Collett's Home Furnishings at 7200 S. State St. is history following its long and controversial going-out-of-business sale begun last September, but that doesn't mean Salt Lake area consumers will have to go elsewhere to update the living room couch or furnish the spare bedroom.
Levitz Furniture Corp., which has operated an 85,000-square-foot furniture showroom/warehouse for 17 years at 1414 S. 500 West, has leased the Midvale building and will take occupancy Feb. 26 to prepare for a late April grand opening as a Levitz furniture showroom.The decision to expand its Salt Lake operations represents a significant about-face locally for Levitz, the nation's largest furniture retailer with annual sales near $1 billion.
A year ago, Levitz, based in Boca Raton, Fla., was seriously considering pulling out of Salt Lake City due to sluggish sales that belied the city's ranking in the top 15 per-capita furniture markets nationally.
But last year, under new general manager Andrew Ross, Levitz made a dramatic turnaround locally with sales up more than 75 percent.
Ross, 32, takes no credit for the turnaround, saying only that the company's employees (totaling 85 when the Midvale store is up and running) "worked their tails off."
Levitz will lease the 50,000-square-foot Midvale building from owner Ferris Collett, operator of the original Collett's. Two years ago, he leased the building to Thomas J. Richards who kept the name and operated it as the "new" Collett's. Despite that company's inability to prosper at the site, Andrews considers it a prime location for a furniture store.
"That location has always been a winner," he said. "We're really going to take advantage of everything that's available in the way of furniture for Levitz customers. That means catering to 70 percent of the market - taking off the top 15 percent and the bottom 15 percent."
The new store will be a showroom-only operation, he said, with the 500 South location acting as the warehouse for the new store. The Midvale store will be the largest showroom-only facility in the Levitz chain which includes 120 showrooms and 70 warehouse/showrooms across the nation.
"We are opening new stores every month," said Andrews.
He said the 7200 South location "is where we've needed to be all along" to reach the large consumer market in Sandy, Draper and the south valley.
"Our feeling is that to get the cross-shopping, we need to be in the heart of the valley. We've proven to the company that this (the Salt Lake area) is a great market (but) we really haven't been able to get our share of business in this (500 South) location."
The new store, he said, is a "merchandiser's dream" because it will be large enough to display specialty merchandise along with the basic lines of furnishings. "This gives us the opportunity to really merchandise and cater to the public."
Does Levitz' resurgence signal a turnaround in the Utah economy? Andrews won't speculate on that but says he "can't complain."
"We need to get housing going, and we need to get more job opportunities, but it's a great place to live - Utah's one of this country's best-kept secrets."
Levitz, once a publicly traded company, was taken private in a leveraged buyout headed by Chairman Robert Elliott and President George Bradley, a Utah native.