The Thursday Show: Bernie de Le Cuona on her brand’s big move. Plus: A new deadline for the pause on tariffs

0:07This is Business of Home. I'm Dennis Scully and welcome to the Thursday show. Later on I'll be talking to Bernie De La Cogna about her brand's big move. But first, we're going to catch up on the news, including the latest on tariffs, a first look at the summer issue of BOH magazine, and a designer podcast that puts clients in the spotlight. To do all that, I'm joined by Business of Homes Editor-in-Chief, Caitlin Peterson. Hi, Caitlin. Hi, Dennis. How's it going? Welcome back to the show. It's going great. Delighted to have you. It's always so good to be here. Thanks for having me. Well, it's a pleasure.

0:43Did you have a lovely fourth? I did. A little bit of fireworks, a little bit of kayaking on the Hudson River. What about you? I know kayaking on the Hudson River, sadly, but it was a lovely weekend otherwise. Very quiet, did have the traditional barbecue outside, and that was quite pleasant. It's funny how quiet everybody got this week. I feel like by the middle of the week last week, you're like, oh, no one wants to send emails. We're all just tiptoeing quietly away from our computers. Did you feel that sense of relief too? I got a lot of notes from people hoping to catch you before you leave.

1:17Oh, I'm already gone. Yeah. Little do they know I'm so bad at getting back to emails anyway, but it doesn't matter whether it's a holiday or not. We have that in common. Yes. I'm working on that. That's a problem I'm working on, Caitlin. Well, let's take a quick look back at Monday's episode. It was an interview with textile legend Christine Vanderherd. Her coming of age story to me was nothing short of extraordinary. The people, the places that she went, the things that she was doing. What was that conversation like for you just to kind of peel away the layers of her experience and her story?

1:54It's a remarkable story. And it was such a privilege to get to go through it all with her. It was she's one of those people in the industry, Caitlin, and you're so right to use the word legendary. So many people wrote to me and said, oh, what a legend. I remember meeting her here. I remember she showed up at my booth here. Or I remember the first time I got to visit her studio and and all that I learned and all that I got to see. She's one of those people that has had such an impact on the work of so many designers, so involved in Kit Kemp's work. And she mentioned about Rita Koenig and so many others that have been in and out of her studio.

2:34I know last year at Destination London, some people got to come. I did. You included. And got so much out of that. So she's one of those people that people love to tell you the time that they met her or something that they learned from her. So it was a real privilege to get to interview her in that long form way that we get to on the BOH podcast. I mean, I think being in her studio, her firm has such a unique approach to doing custom work. And the way that they jump in with a design firm to really partner with you the entire way on anything you can possibly imagine is just so extraordinary. She gave this presentation, and I think it was the first time I'd ever seen someone illustrate so clearly what it means when you say you can have whatever you want.

3:22That's such an arbitrary concept. Sometimes you're like, what do I want? Anything? I don't know. And she showed just how they sort of hold your hand to unlock kind of this world of possibilities. And you couldn't help but leave excited. Yeah, that's such a great point. I think so often, as you say, we talk about, oh, you can create whatever you like, but sometimes that's harder for people to even work with, right? But she guides you through it and in such a kind and graceful way that I think she allows designers to really open up and explore. So she's a remarkable woman. It was a really fun conversation.

4:01And so many greats were in her life over the years. Robert Paplethorpe works his way in there and Andy Warhol's in there. A casual portrait with Annie Leibovitz. Yeah. There's some high-class name dropping that goes on on the show. And it's a good one. So I hope people will enjoy it. We're going to take a quick break and then we'll get into the news.

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5:27And we're back. Just when we thought we wouldn't have to talk about tariffs for a while, Caitlin, they're back. They're back. President Trump's 90-day pause on reciprocal tariffs was set to end this week, until an executive order pushed the deadline back to August 1st. Now, the U.S. is threatening levies of at least 25 % against 14 different countries, and counting if trade agreements aren't reached. Dennis, what do you make of all this? Well, just when we thought that tariffs had gone away and that maybe this prolonged period of peace and quiet about all of this was meaning that they weren't really going to happen, this is a terrible reminder that, oh no, the president seems quite worked up about tariffs and is throwing a great many of them out as he did this past week.

6:15Absolutely. I mean, I think back in April, we had Liberation Day. We covered that very closely. And when those tariffs that had been rolled out were put on pause, it was this 90-day pause. And I think the administration came with this idea that they were going to reach 90 deals in 90 days, right? I believe there have been two deals so far that were announced, maybe three. And so it seems like as that July 9th deadline sort of inched closer and closer and closer, You know, the Trump administration has really been looking for ways to jumpstart those talks and really get a deal on the books. Let's say that.

