Posted on: Sunday, May 2, 2004

Furniture 'dumping' debated

By Paul Nowell
Associated Press

HIGH POINT, N.C. — "Blame China" has been a common refrain from North Carolina manufacturers in recent years as cheap labor and free trade siphon thousands of jobs in traditional industries like textiles and furniture.

But when the furniture industry met for its trade show recently, some of the nation's largest furniture retailers rose to the defense of cheap Chinese imports.

A coalition of 31 retailers attending the spring International Home Furnishings Market announced their opposition to steep "anti-dumping" penalties on some Chinese imports of wooden bedroom furniture.

"Barriers to trade don't help anyone and they hurt the consumer," said Keith Koenig, chief executive of City Furniture, a 13-store chain based in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

"We retailers feel that if prices go up on bedroom furniture like they would like them to, consumers will stop or at least considerably slow down their purchases. Retail jobs will be lost and overall job growth will be slowed."

Besides City Furniture, the retailers opposing the antidumping petition include Rhodes Furniture, Rooms to Go, Crate & Barrel, The Bombay Co., and Haverty's.

The retailers' position puts them on the opposite side from many of the manufacturers who supply the products that fill their stores.

Last fall, a group of American makers — including Vaughan-Bassett, Stanley and La-Z-Boy — filed an antidumping petition with the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The filing accuses Chinese makers of selling wooden bedroom furniture in the United States for less than the cost of manufacturing it. U.S. trade laws prohibit that sort of "dumping."

The Commerce Department is expected to make a preliminary ruling on the petition by mid-June; tariffs could be imposed as early as July.