Focus on Leadership - July 2010

Interview by Kemp Harr

Bentley Prince Street recognizes that its broadloom and modular carpets are only part of the overall interior furnishings solution on any given commercial project and, as such, works to coordinate its designs with other designers and manufacturers that closely align with Bentley Prince Street’s philosophy and market position.

In the recent past, BPS has collaborated with Robert A.M. Stern and Clodagh in the design field and with Crossville tile and Jack Mishkin on the manufacturing side. These collaborations help the specifying community by broadening BPS’s range of products and allowing it to offer designers a pre-coordinated selection of flooring options that work well together.

This past May, at the Hospitality Design Show in Las Vegas, Bentley Prince Street announced two other collaborations. One with Parterre, a supplier of commercial vinyl flooring products, on a flooring collection called Astronomie, and a second collection of Axminster and Wilton woven carpets from industry veteran Herb Frank. This collection is called Global Visions and it allows BPS to service the market sectors that prefer woven carpet to tufted carpet. And even further upstream, BPS has formed a partnership with Aquafil USA on solution dyed nylon face yarn.

At NeoCon, we sat down with Bentley Prince Street’s president, Anthony Minite, to discuss the details and strategy behind these collaborations.

In the recent past, BPS has collaborated with Robert A.M. Stern and Clodagh in the design field and with Crossville tile and Jack Mishkin on the manufacturing side. These collaborations help the specifying community by broadening BPS’s range of products and allowing it to offer designers a pre-coordinated selection of flooring options that work well together.

This past May, at the Hospitality Design Show in Las Vegas, Bentley Prince Street announced two other collaborations. One with Parterre, a supplier of commercial vinyl flooring products, on a flooring collection called Astronomie, and a second collection of Axminster and Wilton woven carpets from industry veteran Herb Frank. This collection is called Global Visions and it allows BPS to service the market sectors that prefer woven carpet to tufted carpet. And even further upstream, BPS has formed a partnership with Aquafil USA on solution dyed nylon face yarn.

At NeoCon, we sat down with Bentley Prince Street’s president, Anthony Minite, to discuss the details and strategy behind these collaborations.

Q. How did BPS first come up with this concept of offering coordinated products to the specifying community?
A. It started years ago, as I felt it was important for us to diversify our company and truly be a solution provider to our customer base. So the concept of coordinating our products with other leading product manufacturers made perfect sense, when coupled with our strong entrepreneurial sales force.

Q. Why did you decide to pursue a partnership with a vinyl flooring and a ceramic tile producer?
A. The reality is, our products when specified always have other materials attached to them. It is our intention that we offer our customers options, which in this case would include the two largest hard surface categories in the commercial market—vinyl and ceramic.

Q. Why did you choose Crossville and Parterre specifically to partner with? What advantages do these firms offer?
A. Both Crossville and Parterre line up very well with Bentley Prince Street’s legacy for highly styled and designed products, quality service and diverse product offerings, and we have similar commitments to sustainability in our businesses. I also like the entrepreneurial spirit in Fred Roche and Frank Douglas.

Q. Let’s focus on the Parterre collaboration for a moment. What markets are you targeting with an LVT collaboration?
A. We will be targeting all markets, as we do with all Bentley Prince Street products. Our segmentation strategy has been key for Bentley Prince Street to continue to sustain itself in a tough business climate. Where I see us maximizing the Parterre partnership would be in some of our stronger segments, like corporate, higher education and healthcare.

Q. How many products are in this collaboration?
A. We are presently co-branding 18 products with Parterre that will be marketed in a Bentley Prince Street product vehicle with the intent to expand the offering as future products in our line, such as Domestic Alchemy (part of our flatweave collection), continue to develop.

Q. When will Astronomie launch?
A. Our official launch date is July 12, 2010. However, we will be making our presence known at all of the markets we attend this summer, and it is part of our product highlights in our showroom. As well, Parterre is featuring Bentley Prince Street products in their showroom.

Q. Tell us about your woven carpet collaboration with Herb Frank. How did it come about?
A. Our collaboration with our new exciting Global Vistas Collection has been a true partnership with Herb Frank. Herb’s wealth of knowledge and expertise in a more global position led us to this partnership, which now allows Bentley Prince Street to offer a standard highly styled stocked solution dyed Wilton program, as well as a coordinating 80/20 Axminster wool option.

Q. Is it different from the collaboration with Parterre? For instance, will there be coordinating products?
A. Each of our partnerships—Robert A.M. Stern, Clodagh, Jack Mishkin, Parterre and Crossville—all have a strategic element to them that enables Bentley Prince Street to expand our opportunities. With our Global Vistas Collaboration it enabled us to have a program that was designed for multiple segments and had an aesthetic that coordinated well with Bentley Prince Street’s existing product line.

Q. Tell us about the Axminster/Wilton products. Will you be strictly targeting the hospitality market?
A. The Bentley Prince Street Global Vistas products will span all segments. It has 37 different patterns and 11 colorways. Naturally we see an immediate opportunity in hospitality, as well as senior living facilities, but based on the coordination with other Bentley Prince Street products we naturally see this being specified in all segments.

Q. What sort of unique market advantage do these types of collaborations give BPS?
A. I believe that Bentley Prince Street has solid name recognition with over 30 years of branding and manufacturing behind us. I believe the unique market advantage of partnering with companies that have aligned business goals and objectives consistent with ours gives Bentley Prince Street an opportunity to better service our customer base.

Q. Do the environmental initiatives at companies you choose to collaborate with fit well with what BPS is doing?
A. All of our partners that we collaborate with carry the same commitment and passion for sustainability. Any of the efforts that we put forth in these partnerships have to be in alignment with our Mission Zero goals of reducing our environmental footprint by the year 2020.

Q. On the nylon side of your Global Visions offering through Herb Frank, the yarn comes exclusively from Aquafil. Talk a little about your relationship with them as a yarn supplier.
A. At Bentley Prince Street we have always been committed to utilizing premium ingredients in our raw material supply chain. That is no different in our commitment to working with Aquafil USA as a branded yarn supplier to Bentley Prince Street. Working with Aquafil for our Global Vistas product was an exciting landmark in our relationship, building on previous collaborations in the last few years such as our Easy Street Collection and our flatwoven products.

Q. This economic recession has hit the upper end of the corporate contract market the worst—which is where BPS has historically been one of the market leaders. Tell us what you’ve done to weather this decline in demand.
A. There is no question that the economic downturn affected the corporate market segment significantly. The good news for Bentley Prince Street is that we have been diligent over the last eight years in implementing a sustainable segmentation strategy in our business. It is accurate to say that the corporate office market is still extremely important to Bentley Prince Street’s success, and I believe that we’ve been able to weather the downturn in this segment, and through our product development efforts we are well positioned as this segment comes out of its decline.

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