Before delving into the charming, endless designs and quirky accessories scattered randomly around Matt Blatt Furniture stores, the obvious question concerns the man behind this unique Australian furniture company and his connection to the Drexler family.
“There is no Matt Blatt, no such person,” Joel Drexler laughs. “My parents were in wholesale furniture, supplying companies like Harvey Norman, before Dad decided to go into retail for himself. They were trying to come up with a name for the company and noticed a box of chairs from China with ‘Matt Blatt’ misspelled on the side instead of the colour ‘Matte Black’. They thought it was a fun name so they called the company Matt Blatt.”
Entertaining furniture
That was 15 years ago and Adam and Deborah Drexler’s obvious sense of fun has extended into each of their 11 Matt Blatt stores around Australia. Walk into a showroom and prepare for your senses to be assaulted by exuberant monkeys hanging from lampshades, a meerkat holding court at a dinner table, or Bertie the French bulldog imploring you from a corner.
Then there is Zoltan the fortune teller, complete with a ruby-encrusted purple turban and natty moustache, or Argo the horse with artificial plants sprouting from his steel frame. There’s something to fill every vacant and boring corner in your house, no matter how modern or classic; and if you’re unsure about being a little different, just ask the Matt Blatt in-house stylist to assist.
For Joel, the company’s general manager, the Matt Blatt shopping experience is all about entertainment. “When we open new stores, or employ new managers, we make it clear we are not in the furniture business; we’re in the entertainment business,” Joel explains.
“We encourage a very strong culture of ownership and inspire our managers to make their showrooms fun, to do weird and unexpected things. They don’t wait for instructions; they are all very entrepreneurial and come to us with ideas to improve their store performance.”
A seat at the table
Although there was no particular plan for Joel to join the family business, he began working part-time after school in the family’s original store at Marrickville. “It was very small, attached to a warehouse; just me and my parents, a receptionist and a warehouse guy,” he remembers. “I went to university and did a commerce degree, still working part-time answering the phones and doing a bit of admin. Then I started doing more and more, and when I finished my degree I just started working in the business full-time. It just happened organically.
“I didn’t have any official title, but people kept calling and asking me who I was and what I did there. I needed to call myself something, so I just started calling myself the general manager.” These days there are 4 Matt Blatt stores in Sydney, with another 3 in Melbourne. There is also one in Brisbane, the Gold Coast, Adelaide and the ACT, with plans to open 2 or 3 stores a year for the next 5 years.
We are not in the furniture business; we’re in the entertainment business
“We definitely want to open in Western Australia, probably a few more in Sydney, Melbourne, maybe Newcastle and Tasmania. We’re also looking at expanding into New Zealand within the next 12 months, but maybe just with an online presence to start. Even though we have a strong online presence, most of our sales are still in brick-and-mortar stores; people love to come in and browse.”
While Matt Blatt initially enjoyed a reputation for fiercely competitive replica furniture, the business has transitioned more to original designs, around 70%, sourced from mostly European designers working for them on commission. “Trends are shifting away from replica, so we’ll be discontinuing a lot of it,” Joel says. “We’re finding our customers are more interested in getting more unique designs – new, different, fun and exciting things they don’t see everywhere else. “Furniture trends are also changing due to more and more apartments going up. Dining tables, sofas and sofa beds require new thought as they need to be more compact.”
Solid partnerships
Compact furniture or not, it all has to be delivered, and the rapid expansion of stores and increase in customers requires precision, not only in meeting deadlines but ensuring the furniture arrives in one piece. For this, Matt Blatt relies on Pedemonts, iconic furniture removalists since the late-1800s and still operating as a family business 5 consecutive generations later.
“We joined with Pedemonts several years ago when we started expanding interstate,” Joel says. “We had a few smaller-scale contractors, but the complexities of getting a sofa up someone’s stairs into a living room are pretty big and we were finding there were just too many issues. We needed a solid partner we could rely upon as we grew.
Our stores were improving, as was our online presence and our marketing, but that all means nothing if you can’t get the product to the customers and, more importantly, get it there in one piece. With Pedemonts, we know that once the furniture leaves our warehouse, we don’t need to worry about it, and nor does the customer.”
Joel’s mum and dad are still very much hands-on in the company and, armed with different strengths, they each bring something different to the table. Joel focuses on the everyday operational procedures, while Deborah is mainly involved in trade shows and selection, and Adam concentrates on marketing and promotion. Meanwhile, Joel’s sister Avril completes the artwork and graphic design.
“Because we’ve worked together for so long, we share the same ideas and same vision. Of course, we disagree sometimes, but we’re pretty aligned. It’s all seamless. If one of us were to step out of the business, I think it would create a big gap that none of us could really fill.”