Defying the retail odds in Ohio

By Vicki Rulli and Tom Heaphey

Hi – we are Vicki & Tom — a married couple who own and operate two businesses in the home industry.  If you’re reading this article, we most likely don’t need to tell you how challenging today’s market is for an independent retail store.  We opened Duo Home in October 2022 in Springfield, Ohio, a small city of just under 60,000 residents. If our timing wasn’t a bit questionable, the fact that neither of us had retail experience may explain a lot. Yet here we are coming up on three years and exceeding our financial projections for growth.

However, what we do have is 15+ years’ experience on the wholesale side of the home industry as Itinerant Studio, a production art company that only sells to the trade. This allowed us to be in the middle of all the trade shows, meeting people from the different areas of the industry.  From talking to everyone, attending educational events, reading publications, to listening to industry veterans, it allowed us to learn and experience so much.

Tom: This experience has provided us with some very unique and useful industry and market knowledge.  If you visit Duo Home in Springfield, you will hear a lot about, as Vicki likes to say, the Four Goods: good people, good quality, good design and a good story.  It has been our guiding principle for our business and the products we buy. We didn’t think of it as a marketing tool but as it turns out, it’s the cornerstone for our narrative and our marketing.  We also leaned into the fact that in Ohio there aren’t many stores that sell a more modern line of furniture or have products from brands you might typically see in bigger cities.

Vicki: We truly live (and purchase) by our 4 Goods and as Tom mentioned, it has evolved into our brand. Because it is authentic to us as people and how we live our lives, I think it is an easier sell to our customers. The concept is that Duo Home buys from good people (treat their employees well, care about what they doing and their impact on the world, etc.); who make a good product (well-made/good quality, but also sustainable, and focused on healthy home; with good design (intentional); and a good story (third generation family, employee owned, started by 2 sisters, etc.)

So, as you can imagine, we spend time researching new companies.  Some we are fortunate to have known for years due to Itinerant Studio, others we recently met.

We use our time in the store to tell this story, and we hold events around them such as a “What is your furniture made of?” or “Let’s talk design.” And of course, we include snacks and drinks.

We definitely want to do a better job of telling our story and having better signage about the brands we carry, but as you all know, small businesses don’t always have enough time for everything all at once.

Tom: We are fortunate because we own our building.  It has Itinerant Studio in one part and Duo Home in another.  Plus, we have room for expansion. While owning a 100+ year old building has its challenges, it does allow us freedom to make choices we might not make if we were renting. The building has also become part of our brand and a source of pride among locals who are excited to see part of their history saved and being used in a unique way. We will talk more in later articles about building ownership as well as the process of renovation.

Vicki: Our building is on the south side of our downtown. For many they were surprised we opened a boutique lifestyle store not just in Springfield — an unproven small market with a mixed socio-economic community — but even more so because the location is on the edge of the downtown where the population is poorer and less inclined to purchase from us. For whatever reason, we were undeterred by these facts and decided to spend two years sanding and fixing floors and ceilings, cleaning, painting, working on windows, and more. Of course, we didn’t have much of an option considering we owned the building and had plenty of space for a store in it.  And as I am sure all of you will agree, to be a small business owner you have to be somewhat of an optimist! So, cheers to our collective optimism — and more articles from us about this crazy journey in our fantastic industry!