say, and I think people would probably say this patient but persistent. And so we were talking about this a little before we started, but we always tell people, and this is true today as well, you know, we'll become friends before, you know, eventually you'll work with us, we'll get there. And I understand it. You know, the timing has to be. You're right.
- [33:48]
Dennis Scully
Part of what is challenging is it's in many cases giant pieces of furniture and so all sorts of white glove delivery options needed to be made available. And it couldn't just be some curbside drop off and all of that. So talk to me a little bit about how that evolved for you.
- [34:09]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah. And there, I would say that's the benefit of being a luxury division of Wait Fair. So, you know, for those that aren't familiar, we very much have our own brand ethos. We curate our assortment based on, you know, quality and a number of objective standards that we have in place. And we serve the luxury customer in a way that we think is commensurate with their needs and the price point. But we're able to leverage, you know, backend platforms and, you know, infrastructure that Wayfair has. It is a vast nationwide network of warehouses, distribution centers, our own delivery agents. And so we're able to provide the customer with high visibility into where their item is originating, where it is in the process when they will get it, and provide now even more conveniences like scheduling your delivery in cart at the time of purchase. And so that was is a real differentiator in home and for luxury home in these brands that was certainly different than how it had historically worked with third party shippers and not clear visibility to where the item was in the supply chain.
- [35:21]
Dennis Scully
Another component in all of this, we talked about many of these brands being to the trade only brands for a long time. And so a trade program had to be created and all of that. Tell me a little bit about how that evolved for you.
- [35:37]
Rebecca Gins
When we started the business, the problem that we were primarily trying to address was that the end consumer didn't have access to the best design brands. And for a lot of brands they already had, you know, channels where they could sell to the trade. And so it wasn't the top problem that we were trying to address. We do know that we offer conveniences to members of the trade, particularly around, around shipping. We have partners that can help sourcing. It can be useful to be sourcing many brands from one place. So in order to support the trade and those that do want to shop with us, we have a trade program that offers primarily trade pricing and some of the services that I mentioned. But we have until this point been very much differential to our brand partners and allowed them to specify how they want the trade relationship to work on our platform.
- [36:35]
Dennis Scully
So interestingly, at some point the desire to be not just online, but to also have a physical retail presence evolved as part of both your strategy and obviously your parent company's Wayfair strategy. They just opened up quite a sizable store just outside of Chicago. And now you have opened your very first retail location in Houston. So. So tell us about that.
- [37:04]
Rebecca Gins
Yes, we have. So we opened our first store in Houston to the public in June. So. But it's a very exciting milestone for us. And we have a second store planned to open in West Palm beach this fall in September. And you know, to your point, it was something that, you know, opening a physical retail store had been on the list and under consideration for a long time. You know, we recognize that one, a lot of shopping happen that happens is omnichannel in nature. So customers look online and then go into a store or they go into a store and then they go online. And also, you know, the vast majority of transactions today are still in a physical store. And so the time was right at this point, particularly Given the state of where the Paragould business is and are offering and we're very confident in. And also that at this point, to your point, Wayfair has also opened a Wayfair store, plus a bunch of specialty retail brand stores. And so there is some backend infrastructure that again, we can leverage.
- [38:14]
Dennis Scully
And Houston being the first one, the first store, what was the thinking there? Was there just so much business coming out of that area for you that you thought, yes, we need to show up here?
- [38:23]
Rebecca Gins
Or, you know, it's a combination of things. There's some, you know, factors about the Houston market, which are it's a large market, it's growing, it has a strong customer base of ours. So which suggests that our concept resonates there. We also think of it as a town that is, you know, a hub of innovation and style. But then also there was just a very practical piece of this, which is we found a great location in Highland Village at the size that we needed. So. So we were looking for 20 to 30,000 square feet. And you know, if you picture an average luxury shopping center, a lot of Those stores are 5,000, 8,000, maybe 10,000 square feet. And so we've got lucky and found two that were next to each other and vacant. So we combined two spaces to get to our total square footage. So that part was. Had a list of markets that we thought were interesting, met the criteria around the kind of places we thought we would be successful, and then we were opportunistic when we found the right real estate.
