Sofa tables were never particularly “in style.”

I was a buyer for a $50 million furniture retailer in the 1970s and 1980s.

• The rule of thumb for buying a new grouping of occasional tables was that:
  • For each 20 coffee tables we would purchase 30 end tables and 6 sofa tables. (3 of the sofa tables were used for floor samples in the three stores, leaving only 3 in stock.)
  • When the time came to reorder coffee and end tables, we usually did not need to order additional sofa tables.
  • The sofa tables were almost always the last pieces left when we discontinued a grouping.
• Despite the slow sales rate, we always showed sofa tables with each group because they helped sell the other pieces.

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