Tag: CORT

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Berkshire Hathaway’s CORT Events, the trade show and event division of CORT Furniture Rental, the nation’s premier provider of furniture rental and destination services, is excited to announce its strategic expansion. As part of this growth, CORT Events is relocating its Orlando warehouse to a larger facility as of August 15, 2024, enhancing its ability to serve trade shows, exhibits, and events in Orlando and southern Florida.

Daniel Tiepelman, vice president of operations, highlighted the practical benefits of the expansion. “This larger warehouse is a testament to our dedication to customer service. By doubling our space, we can stock more products in demand and meet our clients’ needs promptly,” he said.

Damon Ross, senior vice president of CORT Events, further emphasized the strategic significance of the move. “This strategic relocation allows us to broaden our reach and better meet our clients’ and market’s evolving needs. By positioning the CORT Events warehouse closer to our sister division, we aim to foster growth and improve our service in the trade show market,” Ross explained.

The new warehouse, at 8550 McCoy Rd, Suite 200, is 5 miles from the former warehouse and will streamline operations with CORT Furniture Rental, CORT’s business-to-consumer division. This collaboration is designed to enhance efficiency and service delivery within this important market.

“This location and increased warehouse size enables CORT Events to continue to stay focused on improving the customer experience and offer increased product volume and diversity to the Florida region,” noted Phil DeSarno, vice president of sales, marketing and merchandising.

CORT Events’ expansion efforts extend beyond Orlando. In late June, they opened a warehouse in Round Rock, TX, to cater to the dynamic Austin and San Antonio markets.

As the nation’s largest event and trade show furniture rental company, CORT Events boasts 17 warehouses across the country. They offer a wide selection of furnishings, lighting, and event drape, as well as free interactive design tools, positioning CORT Events as a one-stop solution for creating engaging, functional spaces.

© 2024 David Mazor

Disclosure: David Mazor is a freelance writer focusing on Berkshire Hathaway. The author is long in Berkshire Hathaway, and this article is not a recommendation on whether to buy or sell the stock. The information contained in this article should not be construed as personalized or individualized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

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Berkshire Hathaway’s CORT, the nation’s leading provider of home, office, event, and trade show furniture rental, has announced the expansion of its trade show and event division, CORT Events. On July 1, a new warehouse opened in Round Rock, TX, to serve Austin, San Antonio, and the surrounding regions.

Damon Ross, CORT Events Senior Vice President, expressed enthusiasm about the expansion, stating, “We are thrilled to expand our event and trade show offerings and bring our exemplary service to this exciting market. Austin has a reputation for hosting innovative, exciting events, and we look forward to partnering with our clients in this rapidly growing event and convention city.”

The new warehouse is expected to positively impact the local economy by creating jobs in Round Rock and fostering partnerships with local businesses. This move underscores CORT Events’ commitment to the communities it serves.
As the nation’s largest event and trade show furniture rental company, CORT Events boasts 16 warehouses across the country. They offer a wide selection of furnishings, lighting, and event drapes, along with free interactive design tools to assist meeting, exhibit, and trade show planners in creating engaging, functional spaces.

Daniel Tiepelman, CORT Events Vice President of Operations and Asset Management, emphasized the strategic importance of the new location, stating, “Opening a new location in the heart of Austin, Texas, is not just a strategic move to grow our footprint. It is about a commitment to bring our customers closer to an unparalleled trade show and event solution with increased service levels in Austin and surrounding areas. We are excited to better serve our partners with this new location.”

Austin, known for hosting large annual events such as SXSW and Formula 1, is home to major companies like Dell, Apple, Amazon, and IBM. The Austin Convention Center is undergoing renovations, expanding to 1 million square feet with 360,000 square feet of expo space.

CORT Events also operates warehouses in Dallas and Houston, further solidifying its presence in the dynamic Texas market.

© 2024 David Mazor

Disclosure: David Mazor is a freelance writer focusing on Berkshire Hathaway. The author is long in Berkshire Hathaway, and this article is not a recommendation on whether to buy or sell a stock. The information contained in this article should not be construed as personalized or individualized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

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Berkshire Hathaway’s CORT Furniture Rental has promoted Paula Newell, the company’s Executive Vice President, to the position of Chief Operating Officer (COO), effective immediately. This appointment underscores CORT’s commitment to fostering internal talent and recognizes Paula’s outstanding contributions to the organization.

In her new role, Paula will be responsible for overseeing all operational aspects of CORT Furniture and will continue to report directly to CEO and President, Mike Davis. With a strong background in both sales and operations, Paula is uniquely positioned to understand both customer needs and those of our business. She brings a people-first approach to her leadership, emphasizing guidance, support, and vision while driving accountability and results.

“Paula’s promotion to Chief Operating Officer underscores her exceptional leadership qualities, and unwavering commitment to our people, values and vision,” stated CEO and President, Mike Davis.

Paula has been with CORT since 1998, holding various leadership roles such as assistant district general manager, district general manager, area manager, regional vice president of sales, and vice president of national accounts.

Most recently, she served as the executive vice president of operations for the U.S., where she provided oversight for all furniture rental and outlet operations across the company.

“I am deeply honored and excited to take on the role of COO,” said Paula, “This promotion is a testament to the incredible team, culture, and vision we have at CORT. I look forward to continuing to drive our operational excellence and customer-centric approach, ensuring we remain the industry leader in furniture rental solutions.”

Before joining CORT, Paula was the operations, sales, and merchandising manager for Levitz Furniture on the West Coast. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from California State University San Bernardino.

CORT is the nation’s leading provider of transition services, including furniture rental for home and office, event furnishings, destination services, apartment locating, touring, and other services. With more than 100 locations including offices, distribution centers, furniture rental showrooms, and furniture outlets across the United States, operations in the United Kingdom, and a global network of partners in more than 80 countries around the world.

