It was the late 1990s when a new furniture brand, Izzy, was born. It was one of the most audacious and exciting brand launches in the history of the furniture industry, a company determined to make design and the customer experience central to its mission.
Industry veteran Chuck Saylor and a team of young 20- and 30-somethings created a brand, named after one of Saylor's granddaughters, from scratch that forever changed the way furniture would be designed and marketed. Simply put, they made selling furniture cool.
Izzy+, as it became known, is now shuttered, a victim of over-ambitious acquisitions and ownership that wants to focus on its other more profitable businesses. It was a long, slow death that doesn't seem to surprise anyone in the industry, but saddens everyone.
Mike Kelley, who served as the company's market development director, said the launch of the company was like no other in the industry. “It was phenomenal. There was this super creative nucleus of talented young people that created this cult-like level of excitement,” he said.
Kelley, who is now president of Enwork, called the creation of izzy a “huge branding exercise” that became a company with an “unbelievably cool and creative vibe.” “It was a blast,” he said.
Izzy's demise was a long, painful process. The company was owned by JSJ Corp., a Grand Haven, Mich. based OEM, since 2001. JSJ has a number of other companies in the automotive supply industry, hydraulic presses and conveyor belts. JSJ Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Nelson Jacobson said the company would discontinue production of izzy+ branded products and refocus its resources on other manufacturing segments in its portfolio.
JSJ will repurpose the izzy+ facility at 17237 Van Wagoner Road in Spring Lake and transition “as many people as possible to support three of our other well-known businesses in the area.”
“We are a 100-year-old company, and as we go through and look at the opportunities we have, furniture just doesn't fit as well as the other businesses we have,” Jacobson told MiBiz, a West Michigan business publication. “We've been able to take these resources and skills and transfer them effectively.”
Furniture, JSJ management said, just doesn't fit into the company's plans anymore.