furniture and home: March 2009 Archives

Online retailer Home Decor Products is closing all nine of its businesses. The company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy Thursday and has begun liquidating assets. Home Decor, which had more than $83 million in sales last year, considered but rejected a Chapter 11 filing that would have kept the business operational.

Home Decor Products' sites, including HomeClick.com, AbsoluteHome.com, Barbecues.com, PoolClick.com, are not accepting orders, and the sites have a variety of messages posted on them, from goodbyes to "temporarily for browsing only" announcements. The corporate web site at HDPI.com has been taken offline.

While the turmoil at Dial-A-Mattress has concluded, woes in the bedroom and home goods businesses continue elsewhere. In Indiana, TBO LLC was placed in receivership and its 16 stores shuttered earlier this week. The stores, such as Today's Bedroom One, The Mattress Gallery and Today's Kids, have been closed since Tuesday; the parent company hopes to reopen eight Mattress Gallery locations once court proceedings have concluded.

Meanwhile, Hendricks Furniture is strategically closing stores, including two in North Carolina and all its Florida locations.

On the heels of the Dial-A-Mattress drama, bed manufacturer Select Comfort is closing 55 stores in a reaction to lagging sales. Thirty of the store closings are planned for the first quarter, which means the stores will be shut in a matter of weeks. Select Comfort had 470 outlets prior to the announcement.

Dial-A-Mattress, the well-known mattress retailer who owns 1-800-MATTRESS and 1800mattress.com, has had an involuntary Chapter 7 bankruptcy motion filed against it by three of its creditors. The trio are reportedly angry that 1800mattress.com is not paying its bills. Just last week Dial-A-Mattress announced a plan to be sold to a business entity called Dial Mattress Acquisition LLC, which promised a "swift" injection of cash to keep the company running.

The bankruptcy filing does not affect 1800mattress.com franchisees throughout New England, who noted business continues as usual at their stores.

Shabby Chic has begun liquidating its eight retail stores. The home goods line had quietly filed chapter 11 bankruptcy in January (so quietly, in fact, that Timely Demise didn't hear about it). A federal judge ordered the stores to liquidate as part of the bankruptcy proceedings. The liquidation does not include the Simply Shabby Chic line sold at Target. (This news will not be taken lightly at Timely Demise HQ, home to several Shabby Chic sheet sets.)

Creator Rachel Ashwell is retaining the rights to the Shabby Chic name and its designs, but it is unclear at this time whether the brand will continue, and in what form.