Herman Miller's Crossing - Company Business and Marketing

Industry Standard, The, Dec 11, 2000 by Ethan Smith

HERMAN MILLER INC. MADE OFFICE furniture sexy. In the 1960s, the company began manufacturing the Eames shell chair, a sleek metal and fiberglass triumph of design. In the late '90s, its Aeron chair -- a black plastic and mesh ergonomic marvel -- became the seat of choice in hip offices and cutting-edge conference rooms. And last month the firm unveiled Red, a self-consciously slick, budget line of furniture for the suddenly beleaguered startup market.

Red's marketing slogan is "Cool. Doable." But as any midcentury design wonk can tell you, Herman Miller's furniture has never been merely "cool." Thanks to numerous pieces designed by Charles and Ray Eames in the '60s, Herman Miller became the platonic ideal of office furniture: comfortable, sturdy, timeless. So much so that some vintage Herman Miller products, Eames and otherwise, routinely sell for thousands of dollars on eBay. But Red's unfortunate timing and flavor-of-the-month appearance may change the company's golden run.

The new budget line of workstations and accessories attempts to capitalize on the recent popularity of the $739 Aeron. Every Red product, from the wire and fabric "backpack filecart" to the iMac-colored cubicle-divider screen, fits in a UPS-shippable carton and can only be ordered via the company's Web site. While a new Eames table runs a cool $1,500, the slightly smaller Red Rocket desk costs $315.

All of which, presumably, seemed brilliant last year when the line was being developed. With all those startups burning through all that venture capital funding, the market for mid-priced office furniture looked limitless. But just as the line is finally launching, the furniture's touted portability may end up most useful for failed startups needing to ship it to the liquidators.

Decades ago the late Charles Eames laid down the essential criteria for designing a new piece of furniture. "Does it solve a problem? Is it serviceable? How is it going to look in 10 years?"

Here's how Red measures up:

Does it solve a problem? Not really. If budget-minded executives need quirky furniture at a discount, Ikea's already available.

Is it serviceable? Let's just say you get what you pay for. Unlike Herman Miller's sturdy classics, the Red stuff tends to wobble and sway.

How is it going to look in 10 years? It's going to look like the "new economy" got so overheated that highly respected companies started cheaply rehashing their own aesthetic in an attempt to cash in.

The most telling observation came in early November when Herman Miller CEO Michael Volkema visited the Nasdaq's Times Square headquarters to ring the opening bell on the first day of Red's PR blitz. The composite index was in the middle of a weeklong 11 percent drop. Without a trace of irony, Nasdaq President Rick Ketchum told the small crowd that had gathered, "Herman Miller embodies many of the qualities the Nasdaq is all about."