DFS adverts

[George 1978]

Discount Furniture Supplies - founded in the late 1960s, so says Wikipedia. I just cannot believe in recent years how much an ironic cult status DFS adverts seem to be, even more than Don Amott - I noticed that over Christmas they used Wallace and Gromit in their adverts while they were going about the main task of flogging sofas at half price or better. They also did a series of "knitted" or "Lego" version of the adverts as well to link with a then current promotion. I would never have imagined that ten years ago to be honest. I mean, I always think of DFS adverts with weekends and Bank Holidays and they always seem to appear on off air recordings of James Bond and Superman films on ITV.

I know that they started in the Midlands, and I saw an old ATV ad break from as early as 1978 with an incognito DFS advert on it - looking nothing like how we would associate them in later years. By the mid 1980s, the Central region version of the adverts started that they had branches in "Darley Dale near Matlock (near the A6) and Tamworth Road, Measham", while over the next few years, Droitwich, Fenton, Banbury, Leicester, and Nottingham were also added. A "signal booster-aided" Yorkshire TV ad break would reveal that they were called Northern Upholstery in that region, along with the Dining Room Centre until they became DFS in the early 2000s.

And cue the big star of the DFs adverts in the late 1980s, the late actor Tom Adams, formerly of ITC series, (who was also seen in a 1984 Allied Carpets advert with a moustache which he didn't usually have!) and he appeared for a few years as well, so much so that when viewers complained about DFS to BBC TV's Watchdog in the late 1990s because of the hems on the sofas not done up properly, someone, probably Anne Robinson herself asked the spokesperson from the company whether Adams still did the adverts and was told that he no longer appeared in them. Even Michael Aspel made one or two cameos in the adverts. Now, just like Tesco's "Every Little Helps" campaign, it's gone far too ironic for its own good.

And each flipping week, we were told that the offers ended Sunday at 5.00 pm - not one to be afraid of the pre-1994 Sunday Trading Act for such a store to sell sofas, armchairs and the odd footstool (a pouffe [sic] pronounced "puffy" as my late mother called them) - a word that has me in fits of laughter, and I believe that no one calls them that anymore, thank goodness). Deals Finish Sunday indeed.

Did any of the adverts invite you to purchase a three piece suite or a 1983 L-shaped "breakfast television" sofa from there? I think that I hear the word "no" from everyone reading this...

[amethyst]

Re: DFS adverts

Hurry sales end Sunday interest free credit for 4 years

[Richard1978]

Re: DFS adverts

I remember Jasper Carrott jokng that the one day they didn't have a sale on was they day he went to one of their shops to buy something he needed.

[tex]

Re: DFS adverts

I spent five years working for Harveys furniture stores as a salesman (person). There were six weeks of the entire year when they were required to be out of a sale period, this was known as the "price established" period. The majority of the furniture in particular the sofas came from China and were bought wholesale for next to nothing for example a sofa retailing for £600 was bought for about £150, the mark ups on Chinese furniture items is huge.
Once you have selected your sofa of course you are hit with a £59 pound delivery charge which comes as a shock to most of the unsuspecting customers, the salesperson is incentivised to sell you a damage protection warranty and most of them are like a dog with a bone in this respect, in fact the salesperson will usually make more commission on the warranty than on the furniture . Invariably if you tried to make a claim on one of these warranties you would be told you are not covered because...., i heard one woman told she could not claim for a broken frame rail because she sat down too hard, another was told excessive wear to the arm of her chair was due to leaning on it with her elbow!!

[George 1978]

Re: DFS adverts

A mention should also go to SCS of course (in the late 1990s when only Granada, Yorkshire, Tyne Tees and Border advertised the chain in their ad breaks), and the classic ELS which I remember used to have some scary earth-shattering adverts - but why has DFS managed to become the "Tesco" of sofa retailers? Ironic gimmicks we assume. Don't know whether Maple, Waring and Gillow was also one of those chains as well - they might have been.

Tex mentioning Harveys made me think of those horrible adverts in the 2000s with that woman (who I believe was a model and actress called Rachel someone) who was portrayed presumably as having a son and daughter, (and in other adverts, a dog). Notice the absence of a male adult around which is the main reason why I didn't really like about the adverts. It was around about the time or just before they were sponsoring Coronation Street.

[George 1978]

Re: DFS adverts

i heard one woman told she could not claim for a broken frame rail because she sat down too hard, another was told excessive wear to the arm of her chair was due to leaning on it with her elbow!!

Reminded me of the Golightly family characters who used to appear in Beadle's About stunts - the bed shop stunt comes to mind. I think that Mike "Roland's Dad" Savage played the father.