6:49We should point out that we are so we're recording because we need to timestamp this because it's ever changing. But we're we're recording Wednesday the 9th at almost four o 'clock in the afternoon. And what we know so far, it seems like we've got some greater clarity on on Vietnam. It seems like 20 percent tariffs. So far, we're we're feeling like tariffs on Japan, South Korea and Malaysia look like they're ending up at around 25 percent. And hard to know if any of this is going to really end up being the hard and fast. Japan has responded by saying that they're really not interested in playing this game, it sounded like.

7:27And so perhaps those tariffs are, in fact, going to go into place. I don't know if that has a huge impact. The Vietnamese tariffs, that seems like a sizable tariff, although far less than was originally proposed the day of that RH earnings call when all of this first got rolled out. But what's your what's your sense of whether that will be meaningful? I don't think anybody who is importing out of Vietnam is excited about a 20 percent tariff. I do think they're breathing a sigh of relief that it's not the 46 percent tariff that it was announced back in April. That drop, though, from 46 percent to 20 percent is pretty notable.

8:05You know, the Trump administration has been sending out these letters sort of reminding countries that here's the here's the rate we're going to charge you on August 1st. if you don't reach a deal with us. And I think notably, a lot of those percentages are very similar back in April. So it'll be interesting to see if this idea of playing ball with the administration, making a deal by August 1st means that those rates go down the same way it did in Vietnam, or if those rates that they're sort of doubling down on this week are really what we're going to see when these tariffs go into effect. Also, maybe they get delayed again, right?

8:40Like, we don't know. Well, no, exactly. And so we're pushing them off until August for now. The market, the stock market is remarkably complacent. So the market sort of fell on the day that all of this started to come out, but then has very quickly rebounded. And in addition to all of the tariffs against specific countries, the Trump administration has now announced a 50 % tariff on copper. So that's pretty surprising and not great news if you're a home builder or if you're using copper in any number of ways. But there again, just before we jumped on the show, I looked at Toll Brothers, the big home builder, and they're up 3 % on the day.

9:24So I mean, again, I don't know if that is more because also just before we came on the air, We got the minutes from the most recent Fed meeting last month, and it sounded as if many on the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee were keen to move on rates, even without the greater clarity of the inflationary impacts of the tariffs. And I think the market may be now hanging its hat on that, which any port in a storm is, I think, how the market's feeling. But it's really interesting how all of this is playing out. I think a lot of people thought the tariffs were really going away. It doesn't look like they are.

10:04And we're back with a lot of uncertainty. I think it's also worth noting, you know, those copper tariffs come on the heels of tariffs on steel and aluminum, other materials. The process to get to that tariff has been, you know, an inquiry by the Trump administration taking kind of a broad survey of what imports and what use look like in the U.S. Similar inquiries are in progress for pharmaceuticals and semiconductors, but also notably for us in the home industry, lumber. So not to be a total storm cloud, but I think we should expect more to come just in terms of those tariffs on raw materials.

10:39Yeah. The housing industry is already facing so many headwinds. The thought of lumber and copper also being an issue is really sort of hard to fathom. And again, the Wall Street Journal editorial board is voicing its displeasure about the whole thing as they have throughout the course of this whole tariff experiment. But again, a renewed energy around all of these tariff conversations. So somebody is keen to make them happen. We'll see what sticks. But at this point, we look now towards August 1st, and perhaps we'll know more. But we've got to move on because perhaps related markups is the next topic of conversation.

11:26BOH's summer print issue debuts this week in the first story to hit the site. Our show producer, Caroline Burke, explored everything you need to know about markups. Now, we're not actually talking about tariffs here. It's actually a markup on product and a big part of how the interior design industry works. Yes, Caitlin? Absolutely. So this is a great piece. It dives into a particularly kind of thorny industry issue. So we sort of joke all the time that if you want to get people mad, talk about markups. The issue usually includes one really meaty how-to article. And I think this one really delivers on that.

12:04It's this pretty comprehensive primer on how markups work and how you can use them to benefit your business. I think one of the interesting things about markups is there is no one right way to do it, right? How do you calculate it? It depends. When and where do you apply it? It depends. How do you talk about it with your clients? up to you. And so I think Caroline has done a really wonderful job of breaking down, you know, not just here's how you do this, but saying, you know, here's a survey of how a lot of different firms look at making money on product. Here's why it matters for their businesses.

12:38And here are avenues that you can take if you're looking to streamline the way you profit from your procurement process. Yeah. I mean, I think it was interesting in reading Caroline's incredibly thorough piece that really, as you say, gets into all of these different discussions. And I think for many who might be trying to think about changes that they should be making, it was interesting to hear the certainty from some of the designers that were referenced. Well, if you're only charging markups, then you don't really have a business. But also, if you're only charging hourly, then you're just trading money for time.

