If you're familiar with the growing popularity of home staging as a way to boost the marketability of a residential property and you're a home furnishings retailer with a design business, then you've probably entertained at least a few thoughts about adding home staging to your menu of services.

A partnership announced late last month at the International Association of Home Staging Professionals Symposium in Chicago may entice even more home furnishings retailers and vendors to take a closer look at the business. Billed as the first deal of its kind, national art retailer Personal Preference Inc. of Bolingbrook, Ill., revealed plans to integrate its wall decor services and a discounted purchasing program into a national network of accredited staging professionals. The partnership was forged with Staged Homes, a company that offers training and accreditation for home stagers across the country.

New Jersey retailer Kathy Johnson of Point B Gallery isn't one of Staged Homes' accredited staging professionals, but like a growing number of designers, she's relying on her experience, talent and state design certification to grow the home staging side of her retail business. It's taken Johnson more than a year to earn a reputation as a local home staging source, but she's done it, thanks to a couple of successful installations that produced immediate results. "The first was a contract for a property in Normandy Beach: a combination of leased furniture, design services and a package for accessories out of our shop," Johnson said. After being on the market for a year, the property had seen little to no action. Following Johnson's installation, the property sold in five weeks for $1.6 million. "The contract worked out to about a $3,000 per month fee over three months, so the broker still had a month and a half left on our contract," she said. "We rolled it over to a second property, moved the furniture and helped him lease that one for a summer rental."

Soon after, success came with another property that had been on the market for three years. "Eighty brokers attended the broker open house, and people started going to see the house just to see what all the buzz was about." Now Johnson is the local go-to authority on home staging, has gotten eight large projects since, and is accepting invitations from banks and real estate agents across New Jersey to speak on the subject. She makes sure there's a "Professionally Staged by..." sign in front of each property and a stack of business cards and brochures somewhere inside encouraging visits to her shop. And she includes an advance cost estimate for all the furnishings as part of her initial proposal.

"This isn't done like a traditional design project where I say here's what I do, how much it will cost, and start billing on an hourly basis. A lot of design work is done upfront to create the estimate in hopes of getting the sale." For an initial consultation fee of $275, the client receives a comprehensive report. "It gives estimates for everything — how much it would cost to lease furniture, to lease accessories, the design fees. If the house is furnished, we go room by room and produce a written report of things we advise, from simple things like rearranging photos and tossing dead plants to coordinating storage, painters, tile guys, carpet guys."

Johnson said the use of her accessories in this way has provided more advertising opportunities for her store than she ever imagined. "When home staging, we use leased furniture and give everything a punch with our accessories, and we're finding that it's the accessories that make or break the space — the artwork, pillows, candlesticks, big florals. It really shows off my store inventory, and the resulting business from both product sales and the home staging contracts is too good to be true."

As for her latest marketing efforts, Johnson just ordered a new four-color brochure and has begun photographing each completed project and sending out a "just staged" email blitz to her target audience of local real estate brokers and agents. She's also joined the local Board of Realtors as an affiliate member.

Another stager, Pam Stern of High Point, N.C.'s MoveIt! Makeovers, also stressed the importance of joining the local board of realtors and suggested becoming an affiliate of the local builders association as well. Stern's company hosts monthly breakfasts and lunches for both groups and attends their social functions and monthly meetings. Stern, who is not a retailer, buys most of her furnishings at High Point's post-market showroom sales and has recently begun to receive inquiries about selling the items used in some of her installations.