- [39:20]
Dennis Scully
And same thing in West Palm beach in Florida?
- [39:23]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah, very similar scenario, obviously different market, you know, in terms of an element of seasonality a little bit smaller. And so we'll learn some things there. But similarly affluent population, growing market, and then great real estate that we found.
- [39:41]
Dennis Scully
Do you spend a lot of time thinking about your competitive set? Who you're going head to head with? Who do you see yourself going head to head with? And who are you looking at most closely?
- [39:52]
Rebecca Gins
You know, we certainly look at others and admire things that others are doing, but in reality there isn't a single competitor that's doing what we're doing.
- [40:03]
Dennis Scully
But who do you admire to that point? I mean, are there operations that you go, yeah, they're doing it pretty well?
- [40:08]
Rebecca Gins
I think, you know, some of the new our house store concepts, I don't know if you've been in one of those. I think they're beautiful. So that would be. Be an example. There's. I think there's a lot things that a lot of People do well, I've been in some local stores and different markets that have incredible service, which I really appreciate. I think it's, it's a really, you know, it's a hard thing to do well consistently. So a lot of different things I admire at different retailers.
- [40:32]
Dennis Scully
One of the things that I was curious about with, so thinking about Houston, for example, so you have all of these brands, you have all of these different furniture brands. How did you go to them and say, okay, now listen, not all of you are going to get to be on the floor the first time out or tell me how those sort of conversations went because I can imagine some of these brands being wildly excited to have some retail space in Houston. But obviously not every brand can have the display they want. Perhaps. But you tell me, you know, it.
- [41:04]
Rebecca Gins
Was a dialogue and it's likely to evolve over time, but it's not, you know, it took effort on both sides too. So it wasn't the right fit for every partner. And we more started with kind of looking at our data and trying to understand what the right mix of styles and categories from a merchandising perspective was that we wanted to reflect. And then we had conversations with retailers on their ability to partner with us on it. And so it was a bit of a, you know, dialogue back and forth to net at the final number, which is, you know, something like 150 brands, which is the starting point. And then I'm sure we'll see kind of what resonates in each market more or less. And we'll also, you know, want to make sure that we keep the assortment fresh and interesting. That's one of our kind of the differentiators of our very end of our business is that you can discover just an endless number of amazing home brands. And so, you know, it's not to say that we're going to swap out everything in the store immediately, but we want to make sure that, you know, customers that come into the physical space continue to discover the brands that we're excited about also. So it will be evolving.
- [42:11]
Dennis Scully
Yeah, no, I'm sure that will be. Listen, we went through Covid and we've come out of COVID and we've been going through this housing market that's been very challenging. In addition to the challenges of the housing market, which we'll discuss in a moment, we've had obviously since Liberation Day back in early April, we've been navigating a pretty complicated tariff driven environment and many, many of the companies that you work with are scrambling to try and Figure out their own pricing and margin strategy. How has that been playing out for you and for your partners?
- [42:51]
Rebecca Gins
I think the challenge has just been the degree to which the entire situation has been so uncertain and for an extended period of time. And it makes the planning really challenging. And then even when people do know what's happening, the actual, actual calculation of what the tariffs will hit on what portion of your product and how that impacts their costs and their price, it's actually not a simple thing to pull through. That's certainly been a challenge. And as a result, there's been instances where quantities ordered have changed, what's available has changed. And we completely understand that and are trying to work with our suppliers to manage from a physical retail perspective. That certainly creates more complexity just because those are. If we've chosen an item for the floor that has to be available or we have to swap it out from an E. Comm perspective. And just generally what the good news for us, for our customers is that we do have a broad assortment. And so even where that's so far impacted a certain item or certain brand more so because of decisions they had to make, there typically are other options we can surface. But definitely a challenging set of circumstances to navigate, though. I don't know, maybe we'll look back at this and we'll say, see this industry, it's never boring. There's always something.
