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Elevating the retail experience in 2024: Our vision for kitchen, bathroom, and furniture retail

As we embark on a new year and reflect on a successful KBIS – always one of the most exciting events for the industry in North America – I’m excited for the trends that we’re seeing play out in the Kitchen, Bathroom, and Furniture Retail (KBFr) sector. As we speak, the industry stands on the cusp of major change thanks to new digital capabilities and increasing customer expectations. I’m excited to share Cyncly’s vision for how designers and retailers can succeed in this evolving landscape, and what that means for our initiatives in the year ahead.

The KBFr business unit at Cyncly is dedicated to enabling a great retail experience for consumers who wish to build out new spaces or give new life to their spaces through renovations. Many of these consumers are now looking for custom designs, a more collaborative design process, and luxury on a budget.

Professionals serving these customers have more opportunity – and more reasons – than ever before to adopt the latest design and retail technology. They can stand out among customers by taking advantage of solutions that support self-service design, collaborative design processes, more efficient personalization and faster, more accurate design validation.

Our goal is to support designers and retailers building the future of their industry. To accomplish this, we’re creating new solutions that help them bridge the gap between online and in-store experiences, creating a seamless consumer journey from web-to-store-to-purchase-to-fulfilment.

Cyncly’s KBFr group brings together a roster of great products for kitchen, bathroom and furniture retailers looking to transform customer interactions, including:

1. Design Live: This solution has redefined the kitchen and bathroom design process and set the standard for excellence. The next generation will also transform the sales process with integrated systems and efficient quotation management, turning concepts into orders seamlessly. It also enhances business operations with activity monitoring and robust document management.
2. Ideal Spaces: As a fully cloud based, modern inspiration and design solution, Ideal Spaces provides an end-to-end consumer journey, integrating seamlessly with existing customer systems and Cyncly’s own cloud platform. IS is not only visually stunning, it is also easy to use and so powerful that it works equally well in end-consumer and professional environments.
3. Winner Flex: A cornerstone of our product suite, Winner Flex is a collaborative, cloud-backed business and design solution that integrates all relevant supplier catalogs. It ensures designs are visually, technically, and commercially accurate, and empowers the users to successfully inspire, quote, sell and deliver. Winner Flex enables customizable workflows, ensuring reliability and exceptional customer service.

The benefits of bringing these products under one roof are hard to understate. Cyncly has a global team of professionals with deep industry insights to meet our clients’ growing needs. We have a deep bench of product development expertise to deliver great products. And we have the engineering talent to create innovative capabilities that deliver innovation through automation and AI.

We’re applying these resources in several ways to improve the customer experience. One focus area is how we’re helping retailers enhance their digital presence through innovative online inspiration tools. We take pride in offering premier design and sales solutions that allow for the creation of accurate and visually appealing product configurations, powered by access to the industry’s most comprehensive catalogues.

In terms of sales, our focus is on streamlining the process, making it more efficient with effective pricing, quoting, and payment solutions. This efficiency extends to the backend of operations as well, where we enhance project delivery and supply chain coordination with advanced customer relationship management solutions.

To meet the needs of our clients, from small and medium-sized businesses to large enterprises, we offer a cloud platform that not only simplifies IT management but also delivers scalable, robust solutions for the latter. This holistic approach ensures that every aspect of the retail process is optimized for success and growth.

One thing I’m especially looking forward to in 2024 is engaging directly with our customers at key industry events under the unified Cyncly brand. Some highlights for the first half of the year include:

• KBIS in Las Vegas (Feb 27-29, 2024): The largest kitchen and bath expo in North America, offering a platform to discover new products and trends.
• kbb Birmingham in the UK (Mar 3-6, 2024): Hosting top European kitchen and bathroom brands.
• Salon Gedimat in Bordeaux (Mar 12-14, 2024): A pivotal event for industry networking and innovation.
• NeoCon in Chicago (June 10-12, 2024): A leading event for the commercial interior design industry.

These events provide opportunities to listen to our customers, showcase how we can help them meet their goals, gather industry insights, and strengthen our relationships.

Reflecting on 2023, our team demonstrated resilience and adaptability. We made significant progress with initiatives like Ideal Spaces 7, online space planning software that enables consumers and retailers to collaborate to create incredible designs, and Content in the Cloud, which brings complete, real-time manufacturer catalogs to every designer. The integration of more products into Flex, our cloud platform, has laid a strong foundation for future advancements.

In 2024, we’re excited to further develop our products, including incorporating AI solutions, and extend our enterprise offerings. Our focus remains on driving innovation and maintaining our customer-centric ethos.

The KBFr business unit and the people who work in it are here to make a difference and drive success in the spaces-for-living industry. Our commitment to great customer experiences through exceptional service is stronger than ever.

I invite you to follow our journey on our new KBFr showcase page on LinkedIn, and be a part of our transformative year ahead.