From a $100 million development in Plant City to three new stores, City Furniture is investing in Tampa Bay to compete with Wayfair and Amazon
By Ashley Gurbal Kritzer
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Dec 14, 2020

With plans for a massive new warehouse and showroom in Plant City — and three new stores throughout the Tampa Bay area — it would seem that South Florida-based City Furniture is headed deep into enemy territory.

The Wanek family, the founders of Ashley Furniture HomeStores Inc., lives in St. Petersburg. Rooms To Go is based in Seffner, though its CEO resides in Atlanta.

But City Furniture isn't planning to spend $100 million-plus to take on Ashley Furniture or Rooms To Go, CEO Keith Koening says. (He classifies those retailers as "friendly" rivals; in South Florida, City Furniture operates 14 Ashley Furniture stores through a licensing agreement.) Instead, the new Plant City development, if it comes to fruition, will be aimed at ecommerce competitors and emphasize same- and next-day delivery.

"The real competition that we all recognize is Amazon and Wayfair," Koening told the Business Journal on Monday, "and we’re all reinventing our business to the reality of a new digital world."

City Furniture has closed on a big tract of land in Plant City, paying $7.5 million for 111 acres south of Interstate 4 at the intersection of South Frontage Road and Son Keen Road. If all goes according to plan — several approvals are still needed, Koenig said, including permits and final site plan approval — the facility will break ground late in the first quarter of 2021 and wrap up construction in the third quarter of 2022.

"If we get full approvals on a timely basis, we can create hundreds of good-paying jobs and become a solid contributor to the Tampa Bay economy and community," he said. "All Plant City officials have been encouraging and super to deal with, but we are not over the goal line yet."

Koenig's vision for Tampa Bay expands far beyond Plant City. The retailer is planning 120,000-square-foot showrooms in Largo, Wesley Chapel and Sarasota. (While he's finalizing a deal in Largo, multiple properties are under consideration in Wesley Chapel and Sarasota.) Those stores cost a few hundred dollars per square foot to build out, Koening said.

City Furniture has been in South Florida since 1971; it entered the Orlando area in 2018 with a regional distribution center and showroom. The brand has been well received in Orlando, Koenig said, and its ambitions in Tampa Bay are driven by the area's population growth — and lots of runway for further growth.

"Clearly the growth pattern of Central Florida and the Tampa Bay area has been nothing short of remarkable," Koening said. "South Florida’s beautiful; it’s my home, but you’ve got land."

Beyond furniture, City Furniture's stores — there are 19 throughout South and Central Florida — also offer City Marketplace, which is 6,000 to 8,000 square feet of home accents that the retailer regularly updates. Think of the treasure-hunt style shopping HomeGoods offers, but with items from the same manufacturers used by Bernhardt Furniture Co. and Restoration Hardware.

"What we see in the home furnishings industry is what is happening across all retail," Koenig said. "The consumer is shifting higher and higher percentages of their shopping and spending to a digital platform."