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Helping Your Customers Combat Coronavirus

Many of you know my colleague Gary LeBlanc.  For those of you that don’t he has been a fixture in this industry for a long, long, long time… Haha!  Love you Gary!

From VP of Grass America to the Director of Major Accounts for Richelieu – he is celebrating 40 years in our industry.

Gary has been getting traction with some of his major accounts and I wanted to pass this info along to you – my loyal readers.

As Gary put it –

“I’m not sure how the Coronavirus is going to end up impacting our daily lives in the US.  I do suspect that if it continues our businesses could be impacted.  One thing that is certain to change, is our awareness of the transfer of germs. Richelieu does have anti-bacterial solutions.  Our Finsa line of TFL panels has imbedded silver ion paper which is a natural germ killer.  Our Harmony line of acrylic panels comes in Super Matte finishes that feature 3 colors with anti-bacterial properties.  Finally, we offer a line of anti-bacterial pulls and knobs.  These products and features have been part of our program for a while, but these increased times of concern could make this more relevant to your clients.” 

With multiple board warehouses across the US and Canada we can supply Finsa and our Harmony panels into most major markets.

We currently stock two lines of Finsa panels – both with silver ion paper.

Our Duo line is 10 colors all 4’ x 8’ double sided light texture panels.

Our Studio line is a 7′ x 9′ panel with a deeper texture and 8 of the 10 colors are double sided.

Click here to see our Finsa brochure. 

The three most popular Super Matte finishes from Harmony are anti-bacterial.

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    Bianco M001

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    Tortora M021

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    Grigio M060

Only need doors? No problem – we have a complete door program for all of our premium panels – all with the same anti-bacterial properties!

The Finsa doors come in slabs, 3-piece and a 5-piece shaker.

The Harmony doors are all slabs and are banded with PUR glue – so that there isn’t a visible glue line.  These doors almost look like they were painted.

They can easily be ordered on our door configurator right here – Finsa or Harmony

Or if you prefer – you can reach out to our door department – doordept@richelieu.com

Lastly we offer brushed nickel handles with antimicrobial copper which is proven to continuously kill the bacteria that causes infections.

Check out the complete offering here. 

As always if you have any questions please don’t hesitate to reach out to me at RDeMarco@richelieu.com, comment below or contact your local Richelieu rep.

If you would like to connect with Gary on LinkedIn here is a link to his profile.

Thank you for reading.

 

Filed Under: Closet, Closet Hardware, Premium Panels Tagged With: , , Leave a Comment

What’s New for 2020?

Hi Guys,

I hope your 2020 is off to a great start.

Many of you have been reaching out to me with similar questions –

What’s new?

What’s coming?

Does your wife mind the travel?… This one is easy, no she doesn’t mind the travel and I think she likes it better when I’m not around… HaHa!

I thought this would be the perfect topic for my 1st post of 2020.

This year we added even more premium panels to our offering and another shipping HUB.

We just launched 16 new Nature Plus finishes of textured panels from Italy.

These are not like anything else you are seeing on the market, not only did we add a handful of trending woodgrains, we also added abstract finishes.

We have leather, metal and stone finishes that will blow your mind.  These are great as accent drawer faces, doors or even hutch tops.

Here is a link to our new brochure showing all 45 colors.

We have come a long way from Chocolate Pear and Summerflame…

Great news for those of you in the NJ and PA market.

We just opened our new board hub with curtain side trucks.

By March the warehouse will be fully stocked.

Please reach out to your local rep or comment below if you would like more info.

Thank you for reading.

Here’s to a great 2020!!

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What is the Easiest Way to Increase Profits??

This year I started doing something different with my blog.

Every post has been about ways that you can increase your bottom line without adding any overhead to your operation.

The number of email responses that I have received this year has more than doubled.

Thank you so much for your feedback, I’m glad you are finding value in these posts.

The easiest thing to do, is to stop selling white melamine!!!

Think about it – it doesn’t require any additional labor to drill and band premium panels.

I know your customers are on a budget.

I know up-selling can be difficult, but when you can, sell something besides white.

There are a couple of ways to do it while still being sensitive to your client’s budget.

Richelieu is the largest importer of Italian melamine and it’s a great way to differentiate yourself from your competitor.

It could be pricey for some clients, but why not just upgrade the faces?

Richelieu also started bringing in melamine from Spain.  We brought in 10 colors specifically for closet mfrs.

It’s a double-sided light texture, includes four linens, four wood grains and two solids.

It’s a small step up from white melamine but much less expensive than what is currently on the market.

I have some kitchen customers using the linens as their cabinet interiors with high end glossy or super matte doors.  It’s a really cool look and again just another way to differentiate yourself.

Your goal should be to reduce your dependency on white melamine.

Not only will you make more money, but so will your designers and possibly your installers – everyone wins.

What percentage of your installs are white?

Have you had success offering complimentary faces?

What is your second most popular color, if it is summer flame or candlelight, you need to update your offering… It’s costing you business.

If you would like more info please comment below or reach out to your local Richelieu rep.

Thank you for reading.

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