HOM Furniture to open first bedding shops

HOM Furniture is planning to enter the freestanding sleep shop arena with the opening of as many as six HOM Sleep Express stores over the next 12 months.

The stores will be in the 4,000-square-foot range and will be around the greater Minneapolis-St. Paul market, where the retailer can use additional bedding penetration, said Rod Johansen, president and CEO of the Top 100 company.

The standalone stores will be in addition to existing Sleep Express shops within HOM's six full-line stores in the market. The stores' size will enable the retailer to show its complete assortment of Tempur-Pedic and Serta bedding, Johansen said.

HOM has been marketing its in-store bedding departments as HOM Sleep Express for years - to the point where the name has developed its own brand recognition outside of HOM. Sleep Express is the strongest brand for mattresses in the market next to Slumberland, Johansen said.

Other competitors in the area include Mattress Giant, Original Mattress and several local sleep chains.

Johansen would not disclose HOM's expected investment in the rollout but said he projected the stores would have annual sales comparable to top industry bedding stores - in the $1 million to $1.25 million range. That's significantly less than the HOM Sleep Express departments in its full-line stores, but should be enough to make the venture pay off, he said.

"We're just trying to capitalize in areas where there is a distance between (HOM) showrooms," he said. "It's a convenience play.... We're trying to be more convenient to (consumers) if they want to business with us."

He would not identify the exact locations or timing of the openings, noting that HOM is still negotiating on leases, but he said the company plans to have all stores open within 12 months.

Queen sets at HOM Sleep Express start at $299 and run up to about $6,000 for a topof- the-line Tempur-Pedic.

HOM's furniture, bedding and accessories sales rose about 5.4% last year to an estimated $193.4 million at 15 stores, including Dock 86 and Gabberts Design Studio & Fine Furniture. This year, the retailer already has expanded Gabberts with the opening of two new stores in Sioux Falls, S.D., and Sioux City, Iowa, and has opened a replacement HOM store in Sioux Falls.