Big Lots Broyhill Furniture Sales Rebounding

Nearly a year after Big Lots' furniture supplier, United Furniture, abruptly shut its doors and negatively impacted product availability for the retailer’s proprietary Broyhill collection, the company is reporting improved stock levels as well as a selection of new items now available to shoppers.

That insight came during the discount retailer’s third quarter conference call, in which Big Lots reported another challenging financial period. Sales in the quarter were $1.02 billion, down 14.7% from sales of $1.20 billion in the comparable quarter the previous year. Adjusted operating loss was $113.9 million and adjusted diluted loss per share was $4.38.

“Customers continue to be cautious on high ticket purchases, such as furniture, and traffic-driving categories such as food and consumables were impacted by fierce competition in the space, where there is less product differentiation,” said Bruce Thorn, president and CEO of Big Lots. 

While the company has worked throughout the year to navigate economic headwinds, the loss of its furniture supplier near the end of 2022 sent the retailer scrambling as furniture accounts for more than a quarter of its sales. But with improved inventory levels and newness now seen across its Broyhill assortment, company officials said this should help boost sales in the furniture category and have a positive impact on other categories as well.

In recent months, Big Lots stores have seen their furniture selections refreshed with modern designs, new accent furniture along with an expansion of home decor. 

“New products as a share of total SKUs are up year-over-year, and while it’s still early, we are seeing sales and gross margin uplift from the new items,” Thorn said. “The improvement in furniture is also providing a positive halo effect on soft home sales. Our new assortments in areas such as accent, decor, and modern styles started to roll out in the third quarter, and we expect sales momentum to continue to build as we lean into newness and value offerings.”

With its furniture selection seemingly back on track, the retailer is on a path to offer “more extreme bargains” across a broad range of categories. To meet this goal, Big Lots has hired Seth Marks as senior vice president of Extreme Value Sourcing. The seasoned retailer veteran has nearly 30 years of experience in the off-price and closeout segment. He was previously with Big Lots from 2004-2007 when he served as vice president of Merchandising. 

Thorn said products offered at “extreme bargains” would be priced significantly below prices of other retailers. He pointed to the company’s recently launched Black Friday promotional effort that offers products discounted up to 50% off every Friday until Christmas as an example of its “extreme bargains” effort.

The Big Lots CEO also said improved in store execution is another critical component to increasing its relevance with shoppers. To meet this goal, the retailer has named Kristen Cox as its senior vice president, chief stores officer. She has experience running off-price retailers where flexible branding and assortment at store level is critical. She most recently was senior vice president at Burlington Stores and has also spent 16 years at Macy’s.