IT’S ALL ABOUT
The office furniture business to some people may seem to be such a ho-hum plight but to those of us that have flourished selling “desks”, it’s a wonderful opportunity. The creative designer side of humanity thrives on new gorgeous fabrics, sleek Scandinavian motifs, fun graphic laminates, floor layouts, and being able to create the perfect workspace or home environment. It just comes with the territory and originative thinking to make a customer happy with an end “one of a kind” project.
As a manufacturer’s representative in the furniture biz, my lifetime opportunity came when Texas Motor Speedway built a new condominium building on turn 2 of the race track. We had a line of stadium seating (like chairs at a movie theatre) and were called to put on a “dog and pony show” for the new condo owners. There were five floors of private expensive condos with large glass windows facing the track. The stadium seating was placed at the windows at the front of each condo giving the guests a comfy seat from which to view the race. This type of selling was right down my alley and Texas Motor Speedway became my pet project.
After the initial unveiling of the theatre seating, the very first couple came to me and asked what else was in my portfolio? “What do you need or want?” was the question back to them. As they walked out of a lengthy meeting, I was holding a large check and had my first complete remodel from top to bottom! Since the condo building was cold concrete with white walls and concrete floors, they asked me to do an entire makeover utilizing their colors and choices for finishes. They wanted cabinets, granite, hardwood flooring, leather furniture, fixtures, lighting, theatre seating (thank goodness!) and everything else to make the concrete box livable. Once they were gone, I sat by myself in the quiet showroom, having never done anything like this before, nor has the first item to install and just repeated to myself…“can’t never could”. I knew it was going to be an undeniable challenge since it was approximately 6 weeks to the first race, but do-able!
Luckily soon after, I discovered one of our furniture factories was under the umbrella of a large manufacturer that had another 20 companies…like us, but with cabinets, faucets, carpets, appliances, toilets, and everything needed to do a humongous future condo job. Bottom line I requested catalogs “stat” from all companies, got to know all the top management people in the partnered companies and began to layout the condo building for the couple. And yes, oh dear, word got out and customers started ringing the phone off the hook for my remodel talent!!
Not only did my services require putting each project together with pictures and colors, but also to present budgets, get things ordered, find installers, and set up a schedule before the first race of the season. The General Contractor of the condo building was having problems getting finished with the building. They had to complete official signoffs to get out of the way and turn over the building to me to finish each private suite. It seemed like forever…and it was!
When they finally did get out of the way, there were only 12 days until the first race. Thankfully being extremely organized, all things had been ordered and a schedule had been developed for the now 17 condos that had asked for help.
Important to note here, there were no cell phones when this project started, only beepers! We set up a code system of numbers with the subcontractors and everybody that was working for me….beeping condo number, how soon, etc. As I blew up the beepers communicating with all, carried a set of plans, schedules, whiteboard, beeper, pen, pencils, erasers, coke, lunch, stapler, tape, scissors, projects, phone numbers of customers and a pocket of quarters (for the payphone), it became impossible to stay organized. Thus, the only solution was to set up a temporary office. Outside the elevator in the atrium, on the 10 th floor was a large open carpeted glassed waiting area which soon became my corner office! All the subs knew where my “official” floor office was located and when beeped each of them hustled to the 10 th floor ….literally, the floor! The plans were laid out as if the floor was my desk, with all extras organized accordingly. Sometimes they would get off the elevator and have to wait in line to sit on the floor in front of my “floor desk” and were asked to sit down …. On the floor! We all sat Indian style with our legs…cross-legged.
In the meantime, I needed an assistant to run errands and check on things that were supposed to b on the schedule and happening…the time frame wa getting shorter and shorter. My usual trusty standby was my dad and he went to work right beside me. Th only difference was he was on a beeper and receiving coded messages checking on finishes, electricians plumbers, floor installers, painters, and all the subs bouncing from condo 507 to 909 to 1005 to 608 to the office on the 10 th floor and back again. Dad wa making constant rounds picking up things, checking on workmanship, etc. I couldn’t have done it withou him! Then, devastatingly one of my condo owner hired him away from me to build several things in he condo. After all, her husband was the Mayor of a Dallas suburb and they were important! So, dad left m to go to work for the elite!!
Customers included CEO’s of many of the larges Dallas and Ft Worth companies, as well as the owner of the track, and several race car drivers and owners. One of the most fun projects was on the penthouse floor, middle suites. It was actually the two middle suites which I combined by deleting a middle wall into their penthouse corporate board operation. The CEO came almost every day as he didn’ think it would be possible to finish within the given time frame. Completed, it was a very large suite of 5 bedrooms, 5 bathrooms, 2 complete kitchens, wood hand scraped flooring, all furniture, and a large corporate board room with a custom conference table He quickly developed a trust giving me carte-blanch and said if anybody could pull this off, he had the on that could do it! Consequently, it was no longer necessary to call him when there was a question, just answer it yourself and go on!! He had scheduled a party for 225 people on the day of the first race. I got to go too, right there with Bobby Labonte! And, my mom was so jealous as he was her secret CRUSH, absolut favorite Nascar driver!
As race day got closer and closer, people were starting to panic and were calling more and more frequently for my help! However, there was a point that it wa not possible to take any more customers as our tim had run out. In fact, looking for my painters one day they were located in another suite, pulled off my job by another wealthy owner paying cash!! You actually had to guard your workers at all times from peopl swiping them! It was a final chaotic week of no sleep boxing people for the few elevators in the building to move in furniture and supplies getting ready for th first race.
Not only did we have to get the finishes done bu move in beds, chairs, dishes, booze, ice, groceries, and every single thing that it took to have a fabulous firstclass party during the first race.
By the time the first race day came, we all appeared like tattered, actually worn to shreds… individual having had no sleep for a week, bloodshot eyes, and no doubt were all a bit grouchy, but we made it! Th feat that nobody thought could be accomplished, wa done!
I was fortunate to spend the first race on the rooftop of the condo building with several of my customers. Each condo on the 10 th floor had interior stairway access to a roof viewing area. How exciting to hear the public address announcer say, “DRIVERS START YOUR ENGINES”!...and all the race cars rev up their engines to a deafening height as you smel that 110-octane leaded gas! In the entire world, ther is nothing like watching a NASCAR race, sitting in a very high-end condo that you built from sitting on th floor of the office in the elevator corridor!