Services that rent furniture gain traction with millennials

You can try on clothes, but is trying on your home’s furniture the next big thing? Modern decor store West Elm has partnered with subscription-based Rent the Runway to create a home goods rental service for its stylish designs. Rent the Runway members can choose from 25 bedroom or living room bundles to borrow pillows, throws, linens, and quilts.

Subscription-based rental companies like Feather, Fernish and CasaOne are pitching upscale furniture rental to young people across the biggest cities in the U.S., offering delivery, assembly, easy exchanges and an attractive rentto-own option. For millennials, the idea has legs — why invest in expensive furniture for an apartment you may not stay in for long?

Unlike furniture rentals for home staging purposes, the pieces from subscription-based rental startups offer high-end products that are meant to be used and lived in. When items are returned

they are professionally cleaned. Expected wear and tear is typically covered by the subscription costs. Users are also given the option to keep the pieces if they’ve fallen in love with them, simply subtracting the money they’ve already paid.

In Canada, the concept is echoed in companies like Prairie-based Pivot Furniture Technologies Inc., which both makes the furniture and rents it in Saskatoon, Calgary and Winnipeg for a monthly fee and subscription cost.

The hope is that businesses like Pivot will address the growing consumer consciousness around eco-friendly consumption. Postmedia News