His (not so) Secret Weapon
“But, above and beyond LightSpeed,” Roy says, “what clinched the Mac decision in my mind was the ability to take command of so many aspects of my business with such an integrated set of tools.” Caro draws a finger across his Mac OS X toolbar, packed with all sorts of Apple applications.
Roy uses Address Book as his contact manager, iCal for juggling schedules, and .Mac for daily archiving of email and data to his remote iDisk. “In any business, information is money. You can’t afford any unreliability in your data backup; it has to be perfect. And for me, automatically backing up to iDisk is a very, very good solution.”
Retailer Becomes Filmmaker
But Roy doesn’t limit himself to simply tending to the nuts and bolts of Celadon’s operations. “Selling furniture is a very visual business, so it just made sense to take control of the creative side of things, too.” After playing with iMovie for just a few afternoons, Roy realized it was the perfect tool to create “sneak previews” of new designs he’d photographed at tradeshows — complete with zooms, pans, music, and effects — and excite interest by splashing them across his in-store plasma screen. “People love seeing the previews, and I’ve sometimes managed to sell new designs almost before they’re off the assembly line.”
Roy also maintains the mood of his showroom with a handpicked playlist of 1200 songs on iTunes. “When I was in the restaurant business,” he remembers, “running music from CDs was always a hassle, because CDs play at very different volumes. But iTunes equalizes all the volume levels with a click. It’s little design features like those that make all the difference.”
Yes, Looks Matter
Roy cast a design-savvy glance at the “look” of the iMac, as well. “Our showroom space is simple, clean, and white, to make our products stand out in high contrast. The Mac fit in effortlessly with the look of my space. It’s truly a design object as well as a functional one.
“Whether it’s furniture or technology, as you age you begin to really appreciate people’s efforts to be different, to create a more refined product. You want to do more than simply match what’s being offered elsewhere; you want to push it to a higher level. Certainly Apple exemplifies that superbly — and that’s the philosophy I want my business to reflect, too.”
