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August 23, 2006
Conn's Inc., the Beaumont-based major appliance, electronics and specialty retailer, needs to hire more than 80 people for its operations in Southeast Texas, plus more than 200 others for its stores across Texas and Louisiana.
Conn's will be competing for employees also sought by H-E-B, which needs about 150 workers at its new Beaumont location now under construction, and by the city of Beaumont, which is looking for perhaps 40 or more in its first-ever job fair Friday.
Tom Frank, Conn's chairman, acknowledged the competitive environment for good employees and said the company has increased its base wage by 20 percent - going as high as 30 percent for what he characterized as "skilled people."
The retailer isn't hiring only entry-level employees. It needs people for accounting, e-commerce, sales and warehousing. Appliance technicians also are in demand.
Conn's also needs 40 people for its credit department - including a senior credit manager - and Frank considers those employees financial advisers who help customers solve debt problems so that they will remain customers.
"We need professional-type people who present themselves well," Frank said. "We also love bilingual people."
Good customer service is crucial for the company's success, he said.
An industry publication called "This Week In Consumer Electronics" ranked Conn's ninth in the nation for major appliance sales.
The retailer went to $224 million in appliance sales in 2005 from $168 million in 2004, an advance of 25 percent.
The top three in appliance sales, in descending order, are Sears, Lowe's and Home Depot. All three sold merchandise totaling in the billions of dollars.
The publication, also called TWICE, ranked Conn's as 37th in the country in electronics sales, a much larger category dominated by national companies such as Best Buy and Circuit City.
Last year's hurricane boosted refrigerator sales, Frank said.
Conn's sold 16,000 new refrigerators in October alone to replace those that trapped rotting food so completely that the odors never left.
However, he said that still did not borrow from future sales. Demand remains strong, with appliances offering more options for consumers who are interested in upgrading kitchens these days.
Conn's, publicly traded on the Nasdaq stock exchange, has 58 stores in its market areas in Texas and Louisiana, so its rankings among national retailers are cause for celebration, said Frank and Conn Vice Chairman Bill Nylin.
The retailer also enjoys a balanced mix in its offerings to keep sales going through the year instead of depending on a single crucial season, such as end-of-year holiday shopping.
Its sales mix includes: consumer electronics, 31 percent; major appliances, 34 percent; small electronics, 17 percent; and lawn-garden and bedding, 17 percent.
Conn's employs 3,144 people across its 58 stores, with 750 of them in Southeast Texas and 525 in its Beaumont headquarters office at 3295 College St.
Its credit operation is served from the Beaumont office, which occupies about 70,000 square feet in a building with 105,000 square feet of space. The building once was home to a Kmart and then to a Fiesta market.
Hiring more people could result in pushing out into the spare 30,000 square feet as the company continues to grow, Frank said.
In the most recent fiscal quarter ending July 31, Conn's reported an increase of 13.8 percent in sales - $163.7 million compared with $143.8 million in sales for the same quarter in 2005.
Same-store sales, a measure of the company's strength in stores that have been open at least a year, also advanced 7.8 percent in the quarter.
Its stock closed Tuesday at $18.13, up 17 cents. Frank said the company's stock might suffer from a bias against regional companies, but he said that region extends from Baton Rouge, La., to McAllen, Texas to San Antonio, Austin, and Dallas. Its largest market area is Houston with 20 stores.
Frank said there still is plenty of growth opportunity within Texas because of its dimensions.
"El Paso is closer to southern California than it is to us," he said, referring to Southeast Texas, which is about 875 miles from the West Texas city.
Closer to home, Frank said he is thinking about locating a store in Lufkin. A location there would be served from Beaumont, he said.
"We like Lufkin a lot," he said. "It's certainly on the horizon."
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