Who is Restoration Hardwares competition? CEO Gary Friedman dismissively referenced Pottery Barn, Crate & Barrel, Ethan Allen and Room & Board as competitors in the sense that they also sell better furniture and home furnishings. But in the 2nd Quarter 2014 earnings call earlier today, Friedman said the real opportunity for the retailer is hidden behind an iron curtain.

The CEO announced real upside for Restoration Hardware is the highly fragmented segment known as to-the-trade design centers, which are accessed nearly exclusively by interior design professionals or individuals with a resale license. Friedman explained that designers routinely receive industry discounts of 20-40%, but consumers need to hire interior designers to access design-center merchandise so any potential discounts may be lost to them. Friedman believes this target market is Restoration Hardwares big opportunity for future growth in both volume and margin. The retailers vision is to house disparate categories of a design district under one roof, giving access and pricing transparency to all consumers.

Perhaps articulation of this vision gives context to the 11-pound mega catalog Restoration Hardware mailed last June, receiving tremendous publicity, much of it not positive. Despite criticism, Friedman still considers the catalog a success, though one likely to be optimized in the future. Interestingly, Friedman himself admitted that his very own Restoration Hardware 12-book compendium remains on a counter in his kitchen, and that he hasnt had a chance to go through it all yet. Its easy to believe that Friedmans experience is consistent with many Restoration Hardware consumersthough they may be less likely than the companys CEO to keep the books on hand for future browsing.

Like the bold move of an epic hardcopy catalog in an increasingly digital world, Restoration Hardware sees their growth coming from aggressive expansion in retail space. Friedman asserts that when online/catalog items receive in-store presence, sales lift from 50 to 150%. It makes sense that merchandise perfectly displayed and lit in gorgeous environs are elevated from products to a lifestyle, likely increasing the desirability of attaining that lifestyle and increasing sales of those items.

When asked what specific line within the Restoration Hardware portfolio that Friedman was most excited for future growth, there was a Benjamin Braddock moment. However, Friedman sees the future not as plastics, but as leatherdistressed leather.

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Behind The Wrought Iron Curtain: Restoration Hardware's CEO Says True Competition Is Professional Designers

Matawan, NJ (PRWEB) September 09, 2014

"Are you looking to accomplish a home improvement project this year? Are you having second thoughts about being able to complete the project yourself? Stop by our booth number 605 and come visit us to see if we can help you, Diane one of our Sales/Business Manager will be there to assist you", said Mike Bruno owner of Stone Creek Builders.

"The show has become the go-to place for Shore Region homeowners to locate high caliber home improvement professionals to perform needed home improvements. The Home Improvement Show features companies that specialize in small home improvement tasks, routine maintenance chores, large renovations, and new construction", said a SCB representative. Stone Creek Builders will be exhibiting our expertise for the duration of the show. We will be available to answer home improvement questions, explain the benefits of specific renovations, offer estimates, and showcase previous home improvement work the company has accomplished.

The Fall Home Improvement show will be held on September 20th and September 21st at Monmouth University. Monmouth University is located in West Long Branch, New Jersey. The show will run from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. Passes to the show are only 7 dollars for adults and 5 dollars for youth between the ages of 12 and 17. Children 11 and under can enter the show for free when accompanied by a parent. Seniors can attend the show at the reduced cost of 5 dollars on Friday only. Questions about the show can be answered by calling the information number 848-221-8074. Interested parties can also visit the event's website at http://www.macevents.com.

Stone Creek Builders is proud to attend an event with such a high concentration of professional contractors and home improvement specialists. We will be exhibiting at booth number 605 for the duration of the Home Improvement Show. Be sure to visit us to discover how our affordability and expertise can greatly improve your home. Our staff looks forward to meeting you at the show.

Don't procrastinate your home improvement projects any longer. If you have decided a certain project is above your skill level, attend the show to discover how your home improvement visions can be easily accomplished. Whether you are looking to repair a small problem or construct an entire luxury home, the Home Improvement Show is the place to be, said Mike Bruno.