13:17And people really sounded very clear-headed about all of their different positions. But I think as Kevin Isbell pointed out in the article, you ask 100 designers and you get 100 different answers about the whole thing, which often is one of the challenges about our industry in general and what we worry about when we think about people wanting to work with interior designers. And they get all of these different answers or they get all of these different models. I remember you and I had a conversation ages ago when you were thinking you were going to get all these answers from designers, right? And you're going to come up with the perfect, here's how you need to do it.

13:53And you discover it depends on so many different variables, right? I think actually the story you're referencing, it was going to be an article on how to charge. So like ambitious match? I don't know. Um, you know, I think I walked away with a, with a really clear perspective on this really guided, I think the way BOH approaches issues like this since that time, which is, you know, we're not going to give you one answer, but we're going to say like, if you can find what feels comfortable to you, if you can find an idea that you can hold onto and confidently talk about with your clients, that's the right path.

14:26I think I've come around to the idea that an industry standard wouldn't actually serve the design industry as much as we think it would. and that our superpower is that we get to tailor these incredibly bespoke businesses to the strengths and weaknesses of the firm and of their founder. And so what I hope actually that this article delivers is a moment for every person who reads it where they say, that's how I do it. And I still think this is the most legit of the options presented here. Great. Don't change anything. But if you read something and you say, oh, I don't do it that way. But that sounds awesome.

15:02That's what I hope actually happens when someone reads this article is they see something or hear something that either reaffirms what they're doing or encourages them to try a new model that maybe helps them make more money. You can certainly imagine designers reading this piece and either learning a different way of doing it or causing them to rethink what they're doing currently. hearing every designer who spoke in this piece seemed so certain of themselves and of their position when often, I think in the early stages of your business particularly, you're not certain. You experiment. And you and I have spoken to so many designers.

15:43I have spoken to so many designers who said, oh my gosh, I used to charge like this. Or I've tried everything, right? Yes. Or I've redone it multiple times. And some designers say to me, of course, it's a little bit of everything. This project I do by time because I know that person is going to take forever. And so I want to make sure that I'm getting plenty of hourly charges going there. But other projects, I know exactly how much this is going to cost. And I'm happy to say, here's your fee for this whole thing. And I think it really just depends. But I think the really smart firms that I speak to are incredible data gatherers.

16:20Yes. And they have so much information that is informing their decision of how they're charging and how they think about charging. Because this discussion around making sure you really have a margin and that whole notion of not just trading money for time and all of that, but really having a business that makes a meaningful profit regardless of how you end up charging. Totally. I think another thing that, you know, you talk about how in the beginning, you know, nobody's really confident saying, oh, and also there's an extra 35 % on product. I think one of the funny things that I really appreciated in this article was just how many people basically said, yes, I have a market, but you're never going to hear me say the word markup.

17:05You know, whether they're calling that a purchasing fee or a procurement fee or a commission and how they're really, when they talk to their clients, tethering the value of those dollars to all of the work that goes into getting a product, you know, from a purchase order into your house. I thought that was actually a really interesting takeaway as well as that, you know, we have this thing called markups that when we talk about it sort of makes everybody either angry or uncomfortable. But maybe one of the secrets is just not to use the word markup anymore. Yeah, the whole conversation around language is really interesting to me as well and how designers think about it, what they say, what they won't say, how they want to characterize it.

17:45And again, I think you read this piece and there is a lot to learn for everyone. Before we move on, Caitlin, there's a lot of other features in the magazine as well. And I wanted you to just talk quickly about them to tell listeners what else they might find in the new issue. We're doing something a little bit different for BOH Magazine this issue. We're actually publishing four projects. There have been so many industry conversations about photography, right? Like how we capture projects is changing. The fact that designers pay to capture those projects is certainly changing. And I kept talking to designers who knew that their photography, the photography they were commissioning mattered more than ever.

18:27But when they looked at who to hire for those jobs, you can look at somebody's portfolio and say, okay, what of this picture is incredible design work? What of this picture is very successful styling? And what of this picture is great photography? And who the heck am I supposed to hire to create something like this? And I think what I really wanted to do with this issue was kind of unbundle that, to break apart these amazing images that we're publishing in the magazine and to talk to the designer about what that shoot day was like, but also to the stylist and the photographer who were just as essential in creating those final images that are going to really help a firm get noticed, get the next project and have something lasting that showcases what they achieved.

19:14Such an important subject. And we talk about it so often and all the magazine editors that we talk to just stress the importance of photography and the value of stylists and good photographers and all of that. So I'm really excited that you've gotten into all of that in the magazine, and I look forward to reading it. Moving on, we're going to talk about a new designer podcast, Caitlin. Another podcast. Not allowed. This week, BOH Managing Editor Haley Chouinard wrote about why designer Lindsay Olson is putting her clients in the hot seat on her new podcast, which is called Interior Design Diaries.

