Experience is a comfort to furniture store’s customers

TWO thousand years . . . that’s the accumulated number of years staff have been working at Housing Units’ Wickentree Lane store in Hollinwood.

Housing Units director Nick Fox said: “Twenty centuries is a lot of experience and expertise in home furnishings, but it perhaps demonstrates why our customers rate our staff’s advice so highly — whether it’s a technical issue, a design matter or simply helping somebody make the right decision.

“With three-piece suites being replaced maybe once every 10 years, bedrooms being refurbished even less frequently than that, plus big investments in fireplaces and bathrooms, such advice and input is not to be taken too lightly.

“This also demonstrates how loyal our staff are — we have an extremely low turnover on the team at Housing Units, and, again, the customers like to see familiar faces when they come in to invest in new furniture.”

Buying director Jeff Hughes, in his 25th year at one of the UK’s leading home furnishing retailers, said: “There’s a real feeling of belonging at Housing Units. When I joined I actually had no intention of staying, but my view changed. Regardless of the size of the company, it always feels like a small business.

“I have never really felt like it’s been a case of having to come to work — the rewards are about the way people react and respond to the way we all operate and work together.”

Housing Units was established in 1947. The family-owned furnishings retailer stocks 30,000 lines across a range of departments in two buildings.