- [44:15]
Dennis Scully
How are you thinking about? I mentioned obviously, the challenging housing market that we've had for some time. There's a feeling that that rates might come down a bit in September. The market is sort of hoping. Obviously our president seems to want them to come down much sooner. But many have started to believe that even if rates do come down a little bit, that that perhaps isn't going to be meaningful enough to unlock housing. What are you hearing or thinking? How are you sort of thinking about how you navigate this climate?
- [44:51]
Rebecca Gins
You know, I mean, we follow this just like anyone else. And obviously there's a ton of speculation and, you know, some speculation that I think a lot of us were wrong on earlier. And so I think for us, reality is we follow it all tariffs. We're actively trying to work with our partners to mitigate that as much as possible. But the best thing we can do is just keep focused on making our offering as good as possible. At the end of the day, we can't control interest rates, but what we can control is having product, having excellent service, making right by our customers. So that's what we're focused on.
- [45:29]
Dennis Scully
If you get excited by the results of Houston and as you say, West Palm beach in the fall. Can you imagine rolling out into a bunch of other locations in the coming years? Do you imagine this is momentum that's really going to lead to 1015 Paragould stores in the next few years?
- [45:52]
Rebecca Gins
Our ambition is to serve key US Markets with a physical retail footprint. Exactly. You know, the timeline or quantity of that is still very much tbd. But yeah, we are excited to learn from Houston and West Palm and take it from there and pursue the, the next wave of opportunities as kind of the current set supports.
- [46:20]
Dennis Scully
One of the things that the high point companies that I spoke with were most excited about when your brand's name came up was the, was the conference that you, that you give where you share a lot of information about here's what's going on, here's what's, here's what's selling, here's what's, you know, know what's interesting. Tell me, tell me a little bit about that. And when should I look for my invitation to the conference? Should I checking. Does that come by email or how does that.
- [46:52]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah, yeah, I'll get back to you on that part. We hold an executive summit for our parable partners and the idea behind it is that, you know, similar to what it sounds like you do, we go to trade shows, we talk to all of our partners in those and we see, you know, hundreds of people across our team in a given market often. But our partners actually don't have that chance to connect with each other and to take a step back and sort of think about their business with us and strategy. And so we started doing this a number of years ago. Wayfair actually does something similar and it's an opportunity for us to share where we're headed, our priorities, where we're looking for our partners to work with us in a way that can help accelerate their growth on our platform. And we find that we get good feedback on that, but truly the best feedback is typically that our partners have the opportunity to connect with brands in other non competitive spaces that they don't typically talk to. And there's actually been a few partnerships that have come out of this, which is fun to see. So that's the event. We can't hold it every fall for the most part.
- [48:04]
Dennis Scully
Well, and I'm wondering, I mean even with the store, and obviously it's only been a few weeks since you've been open in Houston, but I wonder if you are seeing any interesting trends. I mean, I'm wondering if you're seeing Some green shoots that suggest maybe there is some kind of a turn. Everyone's already thinking about October high point. Here I am going to Vegas over the weekend. Trying not to sound too jealous, but I will be at the Vegas market this very weekend. Weekend. Talking to many of your partners and hearing how they're doing and how they're thinking about things. But I'm wondering what trends, if any, you're seeing that are noteworthy in your mind.
- [48:48]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah. And it's funny because there's a ton of interest in understanding how the store is progressing. And it is. It's so early. It's been a number of weeks, and it's like one of those things where one day it becomes a trend. I think one of the things that's interesting to me is we invested heavily in our opening in stocking some inventory to make it quicker ship. And so cash and carry, you can take home from the store. Made to order items, have those lead times categories like a lighting or a tabletop that generally ship in one to two days. A customer would still get that way, but case good or other furniture items, you know, upholstery on the floor. We have, you know, largely stocked a few units in the Houston area. And we are seeing so far, you know, a lot of interest in that speed, which is exciting because it's something, you know, a lot of times these, you know, items did take longer to get. And so we'll see how that plays out. Again, it's. It's so early. But that's one thing that's been different about this experience so far that we're watching.
