Bob’s Discount Furniture tests store-distribution hybrid, a model Big Lots should watch
Bob’s Discount Furniture put a store and distribution center under one roof in Solon, a test that could speed inventory and squeeze workers harder.
Bob’s Discount Furniture has started testing a format that collapses two jobs into one building: a retail store and a distribution center in Solon, outside Cleveland. The company opened the first combo location in February and said it will watch the pilot closely, with an eye toward repeating it if the numbers work. For a home retailer, that is a direct play on the biggest pain points in the category: bulky freight, tight inventory control and the need to get large items to customers faster without letting transportation costs run wild.
Ramesh Murthy, Bob’s chief operating officer, said the goal is to keep inventory closer to customers, reduce line-haul costs and streamline fulfillment across channels. That setup can improve in-stock levels and shorten the path from receipt to delivery, especially when the same building handles store traffic, pickup orders and backend inventory. It can also tighten order accuracy if the store and logistics teams are working from the same stock position instead of treating the sales floor and the warehouse as separate worlds.
The tradeoff is labor. A hybrid store-distribution site can blur job lines fast. Associates may need more cross-training, because merchandise has to be sold, received, staged and moved with more precision than standard shelf goods. Backroom flow gets more complicated when sofas, mattresses and other oversized items are passing through the same operation that serves shoppers walking the floor. If the concept expands, the pressure will land on staffing plans as much as on real estate.
That is why Big Lots employees should watch this closely. Bruce Thorn said Big Lots planned to add two more forward distribution centers for bulky products and furniture after opening similar facilities in Pennsylvania and Georgia. The chain’s five regional distribution centers, in Columbus, Ohio; Tremont, Pennsylvania; Montgomery, Alabama; Durant, Oklahoma; and Rancho Cucamonga, California, were designed mainly for carton flow, not larger items. Big Lots also operated furniture distribution facilities in Columbus and Redlands, California, showing how much extra infrastructure bulky goods already demand.
The stakes are higher because Big Lots has been remade by crisis. The company filed for Chapter 11 on September 9, 2024, and Gordon Brothers completed the going-concern sale in January 2025, transferring assets that included stores, distribution centers and intellectual property, with Variety Wholesalers among the buyers. Big Lots’ Durant, Oklahoma, distribution center was described in 2024 as a 1.2 million-square-foot site serving 235 stores in 16 states, a reminder that speed, density and control are now core to the chain’s survival. Bob’s is now testing whether putting store and warehouse closer together can sharpen all three.
Know something we missed? Have a correction or additional information?
Submit a Tip