19:50Dennis, we both listened to the show. What'd you think? Well, Caitlin, I always get pretty worked up when another podcast comes into the home scene and I feel, wait, what? And I'm a little bit jealous because this is a conversation that we've talked about wanting to have is talking to some end users, some homeowners about what the whole design experience was like. This designer talks to some of her clients and gets into the whole experience. It's interesting. What did you think? I thought it was really fun. I listened to a couple episodes where she was really breaking down how the client felt throughout the process.

20:31And just to zoom out for a second, Lindsay Olson, she's a designer based in Newport Beach, California. Her company is Lulu Designs. She's been in business for more than two decades. And I think the article kind of explained that she realized that the images in her portfolio, sort of going back to those, you know, the importance of those images, but also the language on her website wasn't really communicating what it was like to do business with her firm or to have her kind of holding your hand, guiding you through the design process. And so that's where this podcast came from. It's basically, I think she launched in February.

21:04She's put out 13 episodes so far, and they are living, breathing testimonials basically from her clients about how they felt seen, supported, and how they feel grateful for her presence shepherding them through the design process. It's a really interesting way to get someone to enthuse about your business. Well, that's what I'm wondering. So you think this is a marketing effort on her part. This is better than the Google review or something that might appear somewhere. This is really getting to hear from the client and the experience they had. Because it seemed like she was pretty chummy with these clients when I was listening to the episodes, right?

21:50It seems like they become thick as thieves during the process, which isn't always the case as we know. That's true. There's a great episode where she's talking to this client. They had done a kitchen renovation together. And I think the client sort of like was her own GC, sort of. And there's a moment where Lindsay asks, how did that go for you? And the client goes, not great. That's why when we did our bathroom renovation, we hired you to do all of it. That to me was a really powerful moment of saying, here's a client who went on a journey of realizing just how much that designer could do for them and could support them.

22:24And then they doubled down when they had another project and haven't looked back. I think the moments like that have to be really reassuring if you're a potential client listening and kind of wondering what this experience is going to be like for you. Yeah. I mean, that's so interesting. And I wonder if end users will tune into the show who might have been on the fence. I mean, I wonder if it's something that, well, listen, if you're thinking about working with me here, why don't I send you some episodes of this show and you can hear from some clients. I mean, that's a really interesting way to build that out and better than just sort of calling somebody out of the blue, hi, tell me what you thought about.

22:59Totally. Totally. I mean, by the way, as a marketing initiative, if that's what this is, it's not inexpensive. She hired a production crew. She's got editors. There's a team creating a show. This isn't just like, oh, I hopped on GarageBand and made this thing myself. She's absolutely investing in the production here. No, that's the part I didn't like. That's the part I didn't like. She's got this whole crew and team and everything, and it makes it sound like it's coming for me. I don't think this show is coming for you. No, I don't. But I do think that there's, and I actually don't know that this would work for everybody.

23:32But I think that if you've got, you know, if your relationship with your client is one of the main selling points in the value that you're delivering in your business, this is a really interesting maybe spark for an idea of a way that you can communicate that to your clients and your potential clients. Yeah, I mean, it's interesting coming at a time when we're hearing so much about how SEO is not working in the same way it once was, right, because of AI and other factors as well and algorithmic changes. But so here's another way to sort of put the word out and attract some listeners. Again, hopefully, you know, not too many listeners, I hope, but enough to possibly win over as clients.

24:14It's very interesting, and we'll have to keep an eye on it and see how it does. I'd love to hear from people what they think once they get a chance to listen to it. Finally, we have to move on to some sad news. Longtime design industry veteran Janice Langrol passed away last month at the age of 71. Janice kicked off her career as marketing director for institutions like Interior Design Magazine and Schumacher before establishing her own namesake marketing and PR firm in 2008. In 2013, she teamed up with Carolyn Salas to form Langrell and Salas. Along the way, Janice also spent many years serving as a member of industry organizations like the Decorators Club, Diffa, and the Alpha Workshops.

25:00Her passing was met with an outpouring of grief from the design community. Encapsulated by a message from Carolyn, Janice touched everyone she met with her keen intelligence, quick wit, and endless generosity. She was a quiet force and a true professional. She will be missed. Very, very sad. Longtime friend of the lovely Mrs. Gully's. Mrs. Gully and Janice actually worked together at Interior Design Magazine back in the day, and I've known Janice for decades. Smart, funny, great writer, and I know you've had some interactions with her as well, Caitlin. She's a wonderful woman. I think, you know, it was always a delight to work with her and I will absolutely miss her at industry events and on the phone and in my inbox.