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Bringing potential customers into the showroom for seminars is another way remodelers leverage their investment in a display area. Runner says Normandy always has seminars on a Saturday morning. Prospects listen to a presentation, such as Secrets of Ideal Kitchen, and get a feel for how the design process works. Then, they���re invited to have lunch and walk around the showroom, where designers are on hand to answer questions and book appointments if desired. Building a showroom is time-consuming and costly and so is keeping it up to date. Normandy recently updated a vignette in response to changing homeowner tastes. Pristine white cabinets with gray and taupe tones have come into vogue on Chicago���s North Shore, Runner says, ���and we didn���t have anything like that in the showroom. We went ahead and made the investment, and people love this kitchen. ���We have to keep in mind that some things can be really trendy but look outdated within a year,��� she adds. Showing clients styles that will stand the test of time and make their investments last longer is the best policy, she advises. Design Center, Not a Showroom Bill Simone, president of El Segundo, Calif.-based Custom Design & Construction, prefers to call the space where he currently meets with clients a design center, but for many years he didn���t have a full blown, visible showroom. ���We had a quasi-showroom that we would bring clients to,��� he says. ���It was more of a conference room that had a really nice kitchen display in it, but that Top: Normandy���s showroom is about 8,000 sq. ft., and about half of that is given over to space for meetings with clients to show them tile boards, cabinetry colors, plumbing selections, granite samples and all of the choices that go into a remodel. Bottom: Outdoor living space vignettes, in addition to kitchen and bath displays, round out Normandy���s showroom. The design-build remodeler offers a full range of services, including wholehouse remodeling and room additions. was pretty much the extent of it. We used it for all of our client meetings ��� the initial meetings, the contract meetings, the design review meetings ��� all those meetings were conducted in that quasi-showroom. ���It was on the second floor of an office building. It had no street visibility. No one knew it was there, and no one would stumble upon it,��� Simone continues. All that changed when Custom Design & Construction had an opportunity to move to El Segundo, where it bought a former manufacturing building, about ���I think it would be difficult to show clients a plan and not have the materials to back it up.��� ���Jennifer Runner, AKBD, Normandy Remodeling 14,000 sq. ft., in an industrial neighborhood with some high-profile neighbors, including Raytheon, Boeing, McDonnell Douglas, DirectTV, Time Warner Cable, the Los Angeles Kings and Los Angeles Lakers, and Mattel. In addition, Simone says he was seeing more kitchen and bath remodeling jobs ��� smaller projects than the additions and whole-house remodels he���d been seeing in previous years. The idea of a showroom, or design center as Simone prefers to think of it, became more attractive. ���It���s really meant to be more of a design inspiration center as opposed to [a sales setting]. It���s to get the creative juices flowing for the client,��� he says. Unintended Consequences Having for years had a design space hidden from public view, Simone was pleasantly surprised by the ���unintended consequences��� ForResidentialPros.com QR February 2013 21