Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, August 19, 1994                   TAG: 9408190078
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MELISSA CURTIS STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

`LOFTY' PLANS ARE PAYING OFF

For Locke White and Robert Dameron, the combination yielded a business with sales approaching $2 million this year.

Fourteen years ago, White, 37, and Dameron, 36, created Collegiate Designs Inc. with the idea of selling prefabricated loft units to college students. Now the Dublin manufacturing business sells its furniture kits in more than 500 college bookstores nationwide.

The company's 20-page catalog offers 23 different furniture pieces that are precut and predrilled, and can be assembled with two wrenches. Pieces run from $15.90 to $159.90

The company's signature piece, called "The Loft," is designed for college dorm rooms. Made of yellow pine, The Loft is a free-standing furniture frame that elevates a bed up to six feet off the floor, freeing floor space for other furniture.

Locke came up with the idea for The Loft as a graduate student at Radford University. Having seen lofts during his college years and at Radford, he was struck with the idea of constructing one of uniform design that could be assembled easily.

Locke approached Dameron, his roommate at Radford, with the idea and the two researched it, hired an architect and invested their savings in the venture.

The risk paid off. Next year the two plan to build another furniture factory on the West Coast. With a production facility there, Dameron thinks that 200-300 more college bookstores will be interested in selling their products.