Change has been a constant at Joseph Winans Furniture Co.

Moving from one town to another, overhauling a building, revamping a facade, shifting galleries from one side of West Main Street to the other. Top floor to bottom, something is continually going through a metamorphosis.

"We’re in the fashion business and the fashions change and trends change," says Joe Pedrojetti, who along with his wife owns the 25-year-old company. "You have to adjust and adapt and be thinking about what you’re going to have to do next."

Today’s fashions, of course, are tomorrow’s garage sale fodder and next week’s antiques. Get caught thinking too long or fail to move fast enough and you might get knocked off your economic rocker.

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"We have to be the trend-setter, not following the trend in our market," Pedrojetti says. "Sometimes we’re too far ahead, but a lot of times we’re right on."

Acting on that premise, the owners of Joseph Winans — long a purveyor of leather furniture in the Rogue Valley — decided more than a year ago to go full-bore in that direction. Pedrojetti’s Fine Italian Leather, featuring a Natuzzi Gallery, is the fruit of that decision. It’s scheduled to open Wednesday across the street at 114 W. Main St. in downtown Medford.

The 12,000-square-foot store most recently housed the Joseph Winans Design Center, which has moved across the street and is now known as the Third Floor Loft. The Natuzzi Gallery will carry a large number of products from Italy’s largest furniture manufacturer — one of the largest collections on the West Coast, joining similar offerings in Seattle and Eugene. The Natuzzi Group, founded by Pasquale Natuzzi in 1959, is based in Santeramo in Colle in southern Italy. Its products are available in 123 markets on five continents.

"We’ve always bought containers of Natuzzi furniture for 20 years — even before they were popular," Pedrojetti says.

Now he’s hoping that hurricane Isabel doesn’t delay East Coast shipments for too long.

Joe Pedrojetti and Mark Winans left their teaching and coaching jobs in Winnemucca, Nev., to start a furniture store on the north end of Ashland in 1978.

Winans’ father had a furniture store in Fallon, Nev., and suggested they could do well financially if they worked as hard in business as they did coaching.

"We figured it out that we were making 16 cents an hour and that we could make more than that," Pedrojetti says. "Actually, we were looking for a place to raise our children and we were to the point in our coaching lives where we were going to have to start moving. I’m one of those people that if an opportunity came up I never backed away."

If nothing else, he reasoned, he could chalk it up to experience and go back to coaching if the business failed.

They rapidly tripled the size of their business to 9,000 square feet and in 1984 bought the 35,000-square-foot Weeks & Orr Furniture store — the site the business now occupies, and a 25,000- square-foot warehouse on Brian Way.

"When we were in Ashland, there were a lot of big players," Pedrojetti recalls. "Rombach’s was huge in Phoenix, Weeks & Orr was big in Medford, Dempster’s Furniture did big business where McMahan’s Furniture is now and Gates Furniture was where PremierWest Bank (on East Main) is now."

Most of the established competitors that operated in the Rogue Valley two decades ago have closed or sold. In their place specialty stores, such as mattress and bed outlets, have risen up.

At the same time, appliance stores began broadening their appeal. For example, Larson’s Appliance became Larson’s Superstore when it moved to its present site at 213 S. Fir St., the same year Joseph Winans came to Medford. More recently, West Coast Appliance on Crater Lake Highway emerged as a player.

"Everyone is selling the little furniture," Pedrojetti says. "Perhaps it’s the natural progression, although I’ve never entertained the idea of doing appliances."

And as Jackson County’s population has grown, big-box superstores and department stores have entered the market.

"There’s a bigger pond now, but more competition," Pedrojetti says. "Still, we’re real excited about the growth, especially new home construction. We’ve seen a real spurt in business the past four or five months."

Although the partners had set up an agreement for a buyout, funded by insurance if one died, neither Pedrojetti nor Winans anticipated the day would come as soon as it did.

Winans’ died of cancer June 10, 1994, but his long illness weighed heavily on Pedrojetti and the business.

"That was a difficult time," Pedrojetti says. "Mark got sick and was out of the store. He started getting better and then got real sick. What’s hard is to run a two-man operation by yourself, plus deal with the emotion of losing your best friend. We had known each other since high school and college.

"But the Lord takes those things out of your mind. I must have been numb doing it and still trying to spend an hour with Mark every day. That was the hardest thing I ever had to go through. I always hoped he was going to get well and then to finally realize it’s not going to happen."

Winans’ untimely death changed things dramatically.

For one, Frances Pedrojetti became more involved. Secondly, their son, Jimmy Pedrojetti, entered the picture.

"My wife had been in the store and she came back and really walked side-by-side with me," Pedrojetti says. "She’s a gifted decorator and you can see her influence on the store."

Jimmy was in law school, but agreed to return home and work in the store for a year.

"During that year, he really took an interest in the business," Pedrojetti says. "Besides my wife, he’s been the visionary and driving force to get us into the position where we want to be."

Autumn marks the start of the busy season for furniture stores as summer recreational pursuits end and people begin paying attention to their living rooms and bedrooms.

Pedrojetti notes that during a recent evening event, customers were lined up waiting for the doors to open.

"That’s the first time in a long time that we’ve had people waiting to come in," he says.

The Natuzzi Gallery also promises to spark interest.

The furniture industry has gone through drastic changes in recent years with China entering the picture and global competition containing prices.

"I was looking at ads from 25 years ago and actually furniture prices are lower now than 25 years ago," Pedrojetti says. "Particularly bedroom and dining room sets are better priced."

Reach reporter Greg Stiles at 776-4463 or e-mail business@mailtribune.com.