Hooker Furniture heads to SoCal

Hooker Furniture heads to SoCal Martinsville, Va.-based Hooker Furniture is set to open an 80,000-square-foot warehouse and distribution center in Carson, the importer's first West Coast DC.
   Hooker, which shuttered its last U.S. manufacturing facility in 2007, now imports its furniture from China and other Pacific Rim nations. The new facility will stock more than 550 products in the company's catalog, according to firm officials.
   Financial terms and details of the lease were not released.
   The firm expects the new facility, located just miles from the ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles, to cut shipping costs and speed delivery times to customers. Hooker Furniture had been receiving containers from China at its 580,000-square-foot Central Distribution Center in Martinsville and trucking the products to retailers in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Oregon and Washington.
   The new facility, in conjunction with a warehousing agreement in China, will also allow the firm's customers to build a customized containerload and have the furniture delivered directly to the retailer's location.