The Benefits of a Purposeful Company Culture
Many home furnishings retailers haven’t given enough time and thought to
the formal definition of their company’s culture. That’s generally
because ways of doing business tend to evolve organically over time.
And, for many of HFA’s retail members, that means generations.
When showroom doors closed during the pandemic, HFA members were forced
to address issues they might not have thought about or had pushed onto a
back burner. One of these was corporate culture. In general, retailers
who were forced to furlough workers without a defined culture of caring
and communication, transparency and collaboration had a more challenging
time and a much steeper uphill climb throughout the pandemic.
CITY Furniture
This was made more apparent when I traveled to CITY Furniture’s Florida
headquarters to present HFA’s 2022 Retailer of the Year award.
CITY is one of those companies that checks all the boxes. Founder Keith
Koenig and his CEO son Andrew have a best-in-class approach to
everything. CITY has seven core values.
- Entrepreneurial Spirit
- Family Spirit
- Mutual Trust & Respect
- Teamwork
- Customer Focus
- Continuous Improvement
- Giving Back
While making the award presentation, I noticed that the first four core
values are all internally focused. The fifth on the list, customer
focus, is realized because of CITY Furniture’s careful attention to the
entrepreneurial spirit, family spirit, mutual trust and respect, and
teamwork. Their success and growth during the pandemic and the fact they
brought back their key people is based on the skillful execution of
those top four core values. It’s a remarkable legacy.
What About You?
Is your culture strong enough to hold you up no matter the next
disruption? If not, you have work to do, and that work needed to start
yesterday. Culture is not something that just happens. It has to be
purposeful and developed over time.
For more information on what HFA is doing to empower furniture
retailers for continued success, join the community at
www.myhfa.org..