I tried to negotiate a discount on a home office collection sold by Haverty's. The Chateau de Vin collection is manufactured by Aspenhome and is modular in construction... You can mix and match different components.
Haverty's quoted me $5,000 for the set of components I was interested in. I asked for a 20% discount because I know the margin in the furniture industry are high. I was immediately told that Haverty's has a "no haggle" policy and they could not adjust the price.
I contacted Aspen Home and requested other retailers in the Dallas area that sold their merchandise. I was referred to Weirs and Charter Furniture. Weirs for similiar components (slight differences) quoted me approx $3,300. Charter Furniture for the same components (from what I could tell) quoted me $3,000.
I contacted my sales person at Haverty's and alerted her to the price discrepancy. The "Asset Manager" at Haverty's returned my email, and informed me that the Aspen Home furniture that Haverty's carried had "added features" from Weirs which accounted for the difference in pricing. I am an amateur woodworker, so I was interested in what the added feature were... I went back to Haverty and thoroughly looked over the furniture at Haverty's and could not note any "added features" other than pull out lighting on the hutches (certainly not worth an incremental $2,000 in my opinion). From what I could tell, the furniture was identical (other than the pull out lighting) to the furniture at Charter and Weirs.
I asked for a complete list of added features that would account for the increased price... As of yet, no response from Haverty's.
This just proves... Caveat Empto
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