Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SUNDAY, April 25, 1993                   TAG: 9304230085
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: D-1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: SANDRA BROWN KELLY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

PROMOTION WAS A HIT - A TRIPLE

"If You're A Conventional Furniture Retailer, You've Probably Noticed The Industry Going In One Direction," the box front said.

Inside the package was a toilet seat.

The mailing was the first of a three designed to get the retailers to come hear about the Salem manufacturer's gallery and franchise store programs, or just get to know the upholstery furniture company and its products.

Rowe has its ShowPlace galleries in 100 stores, plus it has eight free-standing speciality or franchised Rowe stores.

Rowe also placed ads in trade publications like Furniture Today to reinforce the promotion to retailers.

The promotion was a departure for the company, which has tended toward a conservative image.

"I'm sure some of the retailers reacted with `What the hell is this?' " said Bruce Birnbach, Rowe's vice president in charge of merchandising.

The promotion had as its theme the state of the furniture industry.

The toilet seat was accompanied by a serious message: "It's no joke. Furniture retailers are going down the tubes in record numbers."

It included statistics that there are 33 percent fewer retail furniture stores in the United States now than 12 years ago and that another 15 percent will go out of business by the year 2000.

Then came a come-on about Rowe's ShowPlace program that lets a customer select fabric and furniture style through a video process and get the custom piece delivered in 30 days.

The second mailing came about a week after the first one. The box read: "If You're A Conventional Furniture Retailer, There's Definitely One Thing You Can Expect To Run Into."

Inside was a section of faux brick wall and this message:

"It's true, furniture retailers are experiencing some very solid resistance from consumers these days. With devastating results. It seems those 60-percent- to 80-percent-off sales just aren't working as well as they used to.

"Because too many furniture retailers lack any real concept to draw customers, they end up competing on price alone. When traffic doesn't come, and the register doesn't ring, they deepen their discount and have another sale. There is, however, an alternative to this vicious circle."

Of course, the alternative was Rowe.

A third package warned: "Before the End of This Year, Over 900 Furniture Retailers Will Have a Use for the Contents of This Box."

Inside was a "Going-Out-of-Business" banner and this:

"It's sad, but true. The `Going Out of Business Sale' is now almost as common in the retail furniture business as that old favorite, the `Midnight Madness Sale.' . . . Pretty scary, huh? Luckily, there is a way to avoid saleing yourself down the river."

Then it gave Rowe's promotion.

And after each package, a Rowe sales representative followed up with a telephone call to the retailer asking if the package arrived.

Did it work?

In the first two days of the wholesale market, 85 of the targeted retailers visited Rowe's displays, said Mark Moseley, vice president for advertising. He was the person who put together the promotion with Adworks Inc. of Washington, D.C.

"We're ecstatic," he said last week, after the market ended.