By Nathan Peck | MIBIZ
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HOLLAND — Chuck Reid isn’t afraid of taking the road less traveled.

As president and CEO of Holland furniture manufacturer Charter House Innovations, Reid has helped turn a struggling business around by focusing on innovative, sustainable design and targeting new markets. When Reid purchased the company he worked for in 2004, Charter House primarily provided interior furnishings to the quick service industry, such as McDonald’s and Burger King.

The year’s sales are shaping to be the strongest since 2008 for the $20 million company. He added “Innovations” to the company’s name to signify its shift toward new ideas and a focus on design.

“We changed the name when we bought the company. We want to live and breathe (innovations),” Reid said. “I thank our lucky stars that we have customers who are faring pretty well in this economic environment.”

Big, hairy, audacious goals

Many furniture companies would be happy supplying hotels, but Reid took the somewhat unorthodox approach and decided the company could supply its own hotel. So he set out to begin work on CityFlats, a 56-room, LEED gold-certified, boutique hotel in downtown Holland that opened in 2008. CityFlats was conceived as the first boutique hotel in what Reid hoped would become a franchise opportunity for investors down the road. It would also be a means for CHI’s designers to stretch their creative muscles.

“It was a way to diversify outside of the quick service industry. I looked at it as a way to maximize the creative potential and manufacturing capacity of our people,” Reid said. “It was a big, hairy, audacious goal. If you don’t do something audacious, you don’t get change like you will if you talk small.”

The first full year of operation, for good and ill, came just as the economy came to a screeching halt in 2008. Reid had set modest goals for the hotel’s first years and has hit its benchmarks. “We had no grand illusions that we would open with 100-percent occupancy,” he said. By planning on a soft opening, the hotel is doing well, he said.

The company has begun work on its second proof-of-concept hotel, a 28-room hotel in the former Fox Jewelers building in downtown Grand Rapids. With the downtown location, Reid hopes to show how a boutique hotel can work in a renovated urban space.

Reid estimates the project will cost $3-$4 million, which will come in part from a $75,000 TIF grant, state brownfield tax credits worth 20-percent of the total construction investment, and a $75,000 Building Reuse Incentives Program grant based on $180,000 in improvements to bring the building in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Reid is working again with GMB Architecture + Engineering for the design of the new hotel, while GDK Construction is the construction manager. The Holland-based firms worked on the original CityFlats hotel.

The experience gained as the company navigates tax incentives and brownfield redevelopment incentives will prove valuable knowhow for investors looking to redevelop property for one of the franchises.

“With this second model, we can show investors what we’ve been able to do retrofitting a building,” Reid told MiBiz. “The brownfield credits really make it a viable opportunity.”

Reid, a former high school teacher and coach, admits he was not a businessman when he came to the helm of Charter House. It takes a lot of listening to his gut and the input of others within the organization. In the development of the CityDrem mattresses, Reid credits his wife Donna with helping design and market the line of products.

“We were taking the beds home, testing them, and the light went off,” Reid said, as Donna realized the hotel could be a sales channel for the beds and mattresses. CHI now sells the rooms’ beds, custom linens and furniture through the hotel, as many guests say the beds are the most comfortable they’ve slept on. “We’ve received great feedback on them, and a number of orders.”

Greening restaurants

The company has pushed forward into sustainable design, both in its hotel rooms and its core business of quick service interiors. As building owners, architects and designers demand greener products, CHI has stepped up with new designs to meet their needs, mainly by using water-based adhesives. Charter House Innovations is helping design LEED-certified fast-service restaurants around the county.

“We wanted to show that sustainable design doesn’t have to look like polished cardboard. It can look refined and have the quality it should have,” Reid said. “We have a bunch of 20-somethings designing green products. I’m an old guy. They’re coming out with greener designs and techniques. Every portfolio from someone with K College, WMU, MSU came with sustainable designs.”

Reid sees opportunities in developing a green line of home kitchen cabinets and furnishings.

“We know folks are looking for U.S. made, eco-friendly products. That market is growing,” Reid said. “We are constantly looking for new avenues for our products.”