About Stone Creek Builders

The founder of Stone Creek Builders has been a leading provider of building, remodeling and restoration services for over 20 years. Stone Creek Builders provides general contracting, remodeling, insurance restoration, house lifting, and storm reconstruction services to clients in central and shore regions of New Jersey. Contact us at (732) 566-0395 or visit our website at http://www.stonecreekbldrs.com for more information.

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Stone Creek Builders Will Be Exhibiting at the Fall Home Improvement Show

Marcus Lim: TV shows can serve as inspiration as well as entertainment.

The boom in TV home reno shows is proving to be a boon for home improvement industries, with data indicating a spike in demand for tradies after Channel Seven's House Rules went to air in April this year.

Rather than just sitting on their sofas watching the contestants battle it out for the grand prize, figures collected by local services marketplace Oneflare shows a surge in home industry related job requests across the board.

Some of the quotes posted on ServiceSeeking are definitely ideas from House Rules.

The upswing includes a 48 per cent rise in job postings for interior designers, a 35 per cent rise in requests for kitchen renovations, a 30 per cent increase in bathroom renovation job postings, and a 28 per cent increase in requests for architects.

Speaking about the data, Marcus Lim, co-founder and CEO of Oneflare says: "Usually there's a relatively steady amount of jobs in each service category, like people searching for cleaners, plumbers and electricians. But in April of this year, we were baffled as to why there was a sudden jump in people posting home improvement jobs specifically.

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"When we looked into it further, we realised there was a link between when the House Rules show went to air and our job request data. It suggests that TV shows can serve as inspiration as well as entertainment."

Oneflare's renovation and design planning tool, Scrapbooks, which lets home builders compare and hire the best value worker, and manage home improvement jobs from their home device or PC also experienced a spike in traffic.

Home reno dreams are even outstripping desire for a tropical holiday according to an online survey by interiors destination thehome.com.au. When asked what would you do with a spare $15 000, 72 per cent of respondents nominated home improvements over a holiday.

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The truth about home reno shows

Former Flint Police sergeant charged with CSC involving minors Former Flint Police sergeant charged with CSC involving minors

Updated: Friday, September 5 2014 6:28 PM EDT2014-09-05 22:28:09 GMT

Lawrence Bonett Woods was charged on Friday with 16 counts of CSC. We are told, so far police believe the crimes occurred between 1996 and 2000.

Lawrence Bonett Woods was charged on Friday with 16 counts of CSC. We are told, so far police believe the crimes occurred between 1996 and 2000.

Updated: Sunday, September 7 2014 12:34 AM EDT2014-09-07 04:34:45 GMT

(09/6/14) - The annual Genesee County Firefighters Memorial Service was held Saturday at the Flint Memorial Park Cemetery in Genesee Township.This is the 18th year of the service. The service wasn't very long, only about 45 minutes, but it was powerful. Each of the county's firefighters gathered along with family and friends around the memorial that lists the names of firefighters who sacrificed their lives protecting others. The memorial organizers are looking for surviving family members of...

(09/6/14) - The annual Genesee County Firefighters Memorial Service was held Saturday at the Flint Memorial Park Cemetery in Genesee Township.This is the 18th year of the service. The service wasn't very long, only about 45 minutes, but it was powerful. Each of the county's firefighters gathered along with family and friends around the memorial that lists the names of firefighters who sacrificed their lives protecting others. The memorial organizers are looking for surviving family members of...

Updated: Sunday, September 7 2014 12:32 AM EDT2014-09-07 04:32:00 GMT

(09/06/14) - Imagine coming home to a driveway full of firefighters, and your house suffocated in smoke.That is exactly what happened to a Burton family Saturday evening. The fire happened at a home in the 1200 block of Vassar Road, that is just off Lapeer in the city of Burton. It started around 4:00 p.m. "I pulled up and I saw the firefighters in my driveway, it scared me to death," said Cody Titswort, Burton. The fire started in the basement and that is where it stayed thanks to the fast a...