© 2024 David Mazor

Disclosure: David Mazor is a freelance writer focusing on Berkshire Hathaway. The author is long in Berkshire Hathaway, and this article is not a recommendation on whether to buy or sell a stock. The information contained in this article should not be construed as personalized or individualized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

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Berkshire Hathaway’s CORT, the nation’s leading provider of furniture rental and transition services, has seen its conversion rates increase 111% since the launch of an immersive shopping experience allowing customers to have real-time interaction with products while remaining in their own home.

In January, CORT and Vertebrae, the technology leader in 3D & augmented reality (AR) solutions for retail, rolled out an immersive shopping experience allowing customers to have real-time interaction with products. Through its partnership with Vertebrae, CORT is able to utilize 3D and AR technology to bridge the gap between physical stores and online retail to give customers a hybrid shopping experience.

Customers can now view over 150 furniture and home accessory products from every angle, and virtually assess how a piece of furniture will look and fit in their own space.

In its first full month since launching in mid-January, CORT has seen conversion rates increase 111% with beds and sofas receiving the most interaction. In addition to doubling conversion rates from customers engaging with 3D products versus those not engaging, CORT has seen an 122% increase in revenue per visit for desktop users and 78% for mobile users.

“More consumers are shopping online than ever before, which makes this an exciting time to explore ways to enhance our online experience with the use of virtual technology,” said Ben Clark, senior manager of online business development at CORT. “Being able to provide our customers with the tools necessary to make educated rental decisions is a top priority for CORT.”

© 2022 David Mazor

Disclosure: David Mazor is a freelance writer focusing on Berkshire Hathaway. The author is long in Berkshire Hathaway and BYD, and this article is not a recommendation on whether to buy or sell a stock. The information contained in this article should not be construed as personalized or individualized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

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Berkshire Hathaway’s CORT has been selected as an exclusive supplier by Metro Offices, a leading Flexible Workspace as a Service provider that is expanding its Metro Federal.

As a woman-owned and woman-operated private company, Metro has been operating business centers in the Washington Metropolitan area for the past 32 years. During those years, Metro has outsourced cumbersome office acquisition and administration functions to over 10,000 small and medium size companies.

“Metro has always been a company that seeks to be forward thinking on how we can assist our clients to be successful,” states Kathlene Buchanan, CEO and Founder of Metro. “With that in mind, over 10 years ago Metro sought to develop another solution to its future client base, in particular the federal government. Flexible Workspace as a Service solution provides an agency with a turnkey facility including furniture, utilities, communications, IT services and all related infrastructure, and full-time support staff under a services contract. Contracts are flexible, scalable, and applicable for 1-to-5-year terms.”

To achieve this nation-wide growth, Metro Federal has selected CORT’s Furniture-as-a-Service solution to contribute to the successful delivery of this solution.

“With the addition of CORT, our solution truly provides continuous flexibility to our government clients,” Ms. Buchanan said. “Metro and CORT will also modify the furniture configuration in our solution as the government agencies’ needs change during the contract.”

CORT’s workplace furniture offerings enable Metro Offices’ customers to increase flexibility as the fully furnished amenity brings customers one step closer to a turnkey facility. In addition to furnishings, clients are supported with expertise to locate and design their space, build out and equip an office as needed, all under one contract.

“We are very excited at CORT to be selected by Metro for this new offering to federal government customers,” said Todd Simpson, CORT Strategic Business Development Managing Director. “CORT and Metro Offices have partnered a number of times in recent years, and we’ve always been impressed with Metro’s ability to execute turnkey workspace solutions quickly and ahead of schedule, and then tailor them over time as their client’s needs change.”

© 2022 David Mazor

Disclosure: David Mazor is a freelance writer focusing on Berkshire Hathaway. The author is long in Berkshire Hathaway, and this article is not a recommendation on whether to buy or sell a stock. The information contained in this article should not be construed as personalized or individualized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.

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Berkshire Hathaway’s furniture rental company, CORT, has announced that J.T. Marcum has joined the furniture rental company as Vice President of Business Strategy.

Marcum will be relocating from Dallas, Texas, to CORT’s headquarters in Chantilly, Virginia, where he will report directly to CORT’s Chief Operating Officer Mike Davis.

“We are thrilled to have J.T. as part of the CORT leadership team,” said Davis. “J.T. brings great perspective and insight during a time of rapid change in Logistics and Last Mile services. His ability to push innovative customer solutions and question the status quo are just a few reasons we hired him. He has a proven track record of success in creating and leading teams, and we look forward to leveraging his fresh thinking at CORT.”

Marcum brings close to 15 years of experience in developing new business units and pursuing untapped revenue segments. Prior to joining CORT, Marcum was the Vice President of Account Management at Lineage Logistics headquartered in Novi, MI. In his new role, Marcum will focus on new adaption of CORT’s current business offerings and support corporate operations strategy. By integrating CORT’s warehousing, transportation, fulfillment and distribution processes with the latest innovations, Marcum aims to help these teams think about new ways of doing business to solve customers’ logistics and supply chain issues.

“I am thrilled to join CORT and work with the leader in furniture rental,” said Marcum. “Using our networks and capabilities as they exist today to help customers solve real business problems will be my core focus. I am excited to develop and launch new programs while reimagining existing service offerings to help CORT stay relevant and evolve as a business to meet customer demands so we can continue to lead the industry for decades to come.”

© 2019 David Mazor

Disclosure: David Mazor is a freelance writer focusing on Berkshire Hathaway. The author is long in Berkshire Hathaway, and this article is not a recommendation on whether to buy or sell the stock. The information contained in this article should not be construed as personalized or individualized investment advice. Past performance is no guarantee of future results.