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Devastated by the housing crash, Carls Furniture filed for bankruptcy protection this week and will close its Kendall store and could retire a location in north Miami-Dade, too.

The furniture chain, based in Coconut Creek, will close its Boca Raton store and the one at 7501 SW 100th St. in Kendall, according to court filings and an ad on the Carls’ website touting discounts up to 70 percent for both locations. In seeking Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Carls lawyers listed $6 million in assets and $9 million in liabilities.

Carls has been struggling financially for much of the last four years. As the housing market plummeted, so did the upscale furniture retailer’s sales.

To generate cash and reduce overhead costs, the company has tried various strategies, including closing stores and selling off real estate.

Carls stores in Aventura and West Palm Beach were closed around 2007. After marketing its entire portfolio for sale in 2007, the company later sold the real estate for its stores in Stuart and North Palm Beach to a developer, but leased them back. Those stores were closed earlier this year.

To raise more cash and pay down debt, in 2008 Carls sold a major stake in its Carls Patio business to an Ohio-based private equity firm, Weinberg Bell Group.

“We wanted to shore up our balance sheet and pay off our debt in full to make sure we were on very solid ground should the downturn continue,” Jeff Baker, president of Carls Furniture, said in 2008. “We’re going to do everything we can to survive the downturn and be one of the players that is still here in the long run.”

Carls Patio sent out an announcement Wednesday saying it is not part of the bankruptcy filing.

While bankruptcy filings list Carl’s Furniture as a 10 percent owner of Carls Patio, Carls Patio President Gary Ecoff said in a statement that his company “has no affiliation whatsoever with Carls Furniture.’’

Ecoff said Carls Furniture sold its interest in Carls Patio in 2008. The Carls Furniture bankruptcy does not list Carls Patio as a participant. Ecoff was not immediately available for an interview. Carls executives also were not available for interviews Wednesday morning.

The Carls Furniture filings list the landlord at the Carls other Miami-Dade location as a top creditor. Failed rent negotiations with Continental Equities, the landlord for Carls’ north Dade store at 1400 NW 167th St., helped push the chain into bankruptcy, Carls lawyer Robert Furr told the South Florida Business Journal.

“We’re another victim of the economy, but we probably wouldn’t have filed for Chapter 11 if the landlord in North Dade had worked with us more,’’ Furr said, according to the publication’s website. “That location will probably close also, sometime this summer.’’

The Miami Herald also is listed as one of the smaller creditors, claiming $128,000 for advertising fees.

The filings list about $1 million in unsecured claims from companies controlled by Myron Baker, the longtime chairman and CEO of the family-run company. The Baker companies own two Carls locations and a Carls warehouse, and collect rent from the chain.

In an effort to protect U.S. manufacturers from the practice of dumping, the Commerce Department hit Chinese makers of bedroom furniture with import tariffs in 2005. Instead of slowing down the import of artificially low-priced beds and night stands, the move actually increased them, The Washington Post reports.

Woodworth Wooden Industries in southern China used to ship 400 containers of bedroom furniture monthly to the United States, but now sends just 60.

However, the company, along with others, moved parts of its operations to Vietnam to avoid the tariffs. As a result, imported bedroom furniture accounts for 70 percent of the U.S. market, up from 58 percent before the tariff.

While China exported $691 million in bedroom furniture to the United States last year, down from $1.2 billion in 2004, exports of the same goods from Vietnam have gone from $151 million to $931 million.

The number of Americans making furniture in America is now less than half of what it was before the tariffs.

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WARREN, Mich., May 24, 2011 /PRNewswire/ — Beginning next month, Art Van Furniture will take another big step toward one-stop furnishing shopping by adding a full line of name brand flooring in all of our locations. In an agreement with World of Floors, Art Van Furniture will again utilize the store within a store concept successfully proven with Paul’s TV. It will be called Art Van World of Floors.

World of Floors is a Preferred Brands Company based in Minneapolis. It is the third largest flooring group in the United States, selling and installing brand name flooring such as Shaw, Mohawk, Armstrong and Mannington for homes and offices. 

“At Art Van Furniture, we’re all about quality product, value, and exceptional customer service,” explains Art Van Elslander, the company’s founder and chairman, ”by bringing World of Floors into our showrooms, we can now offer an extra added convenience and design services to our guests.”

This new partnership makes great business sense. First, it’s one stop shopping for our guest. Second, it will increase traffic into all 33 Art Van showrooms statewide. Third, it will create 100 new jobs and allow Art Van‘s World of Floors to be more competitive in the marketplace.

The new showrooms will average 2,000 square feet and offer every kind of floor covering imaginable, including carpet, laminate, ceramic, wood and vinyl, as well as an extensive line of window treatments. ”We are very excited about this collaboration,” says Emil Pedick, World of Floors President, “teaming Art Van‘s stellar reputation in the furniture industry with World of Floors expertise in flooring and window treatments is a perfect match.”

The first stores Art Van World of Floors will open in southeast Michigan in mid-June of this year with all of the stores completed by September, 2011. World of Floors currently has five free standing stores in Michigan. Plans are also underway to open more stand-alone stores, expand its internet shopping site, and Shop-At-Home services throughout the state.

Other one-stop shopping features available at Art Van Furniture include outdoor furniture from Art’s Backyard, big screen televisions from Paul’s TV and mattresses from Art Van PureSleep. For more information for World of Floors employment opportunities please email careers@worldoffloors.com.

About Art Van Furniture

Art Van Furniture is Michigan‘s largest furniture retailer and America’s largest independent furniture retailer. The company operates 34 stores in 33 communities throughout Michigan, a full service e-commerce website, plus three freestanding Art Van PureSleep bedding stores in Canton, Troy and Rochester Hills, Michigan. Founded in 1959, the company is family-owned and headquartered in Warren, Mich. Check out artvan.com for more information.

SOURCE Art Van Furniture

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