(09/06/14) - Imagine coming home to a driveway full of firefighters, and your house suffocated in smoke.That is exactly what happened to a Burton family Saturday evening. The fire happened at a home in the 1200 block of Vassar Road, that is just off Lapeer in the city of Burton. It started around 4:00 p.m. "I pulled up and I saw the firefighters in my driveway, it scared me to death," said Cody Titswort, Burton. The fire started in the basement and that is where it stayed thanks to the fast a...

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Family shocked to come home to fire, Burton firefighter injured while fighting the flames

Welcome to Platinum Real Estate Holdings!
Platinum Real Estate Holdings owners have over 40 years experience as Realtor Agents combined, and have sold over 1000 homes total. With our expertise and knowledge of investment real estate,...

By: Platinum Real

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Welcome to Platinum Real Estate Holdings! - Video

Media Release 5 September 2014

Barracks restoration begins

This morning iwi and Devonport-Takapuna Local Board marked the start of the barracks restoration project at Fort Takapuna Recreation Reserve.

The two barracks at Narrow Neck, built to house military personnel during World War Two, will be sympathetically restored in keeping with their heritage value by Construct Interiors NZ Ltd.

The site blessing is a major milestone for the project which has been a Devonport-Takapuna Local Board priority for three years.

We are very pleased to be starting work on restoring the barracks at a site which is so prominent in Aucklands military history, says Devonport-Takapuna Local Board Chair Mike Cohen.

Once restored, the two barracks will be available for community groups to use and hire space for meetings and other activities.

The restoration includes re-roofing, structural and insulation works, new kitchen and bathroom areas, and surrounding landscaping.

Work is expected to be complete in March 2015, in time for commemorations of the Battle of Passchendaele. ENDS

Scoop Media

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Barracks restoration begins

RUSSIAVILLE, Ind. (AP) It's been more than eight decades since the last interurban passenger train passed through Russiaville.

Between 1912 and 1932, the rail line connected Russiaville with Kokomo, Frankfort and Marion.

"The track line actually started in Marion and went to Kokomo in 1907," said Marsha Berry, president of the Russiaville Historical Society.

"The rail extended to Russiaville and Frankfort after that."

Since the passenger lines halted, the station has been home to freighters, a lumberyard and most recently apartments.

The once gutted and abandoned Interurban Station on the town's east side is now getting a restoration thanks to the Russiaville Historical Society.

The plan is to transform the building into a museum dedicated to the history of western Howard County, Russiaville and the station itself, Berry said.

"We've replaced missing brick, cleaned the cement work around the windows," she told the Kokomo Tribune (http://bit.ly/1pDVFBv ).

"Some of the windows had to be re-manufactured or replaced completely. We want to have the historically correct widows and have the building restored to original condition. We hope this will keep people aware of what our heritage is. We have a lot of transportation history in Russiaville. The first trolley came through Russiaville and we had the first county fair, which later shut down and went to Greentown."

Berry also said that auto maker Jonathon Dixon Maxwell, who made one of the first automobiles, lived near Russiaville.

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Russiaville works to restore old train depot

Historical home restoration by John Gregg and the crew of Double G Professionals!
via YouTube Capture.

By: Double G Painting General Contracting

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Historical home restoration by John Gregg and the crew of Double G Professionals! - Video

Williams-Sonoma, Inc is experiencing a bump in its otherwise very lucrative road, as the specialty retailer's outlook has created some concern amid weakness in key segments of its business. Nonetheless, while investors typically group companies together -- in this case, Williams-Sonoma with Restoration Hardware -- one thing should be known: Williams-Sonoma's short-term problems are hardly a forecast for what to expect with thriving home-improvement retailer Restoration Hardware.

What is Williams-Sonoma? Williams-Sonoma is a large home-furnishings retailer that operates in-store and through e-commerce, nearly half-and-half. The company splits its business into two segments, direct-to-consumer and retail, in which each segment includes the company's seven different concepts . The company's concepts are popular among middle- to upper-class consumers, as each of its seven concepts focus on quality. But like so many other retailers today, discounting has broadened its appeal to new consumers.

