Airdrie & Coatbridge Advertiser
Transform your home in a visit to The Top Drawer
It’s a family affair for the team at independent furniture retailer The Top Drawer as it launched its new showroom concept in East Kilbride.
The Top Drawer has arrived in East Kilbride with a 15,000 square feet showroom packed full of furniture, lighting, home décor ideas and of course, lashings of exquisite Christmas decorations too.
This is the hard work and dedication of the four-year-old family business started when Caroline McGonigle opened her small home décor business in Clydebank.
With a passion for home interiors the store served as a perfect outlet for Caroline and sister Lesley Inglis to go to town with their hobby and create something that was a little bit different.
Carolin said: “For the first time we found ourselves working in a job that we really loved and if it paid the bills and people enjoyed shopping with us then we were happy. “We never expected to open a showroom four times the size within five years but here we are.” The remit for the business since day one has been simple - to offer something that little bit different that you wouldn’t find from high street chains and to offer excellent customer service, something that comes naturally to the family business.
With a background in marketing Caroline’s daughter Lyndsay McGonigle was keen to get involved and quickly set to work on the store’s social media profile.
Facebook engagement was instant and the word spread very quickly about the little store in Clydebank.
Lyndsay said: “I would often come home from the day job to answer hundreds of online enquiries.
“It was tough going but we knew we were doing something right!”
Social media helped the business build a strong following well beyond the local area with regulars driving for over an hour to reach the store.
Caroline added: “We’ve had customers travel from Aberdeen and even Cardiff to visit us.
“It didn’t take us long to realise that our biggest challenge was space.
“With customers going to such an effort we really had to up our game to make the shopping experience worth it and there’s only so much you can do in a small store.”
In response to customer demand the business extended it’s offering to include more furniture, beds, bed linen and curtains which led to further space constraints.
Lesley Inglis said: “Some days we would unload supplier deliveries onto the street outside because we just didn’t have enough room inside the shop!”
The family made the decision to expand the business with the addition of a large scale showroom that would also serve as a head office and distribution centre for Clydebank, web orders and any future stores in the pipeline. With a massive catchment area East Kilbride was the family’s first choice in location and after 6 months of searching the family were delighted to receive the keys of the Kelvin Industrial Estate outlet.
Lyndsay went on to say: “We opened our doors at the end of October and the response has been amazing. “With so much space mum and Lesley have excelled themselves with the Christmas displays this year, it really is a fantastic environment to work in and I’m so proud of them both.”
With the business expanding so rapidly the rest of the family were on hand to help with Caroline’s son Justin coming on board full time to manage the distribution centre and Lesley’s daughter Kennedy juggling university life with helping out in store too.
Caroline McGonigle said: “It’s just as well we have a big family, otherwise I don’t know if we would have pulled it off.”
With such a great response to the Christmas collection the family are now turning their attention to the Spring /Summer season and also the possibility of opening a small café in the premises early in the New Year for browsing customers.