Get your electronics under control with Control4

O’Neal Builder’s home in Waterstone was featured in the Peoria Parade of Homes this weekend (which continues this weekend as well, there is a link below to view). Our HomeWorks team installed a whole-house Control4 system in this beautiful house, which I stopped by to see on Friday. I have grown up with electronics, but I’ve rarely escaped the complex operation of high performance theater systems or whole house sound. That’s why the simplicity of Control4 systems like the one in the O’Neal home never ceases to amaze me. The Waterstone model home features:

· Whole house audio, with access to thousands of digital music titles/radio stations

· A home theater room
· Lighting control, with one-touch “scenes” adjusting lighting throughout the house
· Heat and Air Conditioning Control from every room

The best part is the simplicity of operation: there is one simple method of control, either on a touch screen in the room or using a single remote when watching TV. It really is amazing; anyone could operate these systems with very little to no instructions. Most of our customers barely have time to enjoy their electronics; they sure don’t need to spend unnecessary time learning complicated operating procedures. Stop by O’Neal’s beautiful home from 1-5 this Saturday or Sunday. And if you’d like to find out more about how Control4 can help you get your electronics under control, call our HomeWorks folks at 309-691-4100 x160.

http://www.peoriahba.com/pohpics/08%20Parade%2027.pdf

Preparing for Progress

Pictured here is what used to be the back half of our Peru store, coming down to make room for our new store construction. Sherman’s Peru team and our whole family is excited to begin this project that has been in planning for years. With a targeted opening in Spring of 2009, this new store will be Sherman’s largest and will bring a selection of furniture, appliances, HDTV’s, audio and mattresses unlike anything presently in LaSalle/Peru. During construction you’ll find the same great products and sales staff you’ve known at our Peru store (with a slightly consolidated product display!). Ironically, since we don’t have a warehouse at our Peru store during construction, we can actually deliver more products faster to the LaSalle/Peru area than ever before: near daily trucks running from our Peoria warehouse and its multi-million dollar inventory offer daily access to thousands of in-stock products. Please pardon our dust during construction while we expand to offer you more!

Custom Order Furniture Without the Customary Wait

A new customer bought her Sofa from Sherman’s a few weeks ago, and it was interesting listening to her story. She’d shopped for furniture all over town, and she quickly found that no store stocked the exact style and color she was looking for. Now that’s pretty typical if you spend the time to really think about what will best fit your tastes, family’s use and décor. Rarely will that style and color happen to be in stock or even on display at a store, so you’re kind of settling for “good enough” when you pick from in-stock product. So as is often the case, she had to go the special order route. The trouble was, everywhere she went she found special order furniture took 10-12 weeks to get. And she wasn’t too excited about that. Here are her exact words: “I have a couple stories I could tell you about ordering furniture and was told it would take 12 weeks and it ended up that I either never got it or it took about 6 months to get.” She was excited, though, to hear how fast Sherman’s could deliver a special order sofa: “I was floored to hear at Sherman's it only takes 3 weeks.” And sure enough, her new sofa was custom made and delivered in exactly three weeks. Our Custom Comfort Center features exclusively England furniture (a La-z-boy company). Every Monday we order a truckload consisting of the special orders from the week prior, and it’s manufactured to specification in about two weeks, leaving one week for transport to us and for us to deliver it. In fact, at all times we have an electronic message board in the store giving our customers the exact date we can deliver any custom furniture ordered on that day. It’s all made to exacting standards by quality craftsman right here in the good old USA (New Tazewell, TN to be specific) which is a nice departure from all the furniture made in China these days. If you need a new living room, want exactly what you have in mind, and want it fast, Sherman’s Custom Comfort Center just might be the answer.

Sherman’s Memorial Day Cookout

It’s not always easy getting the whole family together! With ours working in the business at different locations (and my mom and dad living in Florida) it’s quite a trick. But we were able to accomplish it for Memorial Day.

