Entries for the award will be vetted by the Sustainable Furnishings Council before they are presented to judges, said furniture designer and ASFD President Steve Hodges.

Pieces will be considered across a spectrum of categories. Sustainability benchmarks are likely to apply to product features such as wood, finish, cushioning, textile, leather, metal, glass and plastic content, Hodges said.

But the item also must be a good value and well designed, he said. The award has not yet been named, he added.

Hodges said last year’s Pinnacle judges were enthusiastic about a green design award.

“Everyone is very excited about it. It’s not just an adjunct award to be trendy. We see the category as becoming increasingly important,” he said. “It also helps the Pinnacle Awards widen its net.”

An entry deadline for this year’s ASFD Pinnacle Awards has not yet been set. Winners will be announced at the fall High Point Market. More formal criteria for entries will be announced over the next several weeks, Hodges said.

Retailer Andy Thornton of LaDifferénce in Richmond, Va., which touts its own green standards through its stores, said that green product is a good idea for the Pinnacle Awards. He said the winning product should be innovative, and “really needs to wow you.”

The Pinnacle Design Achievement Awards were created in April 1995 by the ASFD board to promote design quality and encourage the recognition of furniture designers within the retail home furnishings industry.

By Heath E. Combs — Furniture Today
NEW LONDON, N.C.

WASHINGTON — A program that offers to subsidize wood fiber for renewable bio-fuels or other products could divert the U.S. fiber supply from composite wood products, according to Business and Institutional Furniture Manufacturers Assn.

For domestic furniture manufacturers, the result could be dramatic price increases to board which would not affect imported board prices.

The provision, called the Biomass Crop Assistance Program, provides financial assistance to suppliers of biomass material to conversion facilities for use in producing heat, power, bio-based products or bio-fuels, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Web site.

BIFMA is asking its members to request that Congress suspend the subsidies and amend the list of materials eligible for the subsidy.

The organization is arguing that the use of wood fiber products is contrary to the subsidy program’s intent — to divert materials for renewable biomass that aren’t otherwise used for higher-value products.

The subsidy program has about $514 million in funds to distribute.

It seems that Contemporary is lord of the manor. More than one-half or 53% of stationary sofa units sold can best be described as Contemporary in style. No other style family even comes close to ousting Contemporary from its domination. Even the combination of the next highest-ranking styles, American country and European country, into a new style family, Country, could only lay claim to about one-quarter of the kingdom. And Contemporary’s reign is not a new thing either. In 2006 when Furniture/Today conducted a similar survey of retailers, nearly one-half of stationary sofa units were Contemporary. And in 2004, the unit share figure was just about identical.

For the purposes of the survey, Contemporary included the following individual styles:

• Art Deco
• Architectural contemporary
• Casual contemporary
• European modern
• Scandinavian

Where did Contemporary rule the strongest? Examining style families across price points, Contemporary dominated at both low and high price points. At low price points of $799 and below, Contemporary claimed over two-thirds of units sold. At high price points of $1,500 and above, its share was less but still well over one-half of units sold. And at medium price points of $800 to $1,499, Contemporary’s share was just under one-half, or 48%.

Just over three-fifths of retailers’ unit upholstery sales for 2008 came from the sale of stationary sofas as reported in Furniture/Today’s exclusive Upholstery Fabric & Style Survey, 2009.  Recliners and motion sofas were the other two players, each contributing another one-fifth to the market share pie.

Source: www.furnituretoday.com

www.HowardsFurnitureandDecoratingCenter.com