BY MALCOLM MCDONALD, CHIEF OPERATING OFFICER, BRAVO GROUP

Johannesburg 7 December 2016. The accelerating pace of business globally – and particularly now in South Africa as we hurtle towards the year-end and seasonal shutdowns – can mean that To Do items that seem “nice to have” get squeezed out of the diary. However, think again if you’re contemplating cutting out a planned communication with your customers on your plans for 2017. Year-end is when customers catch up with distant family, friends and colleagues who have moved to other parts of the world.

This is a time when they expect to hear from those who can bring them exciting and refreshing news, and update them for the year ahead. SA business can maximise this opportunity to add value to relationships with their customers, sharing with them trend forecasts to assist in making informed purchase decisions. Our customers are reassured that we know how to make a business sustainable because we have built on a heritage of more than 120 years to make the Bravo Group South Africa’s largest furniture and sleep products manufacturer. In the process, we have learned that sustainability includes looking ahead to identify and capitalise on innovations and key market trends.

For decades, we have gone out into world markets to bring back the best in innovative comfort and styling for our customers. South Africa has embraced our introduction of favourite international brands such as La-Z-Boy, Sealy and Slumberland. However, with globalisation having increased many times over, we do not sit on our laurels. Increasingly, our customers are the Millennial “I want it now!” generation. It is clear that those businesses who will not or cannot respond to this could well fall by the wayside.

It is true that you can track global trends through desktop research, but nothing beats getting out into the global marketplace, networking with innovative and successful designers and retailers and talking trends with global opinion leaders. So we continue regularly sending out teams of our own style spotters to report back on the global trends from top international furniture and décor shows. We find that the China International Furniture Fair in Shanghai and the Las Vegas Furniture Exhibition in the USA are the largest exhibitions of upholstered furniture applicable to the SA market. Shows such as Cologne in Germany are more fashion-forward, giving us direction further into the future.

Acting on such trend-spotting intelligence is key if any business is to stay agile and competitive back in SA. Applying trends to customers’ needs and preferences mean that we are working towards smaller designs to suit the ever-increasing SA trend to townhouse living, for instance. The urban aesthetic also means we look at creating cleaner lines that are less puffy but still softened and inviting. Technology has become so important to urban living so we have added features such as power recliners and cup-coolers for home theatre use and USB charging functions as close to the fingertips as possible.

Overall, we’re aware that earthy tones are more commercial in South Africa, which will be reinforced by their imminent renaissance internationally. As always, these will be offset by a pop of fashionable colours, so we ensure that the ranges we launch at our trade shows reflect both underlying trends and current popular colours. Our business is driven by providing South Africa’s comfort – but the way South Africans want to be comfortable, whether at rest, at play or asleep, evolves over time. We have been careful to evolve alongside them and are proud that over the decades, the well-known Bravo Group brands such as Grafton Everest and GommaGomma have succeeded in becoming household names thanks to our emphasis on brands, viewing trends through the lens of their market positioning. We know, for example, that our success is mainstream commercial, so we tailor our response to trends accordingly. The strong leather focus of our Alpine brand, for instance, means that this is a long-term purchase and so less influenced by colour and fashion trends.

On the other hand, the La-Z-Boy ranges have a greater proportion of fabric-covered models, so they track changing fabric trends more closely. We see leather is extending its territory in upholstery internationally, so we are pairing it increasingly with fabrics in room settings. In applying the intelligence from our trend-spotting teams, we are aware that US trends in products, retail and customer buying patterns are most popular in SA markets. To bring the best to our customers, we monitor these trends, from sourcing and manufacturing to marketing and retailing all the way to the satisfaction of the end user. Communicating our design forecasts to customers then reassures them that they have based their big-ticket furniture purchasing decisions soundly on our expertise in reading of global and local markets. For 2017 and the years ahead,

SA businesses can remain competitive in this country and beyond through giving their customers the added value of forecasts and trend-tracking. That value is what businesses will ultimately see in the bottom line.

Bravo’s, furniture trends for 2017 Upholstered headboards: This is part of the continuing trend to spin out features of luxury hotels to the home.

Modular furnishing: Expanding townhouse living means furniture must multitask for work and relaxation, with softer silhouettes and restful colours.

Move to luxury bedding : as consumers realise the health benefits of a great night’s sleep

Palette accents: Top palettes are grey walls and monochrome fabrics or terracotta, cork and darker timber tones. For either palette, green continues as a strong accent from last season sometimes interspersed with blue.

Kick back: In reaction to our high-tech digital age, nature elements such as feather motifs are featuring in urban settings and home planning provides reading and conversation areas for a digital detox.

Danish drive: Europe particularly is falling in love with the Danish hygge concept – all about comfortable minimalism with rustic elements in an urban world.