News from WithIt.Inc

WOW LEADER
Vicki Payne

Interview by Stephanie Lowder

People want to be plugged into the internet, but they want it to look like TV.

If you aren't streaming video on your web site today, and you are in furnishings, then you're out of the picture. People don't want to see 20 or 40 products lined up like in a catalog. They want to know about a particular couch, why we put it with a particular rug, how it works in a living room. They want to see fast and they want answers fast.

The biggest focus for us: not only the delivery system, but how people want to buy products.

The internet is a beast that must be fed. It's good and it has totally revolutionized our business and we probably wouldn't be in business now without the internet, because there are restrictions to our business on public TV, in terms of selling product, but it gets more difficult every year.

It's no longer possible in any business to know what's going on in every leading area of your company. Media and data is too technical and it's too fragmented. For instance we just lost our webmaster. In the past if somebody left us, a production assistant or an office manager, I could pick it up and say I'll do things myself until we find someone. But that's no longer possible.

On the green issue, I think people are turning turquoise. We have a big Green Initiative in our company, and very recently we did a viewer survey asking how important our green initiative is to viewers, and the answer was: not really. It's something we believe in and it's something we're doing, but I think on this issue people have been greened until they are turning blue about it.

We're so in touch that we're no longer in touch. On different platforms and types of media, we're in touch with millions of viewers every week. Last month alone viewers downloaded over two million pages of educational information from our website. So we can't touch each person personally. There's hard technology going on.

If you don't tap into your own resources, you're really missing the boat. One of my employees 20 years ago said they saw great some how-to stuff on this new Learning Channel and they thought I should look into it. So we sent in three tapes and they said they'd show our tapes for one month, let us sell those tapes - a barter deal - and we'd both see how it went. So after two weeks their phones were ringing like crazy, our phones were ringing like crazy, and we went to our suppliers and said we're going to need a lot more support.

It's absolutely a family business. My husband and I started it 30 years ago, he's retired now. My daughter Sloan has been in the business all her life. My son-in-law is the VP in the office every day. My granddaughter Logan is eight and shy, but I think Hannah Montana is creating all these little stars out there so she'll do a lot now on the show. Our children have always been around the studio, there's always been someone in the family not on camera to look after them.

Now that TV is going digital, everything's different. We used to buy editing time and pay a director's fee at a studio. Now they're sitting at home in their boxer shorts editing my programs on a TV screen.

The reason Crate & Barrel has done so well is that they show what people want, and they set the trends, particularly color trends. Retail furniture does not set trends. I live in what was just voted a number one city to live in, and I went to a retail furniture store and saw something I liked and asked, what colors does that come in? Brown and black. Which is not at all the case, I know better.

If brick and mortar companies start to disappear, then people will turn to the internet and they won't be coming back.

Retailers who are embracing the internet are likely to continue in business. I can see them using the internet to their advantage by using it to the advantage of their customers. They can say we noticed you liked red, some things have come in you'll probably find exciting, come see this new red couch, and print out this coupon to bring in with you for a savings on it.

What we're seeing is people wanting to eliminate all that paper in their lives, and paperwork, and postage. The greatest advantage to our web site is that we can throw an idea out to a handful of people and get a bite on it, no paperwork for anyone.

If you manage your customer base very well you can take clips from different companies and you can have live video with new and different ideas that support your business, and you won't have to create it all by yourself.

For the first time, public TV has destination viewing. Before we had to say, check your local listings for viewing times. With the Create Network, you can call your sister and say, you have to tune in to this great show and here's when it's on.

The 24-hour Create Network is bringing in a younger demographic who wants high definition and digital. It's wildly popular, and once viewers move to the triple digits, they don't come back.

How-To always does better when the economy is bad.

Our new motto: Renovate rather than relocate. I think that would also be a great motto for the furniture industry.

We think and know from being in the market right now, and funded by corporate dollars, that we're all going to have to work very creatively to make things work.

Going forward, I see a lot of people liking to buy brands that really have substance. I don't see people buying a brand, say buying a paint, because it has a football player's name on it. In our case, a big initiative will be licensing. We think we have something of substance, real substance will sell it, and we show people how to use it.

To me the answer to a lot of furniture's woes - and looking from a viewpoint at High Point Market- is to open up market the last two days and let people come in.
When I go to High Point, I am totally blown away, it's so exciting. Don't you get excited? Last time I came back someone asked, did you find a sofa for that living room? And I said, I found 5,000 sofas for that living room. I always go by certain showrooms and the new little designer booths at the big building. It's the best, it's phenomenal, it's like watching Oceans 14. There's nowhere I can go at retail or in design showrooms to see that. If consumers could see that, they would come from all over the world, and they would go home excited, they would go home wanting to be in the business, wanting to be designers, wanting to buy.

I don't think it will happen - but it has worked for other trade associations. And I know they'll say, who is she? But if High Point is looking for something to make them different than Vegas, let people in.

What I want to learn next is how to be a better motivator. We're about the same age, right? When we were young executives, our motivators were we wanted the corner office, we wanted respect, we wanted not to be asked to make coffee. If somebody gave us attention, entrusted us with a big project, that was it. Now, it's different, I want to learn more about what keeps people interested, what trips their trigger.

VICKI PAYNE is CEO of Cutters Productions, Emmy award winning producers of "For Your Home;" "Paint, Paper & Crafts;" and other syndicated programs carried by public TV stations, cable networks, and the new 24 hour digital cable channel, Create Network.