• Long Beach Press-Telegram/AP, Tuesday, April 10, 2007 11:30 AM

Donald Trump and Cindy Crawford are pushing their couches. And Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen have a couple of chairs they want you to buy. Such boldface names are all over furniture today -- some touted at this spring's International Home Furnishings Market in High Point, N.C.

Among the first to enter the market was former Sports Illustrated swimsuit model Kathy Ireland, who in 1998 added furniture to the apparel, accessories and jewelry sold by Kathy Ireland Worldwide. Her collections with Standard Furniture brought in $500 million in 2003, or half of her company's annual sales.

Such well-known celebrity names attract consumers who generally don't spend a lot of time shopping for furnishings, says Mary Frye, president of the Home Furnishings International Association, a Dallas-based trade group. But there have been some notable failures. Vaughan-Bassett Furniture dropped its Elvis Presley collection just 18 months after its debut in 2002.

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