Retailer Profile: Art Mart

In 1963 when Linda Ballard and Carol Ann Hurt first took over five-year-old Art Mart, an Urbana, Ill.-based gift/gourmet store, the sister-team had their husbands sign the bank loan. In those days, women weren't granted credit on their own accord.

Today, they oversee a 9,000-sq.-ft. operation in what has become a family-operated store with their husbands and children working alongside them.

Artistic Roots

Art Mart first opened in 1957 in the town of Champaign, Ill., near the University of Illinois. It began as a sort of art gallery store with artwork, ceramics, and paintings mixed in with tabletop and gifts.

"The merchandise was geared toward design and function," Ballard said. "We bought it in 1963 and moved it into Campustown, expanding it to include more toys, tabletop, posters, bedspreads, and yarn for knitting. We based the concept on artful objects."

Whether shopping for unique gifts for the home, gourmet favorites, or classic toys, Art Mart provides consumers a wide array of selection with their unique three-stores-in-one concept: Art Mart, Art Mart Foods, and Art Mart Toys. To describe the overall store is difficult — it doesn't fall into one particular category of gourmet specialty store. It's not simply gift. Or gourmet. Or specialty food. There are hard goods for the kitchen and dining room table, but there are also items for the bathroom, living room, bedroom, and body.

"We have specialty food and toy divisions, then the rest of the store includes many different categories," Hurt said. "We have a men's department for example with specialty flashlights and grill items with sensors in them. We pull together things for men's gifts. Our experience tells us no one knows what to buy for a man."

In the specialty food arena, Art Mart is known for its enormous hot sauce section that includes cookbooks. Customers come to the store because they know the selection is varied and unique.

"People ask me at shows to describe our store. I can't. I can tell you there's not another store like Art Mart. It just doesn't exist," Hurt said.

Art Mart's shelves are stocked with A.I. Root candles, Hackman knives, iittala glassware, and Crabtree & Evelyn body care. Specialty kitchenware items from Swissmar are showcased with Linnea Design artwork on nearby walls. Guests can relax in or take home designer-styled puff chairs from the Chicago Textile Corporation. Whatever customers are looking for — a quick afternoon snack, a gift basket for a friend, or fine crystal for a wedding — it's all here, selected with an artistic eye.

Network of Friends

The artistic concept is where the two sisters derive their identity. They have experimented in a wide range of product categories from small electrics to furniture and continue to keep their minds open to innovative possibilities when browsing markets and talking to customers. Ballard is a strong proponent of attending markets and trade shows, in addition to keeping in close contact with stores in other areas of the country.

"You have to be out there having the same experiences as your customers," Ballard said. "Luckily, we like to shop. I think you have to like to shop to be in this business."

Her sister agrees: "We go to trade shows and New York and San Francisco. My son lives in Europe, so I visit often and see what's being introduced in those markets," Hurt said. "We watch what's going on so we can be the first ones to have it in our community."

An invaluable tool the sisters have developed throughout their 40 years in business is a wide-ranging network of colleagues. In the early 80s, a trip to Finland with a group of hard goods retailers resulted in the birth of The Collaborative, a buying group of Midwestern retailers importing product from Europe.

"There were ten stores in the Midwest who met twice a year in Chicago," Hurt explained. "We began directly importing items that, as a single store, we weren't able to get on our own."

The group's efforts to bring in products not available through traditional channels led to steadfast business and personal relationships. Although the group has since dissolved, Hurt said the network they have formed through cooperative trips and association contacts is one of the most valuable resources she counts on today.

"We trade resources and sometimes products. I can get something faster from my colleague in Indianapolis than I can from the vendor. It's so exciting getting together and talking about our sources," Hurt said. "That network has become very important to us over the years."

Growing Up

As their retail experience grew, so did their store. In 1978, Art Mart moved again, this time to a 3,000-sq.-ft. space in an enclosed mall wrapped around a hotel in Urbana, Ill. Their inventory consisted of tabletop, china, dinnerware, and cookware. In 1981, Ballard and Hurt stretched out another 4,000 square feet to create Art Mart Foods, a specialty food store with a bakery and a deli.

