Five franchisees with Showhomes, the nation’s largest and most successful home staging franchise system, experienced major growth in 2018, with each of those franchise locations seeing a sales increase of more than 60%.
The Showhomes Main Line franchise, which is located in Malvern, Pennsylvania, close to Philadelphia, saw sales go up by 114%. The Showhomes Houston franchise saw sales go up by 79%. Showhomes Santa Fe sales went up by 83%. Showhomes Folsom Lake, located close to Sacramento, saw sales go up by 69%, while Showhomes Woodlands, located outside of the Houston area, saw sales go up by 86%.
Showhomes Main Line franchisee Allyson Piccolomini attributes her location’s growth to having established itself and getting the name out there.
“We’ve done our own Google Ad work and we now have a professional marketing company doing our social media,” Piccolomini said. “We’ve also been shifting our focus towards more social media and Internet ads versus print ads.”
She also attributes her location’s success in 2018 to the corporate team’s installing Proposify, a digital proposal tool that helps make for a more seamless client transaction and a more professional look overall for the business. The Showhomes corporate team paid for the Main Line franchise to use the service.
“We love Proposify and feel like it has really helped increase our sales,” Piccolomini said.
The Showhomes brand can work in any market, but the Main Line franchise does have some unique market qualities.
“It’s very unique in the Philadelphia area,” Piccolomini said of Showhomes. “Philadelphia was one of the first cities in the country and it has a very unique demographic of people and properties. We’re working in older homes and newly-constructed homes, and there are also a lot of townhomes in the city.”
Piccolomini credits the Showhomes brand with providing franchisees with a solid, proven system and customers with a trusted name.
“The Showhomes name has helped us get our brand out there more and people recognize us,” Piccolomini said. “Homeowners feel better knowing they are working with a franchise location and a brand that protect their most valuable asset, which is why we worked with Showhomes to begin with. It’s that corporate structure and name recognition.”
Shelley Barndollar is the franchisee for Showhomes Houston. She attributes much of the 2018 growth to the bounce back from 2017’s Hurricane Harvey.
“Our growth in 2018 has been very, very big because we suffered Hurricane Harvey last year towards the end of the year, and from September really until December the industry just stopped in Houston,” Barndollar said. “This year, thank goodness, there have been no hurricanes and it has been a really strong market. In particular, our Home Manager Staging portion of Showhomes has grown.”
The Houston location also worked extra hard in 2018 to get the Showhomes brand out there.
“I think it’s also that we have done some strategic planning from last year to this year,” Barndollar said. “We’ve really made the commitment to get out there and really work hard at getting everybody to know who we are and we are seeing some benefits from that.”
The Showhomes Houston franchise also hired a Marketing and Business Development Manager, “and that has made a big difference in really focusing in on getting our name out there to certain groups,” Barndollar said.
Barndollar’s franchise has also done more partnering.
“We’re doing a lot more partnering with title companies and real estate companies,” Barndollar said. “Stewart Title, Gallery Furniture and Showhomes have partnered together to give talks on the importance of customer service and making sure people respect you and know you’ve got the integrity that other companies may fall behind on.”
Barndollar also spoke to the support provided by the Showhomes corporate team.
“They’re always very supportive,” she said. “They’re a great group of people and they’re always there for us if we ever have any questions or concerns. They have our back.”
Showhomes is thrilled with the success these particular five franchises saw in 2018.
“We are convinced we have some of the best franchisees in the country, and Allyson and Shelley, as well as the other three franchisees who saw exponential growth, are stellar representatives of the brand,” Showhomes COO Matt Kelton said. “We’re excited to see what they and the rest of our franchisee system will accomplish in 2019.”