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The Media Center is the heart of Great Bridge Primary School in Chesapeake, Virginia. Hertz Furniture sourced the furnishings, including soft seating from Academia Furniture and curvy bookcases from Russwood Library Furniture.

Hertz Furniture Branches Out

President David Mocton discusses growth strategies and a recent acquisition

by Tina Manzer, photos by Hertz Furniture

At the conclusion of their 2021 back-to-school season, the team at Hertz Furniture in New Jersey barely had enough time to catch their breath before the 2022 back-to-school season began, reports David Mocton, company president. “One of my VPs said to me, ‘David, I don’t think last year’s ever ended.’”

Hertz Furniture has been on an upward sales trend since 2012, but in both 2019 and 2021 the school furniture distributor experienced double-digit growth. This year, the heavy ordering cycle that traditionally begins in May got started in January and was fully underway by March. To accommodate all the orders, the company’s installation schedule now stretches into December.

Fortunately, Hertz Furniture was prepared for the onslaught. “By late February, I could see the writing on the wall,” David explained. “There was already a lot of activity in our sales department; I could see that there was tremendous interest. I had to make sure that we were ready for what was coming our way.”

To that end, Hertz opened a new warehouse in California, the company’s fourth. The others are strategically placed in New Jersey (two) and Texas. Hertz Furniture also hired a summer crew in April that will remain with the company through October.

“In addition, we’re getting orders to our manufacturers early to ensure they have the components they need down the supply chain to assemble product in time,” David says. “We need timely deliveries to our warehouses so that we can consolidate orders and install them on the date we promised our customers.”

Recently, in a move that speaks more to growth than preparedness, Hertz Furniture acquired School Furnishings, a company whose business model is similar to Hertz’s. School Furnishings served all of New England from its base in Hudson, New Hampshire. David said, “It’s the first time in our nearly 60year history that we have looked outside our house for a complementary entity in a region that, for us, was mostly untapped.”