The company has seen its stock price increase 245% during the last five years, but on Thursday its stock tumbled nearly 12% after its second-quarter revenue growth decelerated to 5.9% from nearly 10% in the first quarter, and many of its top concepts, like Pottery Barn and Williams-Sonoma, saw comparable sales growth cut in half. Furthermore, the company's outlook was conservative, which investors dislike for a stock that's had such a remarkable run.

Where's the problem? While Williams-Sonoma does not report detailed financial information for any of its concepts aside from comparable-store sales, the company's PBTeen concept saw noticeable weakness. Specifically, PBTeen had seen double-digit comparable-sales growth in previous quarters, including 12% during the first quarter, but then fell to negative 1% during the second quarter.

PBTeen was launched in 2003 and offers, as the company says, "a complete line of furniture and accessories for teen bedrooms, study and lounge spaces, and college dorm rooms."

On the conference call, Chief Financial Officer Julie Whalen said that PBTeen was a significant piece of comp deceleration, and that issues including a fire in a Vietnam factory destroying inventory caused significant delays for the concept. In other words, many of the company's concepts experienced hardships, many of which were created by discounting, but PBTeen was a major contributor to the disappointing performance.

Not like Restoration Hardware With that said, fellow home-improvement retailer Restoration Hardware saw its stock decline after Williams-Sonoma's poor performance, falling more than 3% on Thursday. While both companies operate in the same industry, generate a significant amount of their business directly from consumers, and use catalogs as a major outlet for their businesses, the comparisons pretty much end there.

For example, while Williams-Sonoma's consumer appeal is questionable, at best, based on economic class, Restoration Hardware is undoubtedly a luxury retailer, and has attracted customers at an alarming rate, allowing for comparable sales growth of 57% during the last two years. Furthermore, while Williams-Sonoma is a mature company with nearly 600 stores, many of which are located in malls or shopping centers, Restoration Hardware has only 70, and has shied away from smaller stores in crowded shopping centers that have declining traffic in favor of enormous galleries.

Last year, Restoration Hardware opened a newly designed 40,000-square-foot gallery in the old New England Museum of Natural History in Boston. Then, in June, the company renovated its New York gallery, making it three times larger, with 30,000 square feet. Now, Restoration Hardware has its sights set on new bigger and better stores.

In the past, Restoration Hardware was renovating existing stores, or locations, keeping its store count around 70 -- the same for the better part of two years. However, earlier this year, the company announced an enormous expansion program , including plans to open new large galleries in Greenwich, Los Angeles, and Atlanta, three areas that aren't short of luxury shoppers. In addition, the company announced plans to build another 25 next-generation Full Line Design Galleries.

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You're Wrong to Worry About Restoration Hardware Based on Williams-Sonoma's Report

(PRWEB) August 28, 2014

Graffiti has become a part of every city either urban or rural, it is everywhere. Its real a shame when a piece of scratched glass can tarnish a business's image once an inconsiderate tagger decides to carve their name into it. Luckily for home and business owners alike, Western Glass Restoration and Tinting is now offering scratched glass restoration services that use absolutely zero chemicals or glazes. Photos of the companys restoration results can be viewed online at http://www.westernglassrestoration.com.

Western Glasss specialized glass restoration system uses a self-contained machine that works extremely well on every type of glass. Western Glasss innovative scratch removal and glass polishing repair system removes scratches, restores glass, removes graffiti and stains fast-and-cleanly from all kinds of windows such as plate glass, dual glazed, skylights, glass rails, slider doors, mirrors and stainless steel at a fraction of the cost of replacement.

Their scratch removal system the company uses is designed to remove scratches from virtually any type of glass. Western Glasss system consist of a handheld tool-kit that uses a vacuum process to hold the machine onto the glass, while at the same time, providing a continuous flow of slurry through the system. The flow of slurry provides a continual source of new abrasives and keeps the glass within a cool operating temperature.

Western Glass Restoration and Tinting and Construction Services are delivered by a staff of team-oriented individuals who share the common goal of exceeding the expectations of their clients. Western Glass Restoration and Tinting Services prime asset and the success of any project is dependent upon them. Those in need of glass restoration can contact the company at (949) 253-7700.

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Repair Scratched Glass and Graffiti Removal Now Available from Western Glass Restoration