But they didn't stop there.

In 1994, the store grew to nearly 10,000 square feet to include Art Mart Toys, a toy store filled with classical and educational toys. Hurt developed the entire toy store inventory which had comprised a small area in the original store.

"We had classic toys like Raggedy Ann dolls and wooden trains," she said. "Then a nearly 3,000-sq.-ft. area next to us in the mall was vacant; we took it over just before the holidays and didn't want it to be empty and depressing. I didn't think we'd fill it with toys, but by the time I was done ordering, it was completely filled. Our customers liked it so much, we ended up keeping it."

Family Affair

While Ballard and Hurt began with small, modest roots, they've grown Art Mart into a highly successful store with a base of loyal customers.

"We began with the little store bought in our husbands' names. When we began to remodel, we had the bank change the names on the loan to our own," Ballard recalled. "There were eight people in the store then. Now we have 35 to 50 employees. It fluctuates with the seasons."

A host of family members are included in the employee ranks. Ballard and Hurt believe in starting family in the business early. Hurt's eight grandsons serve as unofficial consultants in Art Mart Toys, advising the owners on toy purchases and making alternative suggestions.

Daughter Kendra Stewart worked at Art Mart through high school and college. She was running the deli department when her first son was born.

Ballard's daughter Courtney, who swore she wouldn't work at Art Mart while she was growing up, now runs the toy store. And as Hurt's husband neared retirement, he too joined the ranks of the Art Mart team.

"It's only been the last few years since our husbands joined us and it's really nice to have them here," Hurt said.

While Hurt oversees the hard goods department, Ballard runs the specialty food store. Hurt's husband Bob oversees the financials, hiring, and training. And Ballard's husband Dick is the newest family addition to the ranks.

Dick Ballard, an industrial design and architecture professor, is now building sandwiches at Art Mart after the store lost its veteran sandwich maker in May.

Ballard's task is to have Art Mart ready for its lunch crowd by 10 a.m. with prepared sandwiches on hand, along with a variety of fresh-baked cookies. The store draws a crowd from the federal and county courts next door, as well as from local banks and a nearby medical center.

"He likes it, although he says it's a lot of pressure trying to create what people like," Ballard said. "He's very adventuresome in his designs."

One of Dick's signature sandwiches of late is comprised of roast beef, blue cheese, and sliced roasted potato on sourdough with horseradish.

Building Business

A tribute to Ballard's and Hurt's success is the core of long-term employees who are able to apply their own expertise to help grow the business.

Artist Jan Smith and math teacher Joanne Peterson were friends of Ballard and Hurt when they first purchased Art Mart. A few years later, both found themselves working at the store. Peterson became the full-time bookkeeper. Smith began creating an image for the store through visual merchandising.

"They are so valuable to us," Hurt said. "People actually come into the store on a regular basis to see what Jan's table or window looks like this week. She does formal or informal tables with themes. Sometimes, people will say I want to buy everything that's on that table."

While Smith created a stable store identity with her artistic styling, Peterson set the tone for staff training and balancing the books.

"Joanne was only going to work until her last child was out of college and he's now 35," Hurt joked. "We must be doing something right."

Hurt's modest statement doesn't begin to describe the staff comraderie at Art Mart. The family atmosphere translates not only to loyal employees in the store, but carries over to customers who discover a staff geared to answer questions and provide quality service.

"You have to be willing to go out and offer more service to your customer. As a specialty store, it's an important concept for us," Hurt said. "The service and information we offer differentiates us from other stores."

As a tenant in a mall containing an anchoring department store, Art Mart employees find themselves being used as a resource for customers who can't get answers from its neighbor.

