By Andy Resnik
The Associated Press

COLUMBUS - Once an avid collector of Longaberger Co. baskets, stay-at-home mom Jennifer Nasers no longer buys the hand-woven containers that cost up to $299.

The former nurse estimates she has spent $1,850 on about 45 baskets, but has added only three to her collection in the last five years. She said the baskets don't fit into her changed home decor or her budget.

"I would say that the fad went out," she said.

The privately held Longaberger, which has seen its sales and work force decline in recent years, faces a challenge in trying to rebound in an uncertain economy, analysts said.

Its baskets are seen as luxury items that sell better when times are good, said the analysts, who also questioned whether customers still have interest in expanding their collections.

"It's very trendy and it can almost be faddish. If I'm Longaberger, I'm hoping my baskets aren't the new Beanie Babies," said Chris Boring, the president of Columbus-based Boulevard Strategies, a retail consulting firm.

Longaberger, the nation's largest handmade basket-maker, announced last week it would lay off 784 weavers and manufacturing support staff by Sept. 9 because of slumping sales, reducing its total work force to 4,500.

The 31-year-old company employed about 8,000 three years ago, coming off a strong fiscal 2000 that saw sales reach $1 billion. Longaberger's sales dropped to $833 million last year.

Longaberger sells its baskets, which cost $24 to $299, through 70,000 independent sales consultants nationwide who hold Tupperware-type parties in their homes. People also can buy a commemorative basket at the company's Longaberger Homestead, a retail development near Dresden in eastern Ohio, company spokeswoman Bonny Fowler said. The company, based in Newark about 30 miles east of Columbus, has a corporate office shaped like a seven-story basket.

Analysts said the company could consider boosting profits by selling its baskets over the Internet or at gift shops.

Fowler said there are no plans for that because the company wants to stay loyal to the consultants.

"They could have found the saturation point for the concept of the direct selling of baskets," said Doug Lane, a consumer products analyst with Nashville, Tenn.-based Avondale Partners.

Tami Longaberger, the company's president and chief executive, was unavailable to comment.

Fowler said the company remains strong.

"Our history is 31 years old. I don't think that speaks to a fad," she said.

The company might be able to reach new and more affluent customers by changing its approach, said Jack Trout, president of Trout & Partners, a marketing strategy firm in Greenwich, Conn.

"There's no shortage of baskets out there, cheap baskets," he said. "My sense is they should think this should be more of a decorative kind of thing and think retail and sort of reposition not so much as a basket company but as a decorative weaving company."

Longaberger has added pottery and wrought iron products, which could help its bottom line, said Boring, who believes the company should consider selling more home goods.

"Maybe they don't make everything that they sell, but use the Longaberger name. It's a good brand name," he said.

Boring said the company's revenue is still "real high on a product that many view as a luxury item."

Nasers, 30, said the baskets no longer aesthetically fit into her home in Watseka, Ill., where she has replaced her country decorating style with a more formal look.

She said the baskets she has purchased cost $115 to $130, an expense she and her husband, Michael, a welder, can no longer afford while they raise their 2- and 7-year-old sons.

She uses a few baskets to store compact discs and books, has a basket in the kitchen for granola bars and another on the back of the front door for the family's keys, but 20 more sit empty on the laundry room shelves, said Nasers, who's considering selling them on an Internet auction site.

"They are quite expensive and when you add all those liners and little attachments, it just jacks up the price," she said.