The Furniture Awards 2023 winners revealed

The winners of The Furniture Awards 2023, delivered by Furniture News in partnership with the January Furniture Show, were revealed at the event’s exhibitor party last month.

Each year, the awards set out to identify the show’s most inspiring suppliers, says the awards’ co-ordinator, Paul Farley: “It’s great to see so many examples of businesses that are not just surviving, but thriving.”

The show’s exhibitors were invited to make their case in one of five categories: Sustainability; Best of British; Design Innovation; Global Player; and a new bracket, Superior Service. The entrants were shortlisted and assessed by a judging panel chaired by Paul, and comprising: Malcolm Walker (the owner of consultancy FIRST MW); Suzy McMahon (CCO of Oak Furnitureland); Sheetal Sachdev (founder of interiors network Treniq); and Andy Stockwell (the senior retail manager of homewares retailer Gardiner Haskins).

This year’s winners are: Westbridge Furniture Designs (Sustainability); GNG Group (Best of British); Citibed (Design Innovation); Wiemann (Global Player); and Sci-Net (Superior Service).

“Well done to this year’s very deserving winners,” concludes Paul, “and to the finalists, and the businesses which were highly commended by the judges in each category: in Sustainability, Think Rugs; in Best of British, RH45; in Design Innovation, Gallery Direct; in Global Player, Tomasella; and in Superior Service, Iconography.”

Next month’s issue will feature a detailed round-up of the awards programme.

Reshaped board means new MD for Furniture Village

Furniture Village has made several senior appointments from within, following an exit deal from external shareholders which enabled it to become 100% family owned.

Founder Peter Harrison comments: “Internal promotions may be typical in family businesses, but less common in those with around 1200 employees, 55 stores, 17 fulfilment centres and an annual turnover of circa £400m. It is only possible because we have an exceptionally skilled and well-qualified team.”

The key role changes are: Peter Harrison has taken on the position of executive chairman, continuing to play a full-time role in both the strategic and operational activities of the business; Peter’s son, Charlie Harrison, has taken on the position of MD, after over 20 years’ service across several areas of the business, and is tasked with overseeing all day-to-day operations;

Nick Hipkiss, who held several key operational roles within the business and was previously HR director, has also taken over responsibility for retail, and now holds the main board position of commercial director; Eamon Wynne, previously FD looking after general operations, has been appointed CFO; Mike Broughton remains on the board as CIO, leading business development and systems improvements;

Claudia Cooper has been appointed to the main board as multi-channel director; David Ayers, who joined Furniture Village just over a year ago, has been appointed to the board as operations director, taking responsibility for both fulfilment and customer care; and Stephen Sing has been appointed director of customer experience.

Wayfair announces further downsizing measures

Wayfair has announced additional details related to “right-sizing” its cost structure, as well as continued strong business performance since the Cyber Five period.

Totalling more than $1.4b in annualised cost actions, Wayfair’s plan – initiated last August – is well under way, and is expected to accelerate the company’s timeline for adjusted EBITDA breakeven to earlier in 2023 as the first step towards positive free cash flow.

As a part of this effort, Wayfair has announced a reduction of approximately 1750 employees, representing 10% of its global workforce as of December 31st, 2022. This includes approximately 1200 or 18% of corporate employees. Wayfair says these changes reflect efforts to “eliminate management layers and reorganise to be more agile”.

Inclusive of its August 2022 restructuring, the labour portion of the plan represents approximately $750m in annualised cost savings, with the major steps necessary to realise these savings now complete.

“Although difficult, these are important decisions to get back to our 20-year roots as a focused, lean company premised on high ambitions and great execution,” says Niraj Shah, CEO, co-founder, and co-chairman, Wayfair. “The changes announced strengthen our future without reducing our total addressable market, our strategic objectives, or our ability to deliver them over time. In hindsight, similar to our technology peers, we scaled our spend too quickly over the last few years.”

In December, Wayfair’s YoY gross revenue trends experienced a further improvement compared to the month of November, adds Niraj.