Vermont Woods Studios (VWS) is a retailer of Vermont-manufactured wood furniture, established in 2005.^[1][2] The company markets and sells products online and from a showroom in Vernon, Vermont.^[3]

VWS sells furniture from several independent Vermont woodworking businesses, as well as from larger wholesale companies.^[4] The company seeks to promote Vermont's custom furniture industry by unifying marketing efforts for its producers.^[4] In a 2014 Vermont Life article, Steve Holman, a furniture maker from Dorset, Vermont, noted that Vermont's isolation from large markets represents a major business challenge, and that small producers rarely have time to manage their online presence adequately.^[1] The company sells products under two models: it connects custom furniture makers with customers in exchange for a referral fee, and it directly retails furniture from wholesale producers.^[5]

The company was established in 2005 by Peggy Farabaugh and her husband Ken, after Farabaugh lost her position at Tulane University in the aftermath of flooding caused by Hurricane Katrina.^[6][2] Farabaugh drew up the business plan for a $20,000 grant competition; she did not win, but implemented the plan nonetheless.^[7] The company took in approximately $800,000 in sales in 2010,^[8] and grew by 35% between 2012 and 2014.^[1]

The company's Vernon showroom is located in a circa 1790 farmhouse and former ski lodge, and features artworks from Vermont artists.^[1] The building's renovation used primarily local materials, and was financed in part through a $100,000 grant from Vermont's Working Lands Enterprise Fund.^[1][3] The showroom features large windows looking out onto a forest, intended to reflect the company's emphasis on using locally sourced wood.^[4][3]

VWS was a founding member of the Sustainable Furniture Council, whose members seek to minimize the environmental impact of their products.^[9] In keeping with Farabaugh's advocacy for rainforest conservation, the company's products are made with wood sourced from Vermont or neighboring states rather than internationally.^[6]

Farabaugh has helped to plant trees in Central and South America.^[10] In 2016, the company partnered with the Mexican nonprofit Forests for Monarchs for an educational tour of New England encouraging residents to plant milkweed to aid in butterfly conservation.^[11]

The company's challenge to its employees to purchase only American-made holiday gifts was the subject of a 2011 segment on ABC's "Made in America" program.^[12]

In 2012, Farabaugh inadvertently used a photograph whose copyright she did not own in the course of a business transaction. In what Mitch Stoltz of the Electronic Frontier Foundation called a "bullying tactic", the copyright owner then sued the company for $150,000 in damages. The lawsuit was dropped, and then refiled, in 2014,^[13] and settled out of court in July 2015.^[14]