- [49:58]
Dennis Scully
Yeah. No, I think quick delivery could be a huge opportunity for you because people have had a lot of experience with long lead times and waiting and many stores and even design shops. Talk to me so much more today about people just, can I buy this off the floor? Can I take this now? Or can I write or can I? And designers listen. Designers want things right away if they can get them.
- [50:26]
Rebecca Gins
I mean, so, yeah, we did have a few of those instances early on, and we did sell a couple items off the floor our grand opening weekend because there was so much excitement about it. Yes. That we. I think later we were like, wait, now we have to get a new item for the floor? Maybe we shouldn't have done that. But we couldn't resist the customer excitement. They needed two. We only had one in stock, so we did it. But, yeah, it's been a fun thing to.
- [50:51]
Dennis Scully
I would imagine. And you and I chatted about this just a little bit before we came on air. I would imagine that another listen. Ongoing challenge for every brand everywhere is building name recognition and brand recognition and Paragould. I don't know how well known you feel Paragould is at this point, again with consumers and with designers. And if people are, I'm betting it's a lot better than it was in 2017. Hey, well done, Rebecca. Nice. But how are you thinking about that and what are you trying to do? Because many people find, oh, let me open some retail locations and have that do a huge marketing effort on our behalf and I'm assuming that that's part of your thinking, but tell me what else you're doing and how you're trying to get greater brand recognition.
- [51:40]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah, and thanks for the recognition. Getting it from zero up.
- [51:44]
Dennis Scully
Exactly. I mean, you had that listen, but you get to claim all of that as. As you.
- [51:50]
Rebecca Gins
I appreciate that. Yeah, you know, it's good when you start at zero. There's a lot of room for improvement. But yeah, you know, it's been one of those things. You know, we certainly have built awareness as we talked about, but it's also one of our biggest opportunities. And it's, as you said, also something that can take a lot of time. And so we certainly are taking a multipronged approach to this. There's a digital element to this and, and we're pushing even deeper on that. But there's also, yes, a hypothesis that by opening stores in key markets, we can get closer to our customers. They will understand the quality that we're offering and know who we are even more. You know, in Highland Village in Houston, there is a huge amount of traffic that goes by that store every day. And you know, the last time I looked, which was a few days ago. So as I said, very thin data. You know, a good portion of the people said they were coming into that store just cause they had driven by. It wasn't like it was a preconceived destination. It was discovery. And so we will see how that plays out. But there's a lot of room for growth in the awareness.
- [53:00]
Dennis Scully
Yeah. And I'm curious, knowing that you were formerly a consultant and thinking about that Dartmouth MBA of yours, I'm wondering, are there key data points that you look at that might be outside of the everyday, what most people are watching? Are there some metrics that you're looking at that you want to see moving in the right direction in a meaningful way?
- [53:25]
Rebecca Gins
You know, I think you're aware of this, but we are definitely a data driven company. And so there's a lot of metrics that we look at. But the things that I find encouraging as it relates to this topic of awareness that we've been discussing is that once people find. Find us, they are very happy and they, you know, consistently the, you know, NPS is very high. The commentary on the NPS is all about the quality.
- [53:49]
Dennis Scully
So, and explain NPS to people who.
- [53:51]
Rebecca Gins
Write, for example, oh, Net promoter score. So a customer feedback survey that essentially says, would you recommend this brand or retailer or product to someone else? And then it calculates, you know, the percent that would recommend it versus her detractors, the people that wouldn't, and it gives you a net score. And so that number's very high. The commentary around that is always about the quality of the products and how it even surpassed their expectations. And then objectively, we just see repeat really high. So customers shop us and they come back. And so to me, people vote with their feet. And so that's all really good signs. So that's why I say awareness is such a big opportunity because once we find them, then they keep buying and they're buying for one room and then they come back for another room and, and they refresh. And so there's a lot that we can offer. But so getting to the top of the funnel is a huge opportunity.
