Familiar Face Runs Mitchell Gold + Bob Williams Store

Orange County Business Journal, Mar 26-Apr 1, 2007 by Cruz, Sherri

H&M Set to Debut Three Stores Next Month; Fletcher Tops in Revenue, Wilson in Auto Sales

MARKETPLACE

The namesakes behind Mitchell Gold Bob Williams furnishing store at Crystal Cove Promenade have put out u book: "Let's Get Comfortable."

The duo recently appeared on 'The Today Show" promoting it.

, The exposure doesn't hurt the Newport Beach Mitchell Gold Bob Williams store, one of 14 free-standing stores. The company, based in Taylorsville. N.C., is opening two more stores in New York and Washington, D.C.. and has plans to open more.

Maria Dona owns the Crystal Cove store, which is about 3.500 square feet, much smaller than the typical store at about 8,000 square feet minimum. Mitchell Gold Bob Williams license the stores. Dona and other owners adhere to corporate standards, said Eloise Goldman, spokeswoman for the company. Owners don't pay franchise fees.

Mitchell Gold Bob Williams sells Io retailers and hotels, including W hotels, Neiman Marcus, Williams Sonoma Home, Crate & Barrel and Restoration Hardware. It plans to expand those lines of businesses as well, Goldman said.

"The idea is really to do it all," Goldman said.

Dona used to work for the company from Orange County as one of its 'Taps"-training and product specialists-before she opened the store.

The store is known for its hip, casual look, slipcovers and sectionals. Furniture sells at the "low end of high," Goldman said.

The Crystal Cove store also sells Tipper Gore's photography. Gore is a photojournalist, who also does landscape and other types of photography. A portion of the proceeds from the photos goes to the Climate Project.

Mitchell Gold Bob Williams hand makes its upholstered furniture at a 6,000-square-foot factory. Tables, armoires and the like are made overseas. It employs about 750 workers.

H & Mania

Look out for H&M mania next month.

Sweden's H&M Hennes & Mauritz AB opens two stores at South Coast Plaza on April 12 and one at Irvine Spectrum Center on April 13. Opening days at each store will offer the first 200 customers an H&M T-shirt and gift cards worth up to $300.

The South Coast stores will be about 20,000 square feet-the typical H&M store size-and 8,000 square feet. Both stores combined will have everything H&M has to offer.

H&M is known for bringing in new clothes quickly. The stores sell clothes and accessories for women, men, teens and kids.

The U.S. is about 6% of sales. The bulk of sales comes from Europe. H&M has more than 100 designers and buys in large quantities so it can sell for lower prices.

The company also is making a push in Asia.

H&M also recently announced a new higher-end chain called COS (Collection of Style). The stores, targeting older and affluent shoppers, are opening in 10 locations in Europe to start, including Germany, Britain and Belgium. The first store was slated to open in London this month.

Karl-Johan Persson, the son of Stefan Persson, chairman of Hennes & Maurilz, will run the new chain, according to Bloomberg.

H&M began in Sweden in 1947 and is known for its cheap chic lines such as M by Madonna. There are 1,300 H&M stores in 27 countries.

Recliner Time

La-Z-Boy Furniture is opening its fifth Orange County store at Hyland and Sunflower avenues in Costa Mesa. The store will be about 16.400 square feet.

Who's Counting?

The subtleties of OCs auto sales market aren't lost on David Wilson, one of the Business Journal's winners of an Excellence in Enlrepreneurship award.

Wilson pointed oui that while Newport Beach's Fletcher Jones Motorcars does more in annual revenue, Wilson's Toyota of Orange sells more autos.

Toyota of Orange sells 589 more new cars and 1,24) more used autos than No. 1 ranked Fletcher Jones. If the Business Journal's yearly list of auto dealers were ranked by new auto sales rather than revenue, Wilson's group of 15 dealerships would have two of the top IO dealerships in the county. AutoNation Inc. would have three dealers in the top 10.

Here's how the list would look ranked by new auto sales: Toyota of Orange, 7,450; Fletcher Jones, 6,861; AutoNation's Power Toyota Irvinc. 5,349; Crevier BMW. 4,143; Wilson's Toyota of Huntington Beach, 4,018; Elmore Toyota Scion, 3,824; AutoNation's Mercedes-Benz of Laguna Niguel, 3,506; Hitchcock Automotive Resources' Miller Toyota of Anaheim, an estimated 3,500; AutoNation's Power Toyota Buena Park, 3.456; and Damon Shelly's Irvine BMW, 3,439.

The list according to sales: Fletcher Jones, Mercedes-Benz of Laguna Niguel, Crevier BMW, House of Imports, Irvine BMW, Toyota of Orange, Mercedes-Benz of Anaheim, Tustin Lexis (owned by Wilson), Power Toyota Irvine and Lexus of Westminster.