Faith Popcorn To Create Line Of Furniture Partners With Hooker And Barcalounger

Furniture World Magazine

Celebrated author and consumer trend forecaster Faith Popcorn has entered into licensing agreements with the Hooker Furniture Corporation and The Barcalounger Company to create furniture tailored to the unique needs of the female consumer. Popcorn and Hooker have joined forces to create a home office collection for the at-home businesswomen. "Women in America own eight million businesses, and many of them work out of their homes like I do," Popcorn said. "We do things differently and need different tools. My furniture collection will give the at-home businesswoman what she needs - be it 2 desks that expands into a conference table or a side table that doubles as a diaper changer." Popcorn, the author of best-selling- books "The Popcorn Report" and "Clicking," is credited with first identifying and naming the stay-at-home trend Cocooning. "Faith Popcorn's Home Office Cocoon Collection" will be unveiled in October at the 1999 International Home Furnishings Market in High Point, N.C., the largest such exhibit in the world J. Clyde Hooker, Jr., Chairman and CEO of Hooker Furniture, said, "We have admired Faith Popcorn's ability to forecast trends, particularly the Cocooning trend - which has benefited our industry. We took forward to working with Faith to develop a collection of home office furniture that meets the needs of today's businesswomen and female entrepreneurs." The collection will be eclectic in scope, mixing traditional and transitional styling, with the possibility of incorporating stone and metal to mix with wood tones, State-of-the-art functional applications for the home office will be included in this collection. Shipment of the product to retail stores should begin in early 2000. Popcorn has also licensed her name to The Barcalounger Company and will be creating several specialty chairs based on her Trends. "We live in a world of multi-tasking Popcorn says, "and women have become particularly brilliant at doing several things at one time- My Cocooning. Barcalounger Chair, for example, will make it easier for a woman to do many things at once, it will be equipped with several outlets for computers and fax machines; lots of pockets to hold call phones, electronic daytimers and cosmetics; a baby station to house toys and bottles for her children-,. and a vent that will provide several choices of aromatherapy scents, depending on her mood." Barcalounger President Wayne Stephens says the alliance with Popcorn makes solid business sense. "We are excited about developing a collection of recliners with Faith Popcorn," Stephens said. "Barcalounger has always been recognized as the most comfortable seat in the house and now, with Faith Popcorn's assistance, we will add style and functional elements that will appeal to the women of America." Shipments of the Faith Popcorn recliner to retail outlets should begin in early 2000.