PORTSMOUTH — When Olympic
athletes aren't competing in Salt Lake City this February, they'll
likely be sleeping, brushing their teeth, and showering with items
provided by a Portsmouth company.
LTL Liquidators, owned by Leo Guy, earlier this fall secured the
contract to provide not only furniture, but everything from light
fixtures down to shower curtains and toiletries for hundreds of
athletes and security personnel at the 2002 Winter Olympics.
"We're doing everything from teaspoons to toilet paper,"
said Guy, who is LTL's president.
It's a deal worth about $500,000 for the 10-person company, he
said.
LTL operates from a white building on Route 1 in Portsmouth across
the street from Water Country. It's the building with the couch on the
roof.
Founded in 1997 by Guy, the business liquidates hotels and other
properties, then either resells the furniture at its Route 1 store or
brokers it en masse to hotels and other large clients, such as the
Salt Lake City Olympic organizers.
In total, LTL will outfit 900 bedrooms in 300 apartments around the
city. And it has to do it in two weeks.
While LTL secured the Olympics contract in October, it has only two
weeks before the Games start in February to outfit the apartments with
beds, couches, TVs, lamps, tables, desks and dressers Guy secured from
a variety of hotels liquidating their furniture.
While many of the furnishings will come from the 500-room Salt Lake
City Hilton, which is redoing its rooms because of the Olympics, many
pieces are coming from as far away as Vermont.
Just getting the furniture together means moving all of the
furniture out of the Salt Lake hotel and shipping the pieces from
Vermont to a Utah warehouse rented by LTL for the Olympics contract.
From there, LTL must wait until the apartments being used for the
Olympics are vacated and the new furniture can be moved in and set up.
Then, about 35 LTL workers — some permanent staff including Guy
and some temporarily hired for the job — must stock the housing with
the other items, such as silverware, china, linens, and more.
And after the Olympics, LTL will have about 24 hours to remove it
all.
It's a daunting task, but 50 rooms of the furniture will be donated
to a Navajo reservation out West. The rest will be either donated to
schools or charities, or sold to buyers and through the Portsmouth
retail store.
"The hardest thing about it is leaving my family for a
month," said Guy, a father of four who just finished a term on
the Kittery Town Council.
During the course of the preparations and the Olympics, Guy and LTL
workers would be living in the housing they're outfitting, sharing a
building with the Danish speedskating team.
Not to be left out, Guy said LTL has drafted an indoor luge team.
Although LTL usually only does furniture, Guy said it's worth it
for this job. Not only will the Olympic contract bring the business a
half-million dollars at least (talk of extra security at the Winter
Games may increase the scope of the job) to LTL, but also
international recognition of the company's work.
"A job of this caliber will really skyrocket us to a new
level," Guy said, adding that the work will be part of LTL's
marketing campaigns for at least the next four years.
Installation and brokering of furniture has become the focus of
LTL's business plan in the last two years, said Guy, who runs the
company with the help of his wife, Becky, and a core management team.
While LTL operated as many as four stores at one point, the growth
of the service side of the business drove the decision to close those
in favor of nonretail sales, he explained.
"Now it's more buy out a major chain hotel, large hotel, and
have Becky sell it to another hotel," Guy said.
Once the furniture is sold to another hotel, Guy said LTL is often
hired to install it.
Guy said one of the reasons for the growth in the service side of
the business is the service philosophy LTL brings to its jobs.
Guy started LTL after years as a restaurant manager, most recently
with Olive Garden, and much of his staff comes from the restaurant
industry because of their customer service experience.
"When I started the business, I didn't know the difference
between a credenza and an armoire," he said.
Now, Guy said he's actually turning business away, choosing to
limit LTL to two to three installation jobs at a time so the company
can provide its desired level of service and be flexible for
customers, whose timetables often change.
That service is what LTL has built its reputation on, Guy said,
which in turn led the company to the Olympics job.
LTL beat out three larger liquidators to win the job.
"We weren't the cheapest, but it was our reputation," Guy
said.
Securing the contract meant about a year of footwork by LTL that
culminated with the contract being signed in October, including not
only the regular legalese, but an "act of war" clause, just
in case.
"I don't believe the Olympics will be canceled," Guy
said, but delays or a postponements could happen if security or other
unforeseen issues arise.
Read
the Portsmouth Herald Article Here!
