Matteo's first and ABC's latest: in-store boutique a hit

By Andrea Lillo -- Home Textiles Today, 12/17/2001 12:00:00 AM

NEW YORK —

Matteo and ABC Carpet & Home last week celebrated the opening of Matteo's boutique, which now offers the ABC customer the entire Matteo bedding line.

Los Angeles-based Matteo previously had about 100 skus in the store, said Matthew Lenoci, president, Matteo, and everything was selling really well, so ABC approached the company with the prospect of its own in-store boutique. "We were thrilled," he said.

On the third floor of the store, in the space previously occupied by the Calvin Klein line, the Matteo boutique is now the second largest bedding boutique at ABC after Ralph Lauren, at about 1,200 square feet. It's also Matteo's first boutique ever, and Lenoci was pleased with early sales. "It's been absolutely fantastic so far."

The boutique's look is also a departure for ABC. While ABC projects the feeling of an old estate home, with creaky wood plank floors and an abundance of merchandise, the Matteo boutique is modern and orderly. With gray walls and concrete floors, it's set off from the rest of the floor with partial glass walls and shelves built into the walls, with curved corners, where the packaged sheets and other bed linens are stocked.

The boutique also has four dressed beds made of dark mahogany wood — three of which are suspended from the ceiling, allowing them to be at varying heights — that will be changed with new product every month, Lenoci said. The boutique itself will introduce new product four times a year.

Now customers can shop the more than 1,000 skus offered (including fabric samples) — Matteo's whole product line. And customers can also special order merchandise as well, which is a huge business for Matteo, Lenoci said. This was previously hard to do at ABC. But now the boutique has its own fax and phone lines, and the company is in the process of hiring a Matteo specialist.

The boutique first opened on Nov. 16, and since then sales have been favorable. Matteo has consistently been the number-one bedding vendor every week since then, according to ABC.

Lenoci said that the three key sellers in the boutique so far have been the Raso solid color sheeting program, the Quad quilted sateen duvets and the J6 duvets.