I agree with Buzzy. Never found anything to buy at any City Furniture in South Fl. I would think the developer was making money on his furniture business, especially furnishing the lifestyle visit cottages.

We are in the same boat. We purchased a bedroom set that is on hold until we return in January.

When you buy a warranty on your furniture it is an insurance company that has liability, not the store. Read your contract. And then I would say good luck getting anything covered because insurance companies are in the business of making money not paying claims. Your manufacture warranty is through the manufacture as well, not the store you purchased from. Just a thought.

Every single brand that they carry is available elsewhere. There really is nothing special about their selection anyway. Good stuff? Sure. Unique? No.

In fact I was able to get most of my furnishings from a 'direct' rep who allowed me to shop many manufacturers on-line (there were dozens!) and the price as about 1/2 to 2/3 of what Showcase had for best offer. As someone mentioned the warranty is through either insurance or the manufacturer anyway so no worries.

We also bought a bedroom set from showcase last month and made the delivery for nov 4 ...called today said everything is set----i hope:shrug:

Changes could be difficult, until we know the real truth and details it normally is a pleasant surprise.
PLEASE let's wait and see....
Purchased lots of furniture and they will hold..

What would be nice......is if the buyers of the stores would continue them as they are, with the same brands and names on the stores (Southern Lifestyles and Showcase Direct) indefinitely into the future. This is what Southwest did when they bought Airtran, and they have s-l-o-w-l-y accustomed the customers to the eventual merger.

Looking at the City Furniture website, I see lots of young, "urban chic" styled furniture, and not much "coastal" and "Tommy Bahama" styling as TV residents are accustomed to seeing/buying at these two stores. If the buyers close the current stores and remake them as City Furniture, they're going to lose a LOT of customers.

I vote "Leave them as they are, name and all" for at least a couple of years.

Closing "hits" the Daily Sun this morning---page C1. According to the paper, "throughout the transition, Southern Lifestyles and Showcase Direct will fulfill all orders and maintain all warranties on products.". The two new "City Furniture Stores" are expected to open prior to Thansgiving and carry some of the same brands plus other brands.

Needs new management
 

As a retired sales consultant at Southern Lifestyles it is a travesty the way management has treated their employees. Yesterday I talked with one of my ex associates and they haven't been told anything by management. He said that management had told the employees that they were in talks with City Furniture but nothing else and to keep quite about it. They did the same thing when they closed down SLS at La Plaza Grande and opened Show Case Direct. Everything was top secret but of course Talk of The Villages new about it.
Just don't understand SLS management with the waste of money they have thrown away by moving a very profitable store at La Plaza Grande and moving it to LSL and just a couple of months ago moving it again. Then selling it.
It was a great store with totally profession employees. I wish them well.

Makes me think that the end is coming to development and endless empty houses won't need furniture soon. Also the end of life style visits, and model homes. AND decorating new recreation centers beautifully and without mark up. It was a great time for selling furniture for sure.

And end for building maybe, but each day is wonderful for us Villagers.

yes.

???

:wave::wave: Southern Lifestyles had a good run but looking into the future they can see LESS furniture going out the door. I'm amazed at the number of new people that I talk to that purchased most of their furniture on-line.

Our salesperson told us a couple days ago that TV would no longer have a "model Center", rather the sales representatives will be taking prospects to individual furnished homes scattered around the new Villages.

It appears that the Developer is planning for Build-Out in just a couple of short years----time will tell!

I know they are going to honor the warranties but what about the agreement if you didn't make a claim at the end of the warranty you would get a credit for the amount of the warranty towards a new purchase?

According to today's Villages Daily Sun Showcase Direct is closing at the end of the month, ( which I assume is September) and City furniture will open the first store at that site in mid November after renovations.

The name "City Furniture" carries with it an urban tone, when so many of us came here to get out of urban metro areas and enjoy a bit of southern, more leisurely and gracious ambience.

"Southern Lifestyles" conveys a message of quiet relaxation. So now it's being replaced with "City Furniture".....which sounds way too much like the name of two BARS here (City Fire).....and they are raucous and loud.

I hope somebody in authority is reading this thread. It's all too common nowadays for large businesses to not listen to the customers.

Agree
 

We bought sofa and love seat from them. Great product and great staff.

Making assumptions based on a name just seems wrong in my estimation. Haven't yet looked at info on the newest store to set up in TV, but if it isn't one I like, there are many other stores in the area.

When Southern Lifestyles moved to Canal St. you have to wonder why they just didn't shut the door then. It should have been obvious to management that they weren't going to sell very much furniture from catalogs. If that were the case, all furniture retail stores would be closed and sales would be exclusively via the Internet. Now having said that, I wonder what the industry stats are for Internet sales of furniture?

