What do today’s furniture shoppers want? In an industry first, Furniture News, supported by leading 3D furniture product visualisation platform Chaos Cylindo, presents a comprehensive report on how UK consumers shop for furniture – both in-store and online – and the changes they’d like to see …
If furniture retail was ever a simple, straightforward business, those days are long gone. Today, galvanised and fragmented by the advent of online shopping, the sector is fiercely competitive, and each business, from the smallest independent shop to the biggest webstore, must take advantage of every tool at their disposal if they are to survive.
OK, so perhaps that’s overstating it a little. There’s still space in the industry for experimentation, invention and the personal touch, and given the huge variation in approaches that prosper today, the sector could look very different in 50 years’ time.
People will always need furniture, and they will always seek to make their homes more comfortable and attractive – but there remains a great many unknowns when it comes to their tastes, motivations and prejudices around furniture shopping. We can never know for sure what the next challenge will look like, but we can better understand what those shoppers want, and how they want to buy it.
With the support of Chaos Cylindo, a leading 3D furniture product visualisation platform, Furniture News commissioned a representative survey of UK consumers in order to learn more about their preferences. What are they buying, and where? What drives and guides their shopping journey? What should retailers – both in-store and online – be doing better? And, crucially, how is consumer demand evolving?
“Customers are now in control of when, where, and how they want to interact with a retailer,” says Jostein Pedersen, VP product - 3D commerce, at Chaos Cylindo. “However, this behavioural shift can offer great opportunities for businesses that keep a pulse on customers' wants and needs. The main question is, ‘What do customers want?’
“We partnered with Furniture News to get that answer and understand the profile of the modern furniture shopper, in order to help furniture businesses keep up with the latest trends.”
Read the report in April's issue.
