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Furniture World Articles by David Benbow

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Retail Misinformation

Published: 9/29/2022
If you want to have more trouble-free sales, educate your customers with facts and take care that your RSAs do not spread misinformation or disinformation.

Read Does Sales Training Matter?

Published: 1/10/2022
Personnel turnover is high and training costs time and money.

Read Top Ten Reasons to Call a Sales Meeting

Published: 9/25/2021
There are many reasons to get together with your team. From scheduled to impromptu, why, when and how you manage them is very important.

Read Retail Sales: A Great Career?

Published: 1/23/2021
Selling mattresses and furniture can be a great career. So, what can be done to elevate the status of RSAs, starting now in 2021?

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Prepare for Meteors!

Published: 9/24/2020
We don’t know how this mess is going to turn out, but If you are prospering, keep focused. Do what you do well and prepare for everything!

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Motivate Your Retail Sales Associates

Published: 8/5/2020
Ways to keep your sales staff motivated and focused even during those slow and boring times, especially in retail bedding departments.

Read Retail's Weak Link

Published: 4/5/2020
It's been said that retail sales-people are the weakest link in the buying chain for furniture and mattresses.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Up-Selling

Published: 1/4/2020
Get your customers to spend more money than they intended on a mattress, and leave your store happy for spending it!

Read Retail Observer: Loading... 2020

Published: 12/8/2019
A look back to what was, where our industry is today, and the actions it is well advised to take in 2020

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Exchanges

Published: 10/12/2019
What are the best ways, for both store and customer, to handle product exchanges?

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales Bedding Exam

Published: 7/15/2019
What RSAs know, or may not know, but should know about the business of selling bedding. Take this quiz and find out!

Read Retail Ethics: Do you Measure Up?

Published: 5/30/2019
Most mature, adults would say that they know right from wrong. If it is that easy, then why don’t all retail players act ethically all the time?

Read Better Bedding Series: Art of Negotiating

Published: 3/23/2019
If you've decided to negotiate, here's what you need to know.

Read Bedding & Mattress Sales: Retail Sales Management

Published: 1/8/2019
Selling is everything in retail. That’s why the sales manager's job is so important.

Read Bedding & Mattress Sales: What's Next

Published: 11/27/2018
While plans have an annoying tendency to go haywire, having no plan at all is begging for failure.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Strategies For I'll Be Back!

Published: 9/22/2018
How to get the be-back customer back by David Benbow, author of How to Win the Battle For Mattress Sales.

Read Strategies For Selling Higher-End Bedding

Published: 7/4/2018
Whether your top bed is $4,000 or $40,000, here are sales strategies to help you present and sell your best.

Read Don't Waste Down Time!

Published: 5/23/2018
If you are a retail owner/manager you probably don't have a lot of down time. But what about your RSAs?

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Follow-Up, The Key To Success

Published: 3/23/2018
Here's how to build sales by using a follow-up system that creates top-of-mind awareness.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Closing The Sale -Part 2

Published: 1/14/2018
Here's how to make a great closing argument and avoid the many pitfalls that can result in lost sales.

Read Old Tech: Your Telephone!

Published: 11/29/2017
Here's how to improve your stone-age phone practices to increase store traffic.

Read Disaster: Are You Ready?

Published: 9/23/2017
Lessons from Hurricane Harvey. No furnishings retailer is completely safe from disaster, natural or man-made.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Closing the Sale

Published: 7/7/2017
Part 1: How can a quiet, modest, non-pushy RSA ever be a good closer? Here's how!

Read Scary Retail Stories

Published: 6/1/2017
Best ways to avoid situations that may lead to customer injuries; physical, emotional and financial.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Set Misinformed Customers Straight

Published: 3/29/2017
Best ways to help the uninformed and misinformed to make the right purchase decisions.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Selling Sleep

Published: 12/28/2016
Where does sleep deprivation fit into a sales narrative that emphasizes comfort and good, restful sleep?.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: I Object Again!

Published: 11/29/2016
Here we will present a number of specific objections furniture and bedding customers can and will bring up.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: I Object!

Published: 9/30/2016
Responding correctly to customer objections is a powerful and productive sales skill. Here’s how to do it right.

Read Retail Bedding & Mattress Sales: Closing The Sale

Published: 7/7/2016
The start of Closing is the Presentation Step. Here’s how to do it right.

Read How Much Do RSAs Matter?

Published: 6/2/2016
What’s the solution to under-performing sales associates?

Read Steps of the Sale: Selection Step

Published: 3/25/2016
If not executed properly, the selection step can wind up badly for both RSA and the customer. Here’s how to do it right.

Read Steps of the Sale Series: Qualifying Questions

Published: 1/4/2016
More qualifying questions RSA’s can use to keep the sale moving along.

Read Good RSA, Bad RSA

Published: 11/27/2015
What are the most common mistakes you can stop your salespeople from making in 2016?

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Qualifying Questions

Published: 9/28/2015
Part 6 of our Steps-Of-The-Sale series. Qualifying questions RSAs need to know to complete more mattress sales.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Series: Qualifying Questions - Advanced RSA Training

Published: 7/17/2015
Part 5 of our Steps-Of-The-Sale series. Do your RSAs fail to ask even the most fundamental qualifying questions?

Read The Meet & Greet: Advanced RSA Training

Published: 6/9/2015
Part 3 of our Steps-Of-The-Sale series. The ‘Meet and Greet,’ is where the R.S.A. makes a first impression.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: RSA Bedding Sales Training - Part 2

Published: 3/24/2015
This installment provides a checklist of everything your R.S.A.’s need to know, inside and out, about the background knowledge that supports and sustains the sales process.

Read RSA Boot Camp For New Hires

Published: 12/30/2014
A structured, two-week training program for new bedding (and furniture) RSAs.

Read What To Do About Those RSA’s In 2015

Published: 11/21/2014
Tips on how to find, hire, evaluate and compensate what could be your most important assets.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: A Bed Seller’s Guide To Customer Service

Published: 9/29/2014
What policies should you set to respond intelligently to a customer’s (buyer’s) after-the-sale enquiries or complaints?

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales Series: What’s On Your Floor?

Published: 7/9/2014
Ideas for merchandising your mattress showroom so you can show enough beds, the right beds, and the ones your customers want to buy.

Read When To Bring In The Big Guns

Published: 5/22/2014
A retailer’s perspective on using an outside company to do a GOB, inventory reduction, cash raising sale or other high impact promotion.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Control Every Mattress Sale!

Published: 3/17/2014
The final outcome of the mattress sales process depends almost entirely on whether the RSA keeps control or gives up control to the customer. Here’s how to stay in control.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales: Sizing Up Your Competition

Published: 1/3/2014
How to get information on your mattress competition, profile them, and use this information to close more sales.

Read Mattress Series: The Mattress Warehouse Part 2

Published: 12/10/2013
Here is a collection of ideas on how to arrange and run a mattress warehouse for optimum efficiency. This article can be useful as a check list when opening a new warehouse or as a training guide for new warehouse personnel.

Read Selecting The Mattress Warehouse

Published: 11/11/2013
If you haven’t set up a mattress warehouse before, are looking for new/additional space, or want a quick review of important considerations, read on.

Read Better Bedding & Mattress Sales Series: Shorthanded Again?

Published: 9/30/2013
Training new-hires, as every small and large store owner knows, is a problem that never ends. This article provides step-by-step instructions on how to structure a program for new hires that will set them up for success and longevity on your sales floor.