We came in July bought a home and during our stay bought a living room set and dining room set to be delivered in October. Bought with Showcase Direct now that I hear they are closing I am worried that my furniture will be delivered when I need it. I just called them and they said that it will as promised. I'm still very concerned. Since we took out a credit card with them our only requirement was a down payment of $284.00. I'm thinking I should cancel the entire order. Looking for opinions or is anyone else in this situation ??

I just bought $4K worth of furniture due in November. It is all motorized recliners in sofa, chair and loveseat. I was hesitant to buy such furniture but I was told not to worry as Showcase Direct would handle any problems with the manufacturer. I paid $500 plus tax more for the furniture than if I bought online. I did not buy online because of past bad experience in dealing directly with a furniture manufacturer when my furniture store went bankrupt. As an individual I had no clout with them and they refused to do anything.

I am thinking why pay more money if the store will not be here anymore. Might as well cancel and either order online and save a substantial amount of money or buy from another local store who can service me.

There is also the issue of what happens to the extended warranties they sell and say if you do not use it, you get store credit for what you paid for it. If they are not around, I do not see any way to get store credit, do you?

My current furniture is fine so there is no need for me to buy from a store going out of business again. Whenever I have done that in the past it usually did not turn out good. Ever call up an extended warranty insurance company and be told that they have no record of your extended warranty? All I had was a one line item on a receipt for a store no longer in business and they would not accept that. Live and learn.

My advice would be to cancel and order locally because you are paying more for furniture that can be had online without the benefit of the local store to take care of problems now and in the future.

I am cancelling my order tomorrow. I have had the unpleasant experience of having to deal directly with a manufacturer after the furniture store I bought from went out of business.

I am very angry over this news because I just bought last weekend. To those who think it is no big deal I will tell you the problems I had when I bought from Southern Lifestyles:

- wrong color dining room stools.
- damaged night table
- bedroom chest no longer made but they delivered the other bedroom items that they had in stock.

I called up the store and within 3 days they replace the stools and night table out of their inventory and sold us the Bedroom chest they had on display in the store.

If they did not have a store here it would have been a royal mess dealing with three different companies, one of which did not make or have the missing item in stock. No thanks. I am cancelling. City Furniture does not seem to carry FlexSteel. I have been putting off buying a sofa, loveseat and chair that are motorized recliners due to the chances of problems which friends of mine have experienced with theirs. The fact that a local store was telling me not to worry as they would make sure things were taken care of made me take the plunge. Now that they are going away, I rather find another local store to buy from.

It seems logical to me that if any bought furniture and it is being held for months, it makes more sense to buy online and save a bunch of money because you are losing the benefit of the local store to fight for you, replace defective items out of their stock and even send their own repair person to fix minor problems. The price I paid includes a markup for the store and since the store will be gone right after I get my furniture, assuming it is not delayed as half he furniture I order is, why not buy online?

What happens to my extended warranty that I bought last year with my new furniture????

Take a minute and read the above posts were it has already been discussed.

City Furniture Will Have To Prove Themselves
 

Southern Lifestyles has been a fixture in The Villages for years. Their retail spaces were beautifully laid out, giving customers lots of ideas. Their sales staff were well-trained and superb. Southern Lifestyles carried a wonderful array of middle-upper end brands. Their sales staff knew the layouts of Villages models like the backs of their hands. They wouldn't let buyers make the mistake of buying something that wouldn't fit.

Will City Furniture equal or better the products and services offered by Southern Lifestyles? The company's history up until the mid-1990's was as a chain in South Florida called Waterbed City. Since then they added other furniture, but it is all manufactured for them to their specs under their brand name, Kevin Charles, the name of the owner of the company Kevin Charles Koenig. You won't find common, well-known brand name furniture in the City Furniture stores, only their own branded pieces. And like many lower-end furniture stores, they sell financing as much as actual furniture. When "no payments until 2015" is featured in their advertising, I'm pretty sure I know the market segment they're targeting. Surprisingly, I don't think that's a good fit for The Villages. Nowhere near as good as was Southern Lifestyles.

So, will City Furniture equal or better the purchasing experience we've come to know from Southern Lifestyles? Speaking only for myself, I just placed an order for several large living room pieces from an interior design and furniture store in Altamonte Springs. We were familiar with their premium brands and their experienced designer visited our home and provided superb ideas and advice.

By the way, we stopped in to the Southern Lifestyles store in Lake Sumter for some comparison shopping. I don't know who owns or manages the store now, but my wife and I were given a pile of catalogs and told to "see what we could find". The sales person walked away to chat with another employee, leaving us with a pile of catalogs. We didn't look for very long before deciding to deal with the very nice store in Altamonte Springs.