Jack and Sharon (sitting in front) now live year-round in Florida, enjoying the quality time together they never quite had during the grueling years building our business. They come back to Peoria a few times a year to visit. Even though they live in Florida, dad and I talk every week about the business (he gives great advice, we just have to do all the work!) My sister Marsha (standing to right) picks out all the furniture for our stores, no small job. Her husband Rich is our operations manager, running the warehouse and our all-important delivery department. He’s holding his grandson Gabe. That’s me in the green shirt, with my wife Bridget, and our kids Elizabeth and Zachary. Not in the picture are Gabe’s dad David, who is our Peoria assistant store manager, and his wife Cassie. Also attending our Memorial day get-together but busy TAKING this picture are my sister Sheila, who works in sales, and her husband Glen, who takes care of our builder customers and picks out all the appliances for our stores.

We had a great time together. After the usual stuff, like my brother-in-law Glen trying to convince my 5-year old that he’s set for a lifetime of disappointment as a Cubs fan and should switch allegiances to the Cards (ever try to reason with a 5-year old?), the conversations inevitably turned to business. Right now, it’s hard not to; we’re starting site work on our new Peru store next month (it will be our largest when complete in early 2009), and our 20,000 sq. ft. distribution center addition is underway. When you’re growing there is a lot to do and talk about!

And while you’d probably find our business discussions boring (budgets and schedules are like that) you will be interested to know that we came up with a plan for some killer email-only specials. Now would be a great time to click on the “sign up to stay informed” tab on our home page and give us your email address. Sign up and we’ll be in touch soon!

I hope you and your family had a great Memorial Day together like we did.

Strength in Numbers

Last week Robert from the Nationwide group flew into town and spent the day with us here in Peoria, to help make sure we were up to speed on all the latest deals from our manufacturers. Nationwide Marketing Group is the buying group Sherman’s belongs to that enables us to buy like the big chains. We and about 2,000 other dealers across the country pool our $2+ billion buying power when negotiating. While Sherman’s does a lot of business in central Illinois, alone we buy only a fraction of what a Best Buy or Sears does. But combined with our fellow Nationwide members, we have become one of the largest, fastest growing customers in the nation! In fact, many of our manufacturers have recognized that local businesses with long-term employees like Sherman’s do a better job than the national chains explaining their products, so they end up with more satisfied customers. That’s sure no surprise to us, but it’s nice to see the big companies recognize it. In the past, many quality retailers like Sherman’s had to charge more for this better service. But today with the benefits of the Nationwide Marketing/Buying group, we’re able to buy like the big chains AND offer the quality, knowledgeable help central Illinois expects.

Folks You Can Trust

This weekend I stopped by Beck’s Florist to pick up some Mother’s Day flowers for my wife. As is often the case, all the nice folks at Beck’s and I were soon discussing their past Sherman’s purchases and what they’d need soon. I love to hear about what customers do and don’t like about their purchases, so I can pass that along to our sales staff and improve their ability to help customers select the right products. And more than the products, they said they really liked the fact that their salesperson recognized them whenever they came in, even if it had been a year since their last purchase. While we spend a lot of time and effort having the right products and prices, I guess there just isn’t any substitute for dealing with a person you know and trust. My wife and I always want a good deal, but all else being equal we end up buying at a place we trust the people. That’s why I buy my flowers at Beck’s, and I’m glad to hear that it’s the reason people shop at Sherman’s.

Hippie Radio and Sherman’s May HDTV Giveaway

Listen to Hippie Radio 101.1 in May and you could win a free HDTV from Sherman’s! Hippie has teamed up with the HDTV experts at Sherman’s to give away “A Plasma-a-Day in the Month of May”. Here’s the link to Hippie’s site for more details:
http://www.myhippie.com/index.html

And to see the specific 42” plasma you could win, click here: http://us.lge.com/products/model/detail/tvaudiovideo_plasma20flat20panel__42PG20.jhtml20panel__42PG20.jhtml20panel_

_42PG20.jhtml20panel__42PG20.jhtml20panel__42PG20.jhtml

Tune in to Hippie Radio 101.1 for your chance at a plasma a day in the month of May!