Reico Kitchen & Bath is a kitchen and bath supplier that has expanded its scope to aid contractors and homeowners. The flexible East Coast distributor provides expert staff for design services and beautiful showrooms for product selection services.
“Remodelers are fine craftsman, but kitchen design is a very specialized process,” says director of marketing Andy Armstrong. “We've had most success with remodelers in taking away some of the stuff they are not comfortable with.” He's talking about product selection, specialized kitchen design, and running a showroom. Armstrong says Reico offers a place for a remodeler and their customers to work on a kitchen design.
Reico operates 17 retail showrooms in Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, and Pennsylvania that serve builders, contractors, and consumers. The company employs more than 350 people and sells approximately 500 kitchens each week for an estimated annual total of 26,000 kitchens. Beginning in 1996, retail store locations were added to give their clients access to their products and services.
The size and product selection in a Reico showroom allows homeowners to see a range of products. It gives the remodeler an opportunity to upsell, according to Armstrong. “Each contractor is assigned an outside salesperson. That salesperson has one to three inside salespeople with design capabilities,” Armstrong says. The team works together to order products and schedule deliveries. Because the company carries 14 lines of Merillat stock cabinetry, a contractor can bring in a basic design in the morning and it can be delivered the next day. Also, products stored in the warehouse can be used to replace damaged or misordered items.
The large company has systems in place that could work for smaller showrooms. Armstrong says the two most important items are training and technology. Reico uses electronic ordering, rather than phone or fax, with all their vendors. Then, every product that is delivered to Reico is given a bar code and scanned in the warehouse and placed in a specific portal to coordinate delivery.
On the design side, Reico uses standard off-the-shelf programs in conjunction with internal programs tied to ordering. New designers attend six weeks of training before starting their jobs.