- [54:45]
Dennis Scully
In sort of wrapping up the discussion. I wonder what you've learned that has surprised you in some way, both sort of leading up to the opening of the retail stores and just what's turned out to really be important as a driver for this business in general, leading.
- [55:04]
Rebecca Gins
Up to the physical retail stores, I think, and this will probably make some of our supplier partners laugh, but just how much work it is to make a physical space come to life. And that has certainly been a learning there. And then, you know, I think on the broader question of what I've learned on the business, there's a lot, but I think we just staying focused on the things, what we want to deliver to the customer and always coming back to that at the end of the day is what has kept us on track because there's a million things you could do at any given point. And we just are trying to think about what's going to make the most impact to the customer that they want at this point.
- [55:47]
Dennis Scully
Well, and that's why again, I'm curious about, we have a lot of designers that listen to the show and I'm always curious about how many designers and I'm thinking particularly, particularly in areas where they might not have this kind of merchandise. Close by. Right. That this is very helpful to them. When you hear from designers, I'm curious about what they're asking for or what they're looking to you for.
- [56:13]
Rebecca Gins
I think I would just say broadly, we are very eager to be supportive of the design community, whether that be through servicing their product needs or also promoting designers and what we think they bring to customers. So you probably know we have a lot of partners, designer partners that we work with, and we have design or shops on our site, and we've now actually replicated those in the store. And there's been really great feedback on that because designers bring a perspective that we think really highlights what our brand does well, which is offer a lot of different styles that you can combine into a space that feels uniquely like you. So that would be one piece of it. And then in terms of meeting, you know, designer shopping needs, we get a lot of positive feedback, mostly around kind of just how easy it is to shop with us. And I had a designer tell me recently, you know, like, if I just need one item from this brand and one item from that brand and one item from this brand and one item from that brand, it's a lot if I have to go to all those different brands and purchase and coordinate the logistics. But if I come to Paragould, I can typically find all of those items. I can put it into one cart, I can purchase it. I get consolidated delivery information, and which we now offer, which is all of those items coming into a customer's home at once for, you know, staging. And that's a big convenience. And, you know, that designer is like, I can spend my time, you know, actually thinking about the design versus coordinating all of those pieces. So those are typically the types of pieces of feedback we hear in addition to the one you mentioned, which is for a designer that isn't in the area of a showroom, you know, this provides access similar to the way it would to a construction consumer.
- [57:46]
Dennis Scully
And it sounds like, yes, yes, we plan to roll out lots more retail locations. Let's catch our breath from this one. Get ready for West Palm beach in. And West Palm beach, we're saying the fall right now.
- [57:59]
Rebecca Gins
Yeah. It's on track to open in the September, October timeframe.
- [58:03]
Dennis Scully
Okay, great. And then ideas of where you're gonna be next. Anything you wanna tease about a potential next location.
- [58:10]
Rebecca Gins
We will definitely update everybody as soon as we have more details on what the broader plan is. But for now, you know, are celebrating opening Houston, hopefully celebrating soon opening West Palm. And we're going to see what we learn in those markets.
- [58:25]
Dennis Scully
Okay. Because I'm pretty excited that Wayfair has announced they're coming to what we affectionately call the Ridge Hill Mall here near Bronxville, where I live. So I will have what I'm assuming is going to be a pretty giant Wayfarer location. So I'm looking forward to that. If you want to throw a paragould location in there, too. Hey, that would be great. The people of Westchester would love that.
- [58:49]
Rebecca Gins
Noted.
- [58:50]
Dennis Scully
You know, it wouldn't be a bad spot to open the door.
- [58:53]
Rebecca Gins
Dennis, watch out. I'm gonna start calling you to consult you on these decisions. You have a lot of information on our business.
- [58:59]
Dennis Scully
I'm there. Listen, I can't wait to get my invitation to the conference. I'm gonna be a huge participant, and I can't wait for that. You've got a lot of fans, and so I'm excited to finally get to talk to with you, and I so appreciate you making the time.
- [59:14]
Rebecca Gins
Thanks so much. I appreciate it. This is fun.
