Making No Waves

摘要

No news is good news, as they say, and that also goes for the bath business in home textiles. In 2014 it was business as usual, with incremental increases for the bath category - which includes towels, rugs, shower curtains, accessories and tank sets. Given the 1.7% gain in total bath product sales at retail last year to $4.78 billion, suppliers have some cause to celebrate another year of increases - even if minimal - and emerging growth of certain retail channels. "Bath is such a mature business that it tends to go in the same direction as the economy," said David Record, director of global sourcing, Mohawk Home. "You could make an argument that with unemployment dropping, the housing market improving and gas prices still down, which all translate to increase in discretionary dollars, you would think there would be very measurable increases. But I don't know if that has manifested yet in home textiles. Until then, the bath business continues to move along with slight increases based on the overall economy." Direct-to-consumer - which includes e-commerce - posted the highest sales increase, 2.4%, of the various channels, taking it to $146.3 million in sales.