Yeah the Developer is taking his furniture and leaving town. lol lol How silly!!!

Babette's or Hudson's Furniture may be a better option.

Babette's in Leesburg has many of the same brands, and especially floor space to show the furniture and try it, instead of looking at catalogs and guessing whether a chair or sofa is comfortable or not!

Also, Family Furniture across the street from Babettes has many of the quality, moderately-priced brands like American Drew and Legacy Classics that Southern Lifestyles had.

A former waterbed city store advertising no payments till 2015 definitely sounds cheesy.

And it's not too smart to take on the too-small store space Southern Lifestyles has been reduced to now, where there's not enough room to properly display furniture groups by room type.

This is almost funny....The build out was happening at the building of Spanish Springs then LSL and now BROWNWOOD....What next ?

I think that the closing, or selling of these two businesses is maybe a clue that it is close to the end. They needed furniture supply to outfit their model homes and rec centers.

I agree, Gracie, that makes sense.

Alternately, as you like to point out, the Morse family are good business planners. Right now, the value of those stores is still pretty good. In another 3 or 4 years, even building is still going on, value may not be as high.

If I were investing in new businesses, I'd do so in assisted living and skilled nursing facilities. DW (who is an expert at such things) says we're short around 5,000 or so of those beds right now. (and you will note that the developers are involved with SumterPlace and several other such ventures.)

Our sales person at Southern Lifestyles said TV will keep a furniture operation, run out of their warehouse, to furnish spec homes and models. TV will still be in the furniture business but only for their own use.

Another rumor with no merit. Salespeople don't always know what they think they know. That's why their sales people. Tell you what u want hear not always the truth.

Not sure why people always think about items like this as "the developer wants" or "the developer thinks".

Let's think about the furniture situation this way:

TV will have over 110K citizens very shortly. With the average household population at 1.87 (last census) per house that represents about 54K houses, villas.

Think about the town you came from up north. The average household size with kids etc is probably closer to 3.87 (guess). So if you had 54K houses how high is the population? The answer would be a town with over 200K people.

So if you had a town with 200K people who many furniture stores would there be to service that town?

There will always be a need for furniture stores regardless of who is running them. This is capitalism 101. If the business owner calculates a need and can provide the service they decide to locate there.

I see this furniture situation as nothing different.

You are right as usual Russ, but we old-er people come in and FURNISH the home as opposed to dib and dabs like we did younger and underfunded. Most of us move in, buy stuff we need and go out and play golf.

I think that the Morses, as usual, struck while the iron was hot, got most of the homes furnished with a nice couple of stores and have now decided to sell them to another company.

I am selfishly not personally worried about this. We just trotted over to Babbettes in Leesburg and got a nice new sleeper sofa and I am looking for a killer lamp like Swimdawg got at TJMaxx. If I can't find one, I may have to break into her home and steal hers..

Once the lamp is in this house, I am done with buying furniture.

I googled Southern Lifestyle Furniture they were only in TV. This must be part of a much larger furniture company. It all boils down to costs. Retail space is very expensive and furniture takes up a lot of space. I have roamed SLF many times and there were very few people in there. Their furniture is of very good quality but who in TV needs it to last 30 yrs. Fabrics get dated and THEY DO NOT COME WITH ARM COVERS. Just go to the consignment shops and see used, good quality furniture but DATED fabric and dirty, worn, arms. Needs slipcovers or to be upholstered. Most of the people going into SLF are getting ideas, picking the minds of the salespeople and then going elsewhere to purchase. They obviously can't stay in business when this happens.

Today we took delivery of the Flexsteel sleeper sofa which we ordered from Showcase Direct back in August. The sofa was delivered by "Mike and Nick", two very nice young gentleman, both of which will be out of a job when Southern Lifestyles closes it's doors. "Mike" said he just enlisted in the Navy and is hoping to ship out sooner than his expected date of June, 2014. "Nick" said he will look for another job within The Villages. We would like to wish these two nice young boys the best!

The sofa is beautiful and Mike said the warranty we purchased will be honored by City Furniture. Hopefully we will not have to find that out!

I went to the new City Furniture & was disappointed to see the Tropical prints that were so popular at Southern Lifestyles are no longer available...I've tried to find them on line with no luck at all. If anyone knows how to find out a brand name it would be helpful to me. I saw a set & was about to purchase it in Lake Sumter, but they closed the next day. And what about people who may have a problem with items purchased there??? how is anyone supposed to reach them??? please reply. Thanks, Sandy in OBG