{"id":53377,"date":"2025-01-14T18:37:40","date_gmt":"2025-01-14T23:37:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/?p=53377"},"modified":"2025-01-14T18:38:42","modified_gmt":"2025-01-14T23:38:42","slug":"former-badcock-execs-form-furniture-retailer-hometown-furniture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/2025\/01\/14\/former-badcock-execs-form-furniture-retailer-hometown-furniture\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Badcock execs form furniture retailer Hometown Furniture"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\n
\"\"
Robert Ball<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"
Matt Pridemore<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Former Badcock executives Robert Ball and Matt Pridemore have joined forces to create Hometown Furniture, a new company that is transforming 30 former Badcock Furniture & More locations into new retail storefronts in the Southeast.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ball is chief executive officer and Pridemore is chief operating officer of Hometown Furniture, which is partnering with 11 former Badcock dealers to open a total of 33 stores in Florida, Georgia, North and South Carolina and Alabama. With footprints ranging from 15,000 to 20,000 square feet, 30 of the 33 locations were Badcock stores that were impacted by the bankruptcy of parent company Conn\u2019s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSome of those dealers either own or are leasing those properties already, so those dealers are taking those leases or the ownership of the property and transitioning it from Badcock to Hometown Furniture,\u201d Ball told Home News Now. \u201cWe have identified strategic markets that we are going to be entering, whether it is an existing or previous Badcock location.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

He said that the company has no corporate locations at the moment, but has closed on a few properties that it will announce in the next 10-15 days that will be among its first corporate locations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ball said that he and Pridemore brought a number of the former Badcock dealers to the October High Point Market where they introduced them to vendors that could end up supplying the Hometown Furniture locations now and in the future. While the mix will be similar to the lower-middle to middle price points offered by Badcock, there also will be some higher-priced goods, offering consumers an aspirational furniture shopping experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That said, dealers will also have the opportunity to purchase product that is unique to their individual markets, thus serving the specific needs of consumers in those communities.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur goal is to carry the product that the consumer in that demographic area wants,\u201d Ball said noting that Badcock, while a great organization that did a lot of things right, also made some mistakes along the way. \u201cBig ships are very hard to turn. Ultimately, we want to make small decisions more frequently, stay on top of the pulse of what the consumer is looking for and pivot to meet her demands.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWho wouldn\u2019t want to own a living room set that was made in their county or their state?\u201d he added, noting that the mix at individual stores could include some locally or regionally curated goods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ultimately, he said the focus and motto is very simple: \u201cWe want to be your friends in the furniture business.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur goal is to be the place that solves your problems, not create more of them,\u201d Ball said, noting that all locations will be open by the end of this month, with some open sooner. \u201cWe are willing to bend over backwards to earn our customers\u2019 business and to hunt down the products that he or she desires. If we can source it and the customer is willing to wait for it and pay for it, we will get it for them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Believing the new stores will fill a void in the markets they\u2019ll serve, he also believes in those who are committed to being part of the new organization.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEverything in life is a gamble,\u201d he said. \u201cBut these men and women who have operated these stores have done so under some of the harshest conditions imposed by Badcock, FRG and Conn\u2019s and have stood the test of time and outlasted the parent company. If that doesn\u2019t tell you all you need to know about these individuals, then nothing will.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Former Badcock executives Robert Ball and Matt Pridemore have joined forces to create Hometown Furniture, a new company that is transforming 30 former Badcock Furniture & More locations into new… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":53378,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"17","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","inline_featured_image":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"wpai_generated_summary":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":true,"token":"eyJpbWciOiJodHRwczpcL1wvaTAud3AuY29tXC9sYWtlbGFuZGdhemV0dGUuaW5mb1wvbmV3c1wvd3AtY29udGVudFwvdXBsb2Fkc1wvMjAyNVwvMDFcL0hvbWV0b3duLUZ1cm5pdHVyZS1pbWFnZS53ZWJwP2ZpdD04MDAlMkM0MDcmc3NsPTEiLCJ0eHQiOiJGb3JtZXIgQmFkY29jayBleGVjcyBmb3JtIGZ1cm5pdHVyZSByZXRhaWxlciBIb21ldG93biBGdXJuaXR1cmUiLCJ0ZW1wbGF0ZSI6ImhpZ2h3YXkiLCJibG9nX2lkIjoxNjMwNDA2NjF9.Ev7PFdmFiYJHyglHPUzaTLETxmuF01fMrp_nOMgH8BsMQ"},"version":2,"attached_media":[{"id":53378,"url":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Hometown-Furniture-image.webp","type":"image\/jpeg"}]},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false},"categories":[17],"tags":[10765],"class_list":["post-53377","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-regional-and-world-news","tag-former-badcock-execs-form-furniture-retailer-hometown-furniture"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53377","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53377"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53377\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53381,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53377\/revisions\/53381"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53378"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53377"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53377"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lakelandgazette.info\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53377"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}