January 19/26, 2015; Volume 28/Number 15
By Ken Ryan
Flooring retailers have heard the argument that they aren’t just competing against other specialty dealers and big box stores, but also for consumers’ discretionary income.
Still, the fact remains the majority of flooring retailers choose not to open their doors on Sundays—a day that many Americans choose to shop and spend money. Some dealers who are open on Sundays said with more competition than ever before, and an increase in the number of dual-income families, flooring retailers need to adapt to a changing world.
FCNews interviewed dealers nationwide about their philosophies on Sunday hours.
Scott Patrick
Carpet Specialists Carpet One, Ishpeming, Mich.
Open on Sundays, 11 a.m. to 3 pm.
We started opening on Sundays 14 years ago when we built a new store. We are open on Sundays because people are busier than ever on weekdays with work, kids’ events, etc. We feel like weekends are important for our customers to use when needed. It is hit or miss on Sundays, but as a whole it is worth it. Keep in mind our staff is on payroll, not salary. It may be hard to find salaried people to work.
Part of our thought process about being open on Sundays is box store hours. We need to put ourselves in a place to succeed. Success comes from putting yourself where and when your customer wants you, whether it is time related, price related or quality related. With Internet shopping customers are more and more accustomed to instant gratification.
Steve Weissberg
Crest Flooring, Allentown, Pa.
Closed on Sundays
I want to give my employees the “day of rest” off. Crest Flooring maintains late hours on Monday, Thursday and Friday.
We changed our operating hours three years ago to better serve our customers, extending Monday, Thursday and Friday to 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. instead of 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. We noticed we were more available to a great percentage of people after 5. We used to close on long days at 9, and after a lengthy survey we found that after 8 we were generally not busy. It’s important to note that I didn’t do this to compete with the big boxes. We are the leaders in floor covering in our area, not them.
Mark Ledebur
Carpetime, Grand Junction, Colo.
Closed on Sundays
We used to only close three days a year: Christmas, Thanksgiving and Easter. About 10 years ago we started closing on Sundays. We also started closing the store on Labor Day, Memorial Day and 4th of July, and perhaps even the weekend day around those holidays. We have reasons for closing on Sundays: First, when we were open there was not enough business to motivate our commissioned salespeople to work. They started asking for hourly pay on Sundays in addition to whatever they sold. Second, since owners are usually involved with opening and closing the store, it was nice to be able to close Sundays and not have that to take care of. Retail is only part of our business—commercial, new construction and property management are not usually working on weekends. We do not have a late night that we stay open. We do, however, say, “Available by appointment—anytime.”
I think the big box stores opening in our town reduced our Sunday traffic. Our perception was people from out of town would go to the big box store for numerous reasons, flooring being one of them.
Bruce Ball
Floor Concepts, Wilmington, Del.
Closed on Sundays
Sunday is family/rest/religion/sports day. We’re open Monday and Friday nights until 8 p.m. to accommodate working couples. I’ve considered opening on Sundays but most of our customers would just wait until we’re open. The majority of our business is professionally installed floors. Cash-and-carry customers would want to pick it up immediately. If you want it to last for the next 20 years, you don’t necessarily need it on Sunday.
Eric Langan
Carpetland USA , Davenport, Iowa
Open on Sundays, Noon to 5 p.m.
We are open on Sundays because we are a retail business. In retail you have to be open when your customers are available (i.e., not working). Most customers are available at night and on the weekends. It’s the nature of the beast when working retail.
Billy Mahone
Atlas Floors Carpet One, San Antonio, Texas
Closed on Sundays
We have always closed all of our locations on Sundays, mainly as a rest day for our staff since most holidays are working days for us. A few years ago we hired an ambitious sales rep who came from a store that was open seven days a week. She begged us to test out opening the store on Sundays and letting her work. So we advertised it, and she started opening Sundays. The experiment lasted about six months. What we found is that while we were able to generate some traffic on Sundays, it seemed to come at the detriment of our Saturday traffic. I don’t foresee us opening any of our locations again on a Sunday in the future.
Tony Leonard
Carpet One Floor & Home, San Ramon, San Ramon, Calif.
Open on Sundays, Noon to 5 p.m.
Fifteen to 18 years ago we converted over to opening on Sundays. We got a little pushback at the time, but we have to be fishing while the fish are biting. We are in business to do business, not to be convenient for ourselves.
Stephen Dayton
Carpet Village, Pasadena, Md.
Closed on Sundays
We are blessed with quite a bit of business without having to open on Sundays. Sunday is a wonderful day to go to church and be with family. We occasionally reconsider our hours of operation, but do not foresee any changes in the near future.
We have a pretty good web presence that works 24/7 for initial contact, and we do many in-home measurements during the day and in the evenings. Many customers do not visit our showroom.
Cheryl Snowder
The Finishing Touch, Los Alamos, N.M.
Closed on Sundays
I decided 35 years ago when I began my business to open only six days a week, leaving Sunday as a day of rest for myelf and my staff. As a small business, where I work up to 15-hour days the rest of the week, I think it is unhealthy to not take time away from work. Even if I had others working that day instead of me, the fact that the store was open would not allow me to relax and not think about work. The second reason is that my staff also needs time to rest.