- [59:20]
Dennis Scully
And we're back. We're getting to the end of the show here, but before we go, we'd like to highlight anything going on in the industry that might have caught our eye. Fred, what caught your eye?
- [59:28]
Fred Nicholas
Well, it's a very divided political age, as you may know, but thankfully, Congress is coming together on the one issue all American Americans can agree on.
- [59:38]
Rebecca Gins
Adu.
- [59:39]
Fred Nicholas
Accessory dwelling units. No, in all seriousness, I think it was maybe this week or late last week, there was a proposal to put through some legislation that made it easier to borrow to build an ADU in your backyard. Now, we've talked about ADUs on the show a lot. I think they're great. I don't know that they're the answer to our housing crisis, but I don't think there's anything wrong with accessory dwelling units. And I think it's. It's something that a lot of people on both sides do. The aisle can get behind, which we really need in this day and age. Now, will this actually get voted on? Probably not this summer because of a very partisan issue that I'm not going to mention here on the Thursday show, but hopefully, fingers crossed that this. This ends up being a good piece of law and that it makes its way up the chain, because I think we do need more of that kind of thing. Also, a couple weeks ago, we talked about how the parent company of hgtv, which used to be Warner Discovery, split into two companies where all the streaming shows went on one side and all the cable networks went on the Other and how we speculated about how HGTV might be seeing some cuts. Well, they have come fast and furious. There have been reports that I think like six or seven shows have been cut in the past month alone. Very early, even before this, this deal has really, you know, cooled off. So I suspect we're going to be seeing more stuff like that. I really am curious to see what HGTV looks like after all these cuts, but there appears to be some movement there. I don't know if that caught your eye as well.
- [60:59]
Dennis Scully
It certainly did catch my eye and I'm, and I'm so curious to see what happens there. I mean, first they come for Colbert and then hgtv. I mean, where is it?
- [61:09]
Fred Nicholas
Yeah, exactly. Yes. Don't worry, we're not owned by Comcast or cbs. What caught your eye this week, Thomas?
- [61:16]
Dennis Scully
A couple of things caught my eye. One is former guest of the show Jomo Toriku, who is a furniture maker and a craftsperson and just an all around interesting guy, has had several of his pieces have been added to the Vitra Design Museum collection in Germany, a huge honor for him, including the Nyala chair and the ottoman, which is a favorite of mine. And I also, I really quite fell in love with when I spent some time interviewing Jomo. But I was very excited for him. So congratulations there. A huge honor. The other thing that caught my eye was actually some really interesting pricing activity that was going on in the stock market yesterday. I'm always looking for green shoots signs that perhaps the home and furniture related stocks might finally be on the recovery trail. We got some very strong numbers from two U.S. home builders, Pulte and Dr. Horton. Those names might not mean much to a lot of listeners out there, but, but they're pretty big home builders. And Dr. Horton jumped more than 10% on the news. Pulte as well, they, they had much stronger than expected news. And what was interesting was that it lifted the whole home category. Yesterday there was a, it was a big jump in most Mohawk carpeting and there was a big jump in Wayfair and RH and Ethan Allen. And so you're sort of getting the feeling that that sentiment is shifting regardless of the continuing bad news. We hear about housing sales and we hear a lot more of people pulling out of the purchasing of homes at the 11th hour. These past few months you get the feeling that there is a little bit of a sentiment shift going on and more people are feeling like maybe we have seen the worst of it. So that was, that was encouraging to see. We'll see if it sticks. Another thing for me to talk about when I'm in Vegas with people, when.
- [63:13]
Fred Nicholas
You bring the cheer to Vegas, I think sentiment's gonna tick up at least one more point.
- [63:17]
Dennis Scully
I hope. I hope. All right, that's all the time we have today. Thanks so much for listening. If you want to keep up with the latest news, browse job listings or take a workshop, visit us online@businessofhome.com if you want to get in touch with the show, write to us@podcastusinessofhome.com this episode was produced by Fred Nicholas and Caroline Burke and edited by Michael Castaneda. I'm Dennis Scully. Have a great weekend, and we'll be back with you on Monday.