Commentary
COMPENDIUM: HOW OUTSIDERS VIEW DETROIT TOO MUCH NEW, DAMAGED FURNITURE GETS THROWN OUT. THIS COMPANY PROVES THERE’S A BETTER APPROACH.
FAST COMPANY FEB. 24, 2022 BY MARK WILSON Go to almost any big furniture store, and there’s a room in the back with scratched tables and returned couches. These damaged goods are sold at a discount, offering a project to someone who is handy, or imperfect but-functional furniture to someone on a budget. However, as online furniture sales have exploded in recent years — it’s now around a $58 billion market in the U.S. — that discount room has ostensibly disappeared. If your coffee table arrives at your house scratched, and you return it for a refund, chances are good that it’s simply sent to the landfill, or you’re asked to dispose of it yourself. Because that’s how retailers handle all sorts of home goods, even goods that are still in perfect shape. But the Detroit-based furniture company Floyd is proving that another model can work. Their program, Full Cycle, takes back items damaged in transit, which is under 2 percent of their total orders. Then it mixes and
matches parts, like table legs, as necessary to make fully functional (if aesthetically flawed) kits. Floyd resells these items online at a discount. The model doesn’t sound all that complicated, but it’s also a rarity in the industry — a rarity that’s already working out pretty well for everyone. Now a year into the program, the company has revealed just how well Full Cycle is going...
AT 85 YEARS OLD, LONGTIME DETROIT ARTIST GETS A SHOW OF HER OWN SMITHSONIAN MAGAZINE MARCH 4, 2022 BY NORA MCGREEVY
Artist Shirley Woodson has seen Detroit through it all. In 1936, her family moved to the city’s north side when Woodson was just three months old. She earned art degrees at Wayne State University in Midtown and, over her six-decades-long career as a professional artist and arts educator in the city, steadily championed Detroit’s thriving Black arts scene, her colleagues say. Now, at 85, Woodson has put on a major solo exhibition of her works at the Detroit Institute of Arts. On view through June 12, “Shirley Woodson: Shield of the
Nile Reflections” showcases 11 of the artist’s colorful canvases rich in Afrocentric symbolism, according to a museum statement. “Shirley’s art exemplifies her quiet determination to creatively express what she has learned about herself and the world she inhabits during the course of her life and career,” said Valerie Mercer, exhibition curator and department head of the DIA’s Center for African American Art, in the statement. “Through her skillful drawing combined with her exuberant palette, she lets us know that it’s always a balancing act to assert the complexities of her existence as a Black female artist, a wife, a mother, a mentor, a friend, and a human being.” As a part-time gallery owner, art historian, and educator, Woodson made a point throughout her career to nurture the careers of young Black artists. Several artists from Detroit, including nationally recognized fiber artist Sonya Clark, credit Woodson as a mentor, as Maureen Feighan reported for The Detroit News in October 2021. Even as an octogenarian, Woodson’s career isn’t slowing down: in 2021, she was named a Kresge Eminent Artist, a prestigious Detroit-based distinction…
DETROIT CAR THIEVES TARGET AUTOMAKERS’ OWN STOCK
CAR AND DRIVER • MARCH 20, 2022 • BY SEBASTIAN BLANCO
Brand-new trucks are disappearing out of the parking lots outside Detroit-area assembly plants in a new twist on car theft — so brand-new, they are still in the custody of the manufacturer. Truck thieves have targeted at least three locations full of new vehicles in the metro Detroit area recently. The details of these thefts are under investigation, but the general plan seems to be that the thieves break into the lot somehow and then drive the new trucks away, maybe by smashing a gate or fence on the way out. A Stellantis spokesperson responded to Car and Driver’s inquiry about these news reports with a short statement on the situation. The statement said Stellantis is working with the Sterling Heights Police Department on the theft of several vehicles from a shipping yard that services the Sterling Heights Assembly Plant managed by a third party. “As this is an open investigation, the company is not commenting any further on what vehicles were stolen or how they were stolen,” the spokesperson said. According to an Instagram post by themetrodetroitnews.com, however, at least 15 vehicles have been stolen in the past month, including new Ram trucks, a Jeep Wagoneer, Charger Hellcats, and a Jeep Trackhawk. Stellantis locations that have claimed to have vehicles stolen recently include a lot in Shelby Township, the Chrysler plant in Auburn Hills, and the Jefferson Assembly plant in Detroit. At least four trucks were stolen from one location in a single night, including a Ram TRX worth more than $100,000. The thief driving one of the trucks quickly crashed the new car into a nearby semi-truck before being picked up by a thief in a different stolen truck. Themetrodetroitnews.com said it can’t confirm if all of these thefts are connected, but there are definite connections between some of them. They claim that two high-end vehicles, including a $90,000 Jeep Grand
Cherokee Trackhawk, were stolen from the Stellantis Jefferson North Assembly Plant a few weeks ago and then, in an unusual twist, the thieves used the Trackhawk to go back to the lot and steal a Dodge Challenger Hellcat a few days later. It might be easier to steal these new vehicles than outsiders assume, according to a report by Detroit’s WDIV-TV that notes that Stellantis and its partners do use prominent security guards at these locations. But the automaker could possibly change a policy to make these new vehicles more difficult to steal. “Insiders tell us it’s really no secret that keys are put in these brand-new, high-dollar trucks and thieves sneak onto the property, somehow undetected, get into the trucks, and wait for the key moment to drive off,” Click On Detroit reporter Shawn Ley said in a video report. Thieves have targeted Detroit-area car factories as easy targets in the past. In 2018, for example, as The Detroit Bureau reported at the time, a group of thieves first stole a 2003 Ram truck, then used that truck to approach the Fiat Chrysler plant in Warren, Michigan, in the middle of the night. From there, they cut a hole through the fence and then drove away with eight new trucks that had recently come off the production line. At the time, there were questions about why the thieves could so easily steal those trucks and it was assumed that the keys were kept in the vehicles. Fiat Chrysler declined to comment on that policy. …
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