Most respondents preferred solid wood furniture to veneer construction (Table 2). About 93 percent of respondents would like domestically made furniture and 80 percent of that group did not like imported furniture. Customers also preferred character marked furniture to clear grain.
Almost half of respondents preferred delivery within three to four weeks, and 22 percent wanted delivery within six weeks of their order.
Preferred attributes
Solid wood
Veneer construction
Both solid wood & veneer
U.S. made
Imported
Both U. S. made & imported
Character marks
Clear grain
Both marks and clear
Light finishes
Dark finishes
Both light and dark
Percent of respondents
72.5
12. 5
15.0
80.5
7. 3
12. 2
60.0
27.5
12. 5
35.0
35.0
30.0
Solid wood and U.S.-made construction were the most wanted attributes.
Assembling wormy sycamore table at the Hodges Wood Products Laboratory at North Carolina State. (Harry Watt, project leader)
These survey results are preliminary findings about customer perceptions of the use of underutilized species in furniture. Similar surveys will be conducted at other home/furniture shows to get a better and much larger sample of customers to understand
The authors wish to thank the USDA
and USFS’s Wood Education and
Resource Center in Princeton, W.Va.,
for their support of the project and to the
respondents. For more information contact
Harry Watt, hwwatt@ncsu.edu.
retailer and homeowner preferences for furniture made with underutilized species. ●
References:
Archives