If you live in Cincinnati, or even the Tri-state region, you know the name: Furniture Fair. The locally owned and operated business opened its doors in 1963 and has grown to include 11 stores from Dayton to Louisville. In March, the family business began renovations of its Loveland location on Fields Ertel, and come July, customers will get to enjoy a new store layout, more special-order options and exciting technological upgrades. Says Furniture Fair Marketing Director Craig Daniels, “It’s the furniture store that Loveland, Fields Ertel and Mason deserve.”
At roughly 76,000 square feet, the Fields Ertel Furniture Fair is one of the company’s largest stores. The renovation includes an enhanced design center as its pièce de résistance, offering up a wide range of customizable design and special-order opportunities. Merchandise Manager Cindy Baker says there is about seven brands’ worth of fabric to consider (with most of those brands carrying a minimum of 500 fabrics), along with hundreds of leathers, finishes and nail heads, among other design components.
“We want you to see our design center. We want you to know that this is your furniture. You’re designing the room of your dreams,” says Baker. “This area is set up for presentation and for true design work to be done, for as little as helping a customer select fabrics for a chair to as much as doing a new house.”
The Fields Ertel renovation follows the lead of Furniture Fair’s Louisville location, which opened in 2018. It became the blueprint for new (and newly renovated) stores going forward to meet the design and product needs of today’s customers. While the Fields Ertel store did have a design center, says Baker, it dated back to 2002 and no longer suited the way Furniture Fair does business. She calls the design center of the newer stores “very bold,” underscoring the range of selections and price points the company offers.
“That design center allows us to show anyone who walks into that showroom the breadth of product that we have,” says Baker. “This is like a banner that says, ‘Hey, you want it? We got it, we’ll figure out how to get it for you, we’ll figure out how to make it. At every phase of your life and for every need you have, we have products to fit that, and the design center is really a great example of it.”
Additionally, the renovated Fields Ertel location features Furniture Fair’s exclusive, bed-match technology system. A large-scale mural in the bedding department highlights the simple, four-step process of finding “a perfect night’s sleep,” says Daniels. The mural is the first of its kind for Furniture Fair, and the Fields Ertel location is the only store so far to have it.
With the bed-match technology system, customers can optimize their bed and mattress selection through computer technology to narrow down their options, rather than physically test out every mattress on the floor. The process starts by asking a handful of questions about your sleep habits and patterns — if you sleep on your side, if you sleep on your back, if you sleep alone or with a partner, if you wake up with any back pain, etc. You then lie down on the mattress and rollers inside (like a massage chair) move across your body, applying pressure and measuring your weight differential. Then, the system makes its recommendations of mattress options best suited to your needs.
“We carry roughly 42 to 45 beds per store and testing 42 to 45 beds is just not realistic,” says Baker. She adds that the bed-match technology mural that outlines the simple process gives customers a better feeling of control while shopping.
The renovated Furniture Fair boasts a number of other enhancements, like a more visually accessible store layout and an upgraded exterior. Salespeople are equipped with iPads on the showroom floor to provide a more holistic and knowledgeable shopping experience. And the design center features a 5,000-square-foot gallery of Stickley Furniture a premier brand of American-made furniture with craftsmanship that dates back to the 1900s. Furniture Fair is Cincinnati’s exclusive Stickley dealer, and the Fields Ertel and Florence locations are the only stores to carry the brand.
For both Daniels and Baker, the grand-scale renovation reflects Furniture Fair’s deep ties to the Loveland and Mason region. The company employs team members from the community, supports local charities and enjoys different types of community engagement. That is what separates the furniture store from others. According to Daniels, “We’re not Haverty’s, we’re not Ashley, we’re not Bob’s Furniture. We’re a local company. Family-owned and operated.”
Says Baker, “We wouldn’t be able to do what we’re doing at this store if the community didn’t already support us. This is our way of giving back to those who have already been our loyal customers.”
The grand re-opening of Furniture Fair on Fields Ertel is scheduled for mid-July. The store is located at 9591 Fields Ertel Rd., Loveland, Ohio 45140.
If you are interested in design services, stop into one of Furniture Fair’s 11 locations in the Cincinnati, Dayton or Louisville area. Meet with a member of their design team, or visit them online at furniturefair.net to check out the many furniture options available on their sales floor.