"The department store employees send customers over to us saying, 'Art Mart employees know everything,'" Hurt said. "When we have new employees who don't know something, we encourage them to learn. We are constantly telling our staff, 'If customers come in and you can't answer their questions, take their names and numbers and Linda or I will call them the next day.' I don't want anyone to leave the store without an answer."

Mart-Kept Concepts

Through the years, the sisters have created a myriad of marketing concepts for the variety of departments in the store, including newsletters and in-store demonstrations. Now, they are concentrating on their online presence — in particular, on their bridal registry efforts.

"The whole focus of brides and grooms has changed so much. We used to have a great bridal registry. I used to spend a lot of my time trying to be sure we had the right kind of dinnerware, but there's not much of that type of bridal registry anymore," Hurt said. "We're hoping that we can bring more bridal couples in and increase our shipments with the online service. It's really a test for us. We don't know what to expect yet. We did end up getting an order from England a couple weeks ago for a bride."

This fall, the Web site will get its own marketing support as Art Mart tests its first billboard campaign. Ballard said they scouted locations after taking the lead from their marketing agency and have decided to take the plunge.

"We'll see how it works," she said. "I've never seen our name in print that big before."

The billboards' aim is to drive traffic to the Web site, allowing new consumers to get hooked into merchandising programs already housed at www.artmart-food-toys.com, including the store's successful Coffee of the Month Club. Art Mart markets its specialty coffee category with a Coffee Club available both in-store and online. Selling points for the club include the following:

Our coffee supplier not only uses the highest-quality beans, he does not roast our beans until we place an order, ensuring that our beans always arrive ultra fresh. When you're a member of our Coffee of the Month Club, you get great coffee delivered right to your door every month.

Along with cross-merchandising throughout the store, a well-received in-store merchandising tool Art Mart uses is its Specials Billboard at the store entrance. Each week, five specials are placed on the board directing customers to closeouts and new introductions.

"We have a good relationship with our reps, so they'll call us when they have a closeout on a specific item. We like that kind of opportunity," Hurt said. "We had a company in California that was going out of business and they carried this mug we really liked. We bought their entire stock, about 10 times more than we would normally order, and we were able to pass that on to our customers."

Outside the Box

The sisters continually test their market with new concepts and ideas. Their business plans have no room for thoughts of failure. Instead, they are an enterprising team willing to test any concept.

"We had a café for a couple of years in another part of the mall, but it just didn't work. We wanted to have everything in one location," Ballard explained. "We had a catering business for 10 years. It consisted of drop-off only, service trays, and salads. But then our catering person returned to college and we couldn't continue it ourselves."

One reason the sisters give for their bold business spirit is the need to keep ahead of the traditional marketplace.

"We've tried a lot of different things," Ballard explained. "A lot of it comes from where the trends are and where they are going. We try to get into things early and then when we see the department stores and mass merchants entering the same market, we move on."

"Our role as a retailer is to pick up on the new things. We ease out of things when they become available at other places," Hurt said. "For example, when I am grocery shopping and I see something we carry and it's a dollar less than in Art Mart, we'll phase it out and look for something new to replace it at the next specialty food show."

Ballard and Hurt continually review the progress of specific categories and lines, watching prices in discount outlets and their own consumers' purchases. Their observations have led to some entire gourmet categories being either eliminated or limited.

"We can't compete with the discounted prices on small appliances, so we don't carry them anymore. We sell Capresso because they don't sell to the big stores," Ballard continued. "You have to be on your guard because sometimes you just can't match the prices."

What they do carry are items their customers can't find anywhere else. Ballard loves to find new products through her network of specialty retailers, consumers, and friends. And she gets a real thrill when discovering an innovative idea at market.

And how do they discover those innovative ideas and products? By walking the trade show floors, a task for which they have devised a technique to complete with the most effective results.

"We start in the middle of the hall on the first day and walk through taking notes. We don't buy anything on the first day. Once we've walked the entire show, we begin again at the opposite end of the aisle," Hurt explained. "You always see something new when you look at it from another perspective."

And it's that unique perspective that has made Art Mart the success it is today.