Contemporary Furniture

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The Challenge

Showcasing a frequently changing inventory online.

The Project

With one local New York showroom, Contemporary Furniture wanted to showcase its products online to take advantage of a national potential customer base. But with thousands of products, a changing inventory and variable options and availability, Contemporary Furniture needed a cost effective way to update information on the web site and make it available quickly to customers. To meet this need and give Contemporary Furniture the flexibility to grow its web site along with its business, we have helped by:

• Designing a database to house Contemporary Furniture's full product inventory including photography, product descriptions, pricing, fabrics, finishes, options and availability.
• Building a content management system so that Contemporary Furniture can easily and immediately update product information, as well as create and edit product categories and subcategories, upload video files and edit other site content including ordering and shipping policies, showroom information special offers.
• Giving site administrators product cross-reference capabilities that allow them to define a meaningful site structure based on customer requests and visitor activity.
• Programming site search features to give visitors easy access to products.
• Developing administrative reporting tools that allow staff to more easily manage a large inventory.
• Programming a Personal Showroom feature that lets customers save favorite products for later viewing or email the page to a friend.
• Integrating mini-polls that allow site visitors to give Contemporary Furniture instant and specific feedback.
  Integrating with Constant Contact, a program that allows visitors to sign up for Contemporary Furniture's email newsletter.

The Benefits

We have worked with Contemporary Furniture through several redesigns and multiple feature enhancements to both the web site and the content management system as their business has grown. Some of the benefits to their business include:

• Money Savings. With the ability to make site updates in-house, Contemporary Furniture kept maintenance costs to a minimum and ensured that the most current product information was immediately available to customers.
• Increased Sales. Able to reach a national audience, Contemporary Furniture expanded its customer base and its presence in the contemporary furniture market.
• Enhanced Customer Service and Marketing. With web features like polls, the personal showroom and email-a-friend capabilities, Contemporary Furniture was able to provide visitors with an enhanced, interactive experience and collect marketing data to help them make informed marketing decisions.

Our Client

Contemporary Furniture is a national contemporary, modern and Scandinavian furniture retailer with a showroom in Buffalo, New York. Their product line encompasses bedroom to home office, dining room to home theater and includes many accessories, accents and art pieces.

A Word From Our Client

"It seems that we are saving customers a 20-60 minute drive to see what we are all about. Our customers are using the Web site as a resource. They like to be pre-informed when they come to the showroom."

John Kenyon, National sales manager

Inventory Management

Contemporary Furniture stays on top of changing inventory and customer demand by managing their product line in-house. Their CMS gives them the flexibility to update images, descriptions, pricing, options and availability with no lag time. Over the years, as their business needs have changed, we've added new management capabilities to their system using a core that was built for expandability.

An Evolving Design

Most of the content and imagery is managed internally, but we've helped define a site structure that has grown along with the capabilities of Contemporary Furniture's CMS and their growing and changing product line.

A Decade Of Difference

It's fun to watch the evolution of a site that has changed with the times. By building lasting relationships with our customers, we're able to see and be a part of many unique progressions.