Cartersville, Ga.—Shaw Industries has opened its commercial Create Centre here. The three-story, 67,000-square-foot Centre houses the commercial division’s marketing, design and innovation associates, including its Patcraft and Shaw Contract teams.
Designed by integrated architecture, design, planning and consulting firm Gensler, the Create Centre offers a stimulating storytelling environment that is a catalyst for growth and innovation across Shaw’s commercial business units. Supporting Shaw’s client-centric approach, the new workspace provides a collaborative environment that facilitates the sharing of ideas, ignites fresh thinking, fosters Shaw’s culture of innovation, diversity and inclusion, and showcases Shaw Contract and Patcraft’s design and performance leadership.
“Innovation doesn’t just happen,” said Vance Bell, Shaw chairman and CEO. “It’s a process of consistently and intentionally reaching beyond what we’ve done before. The Create Centre is an exciting and stimulating new work environment that was designed to foster collaboration, cross-pollination of ideas across teams and departments, and greater engagement with our customers as we focus even more keenly on customer experience.”
The Create Centre is an important tool in supporting Shaw’s vision of growth for our commercial business, including global expansion and domestic market leadership. It is a physical symbol of the company’s commitment to think differently and to strategically invest in continued growth and innovation.
“The Create Centre will provide the ideal setting for our talented team members to create, dream, collaborate and solve challenges,” said Brenda Knowles, vice president of marketing, Shaw commercial division. “It’s a space where our customer obsession can come to life. Similar to the approach we take in developing our flooring products, this space is where form and function, beauty and performance come together.”
The Create Centre is expected to be USGBC LEED certified and features ample daylight and open collaborative spaces. The new building consists of a variety of public and private areas to support different work styles across the organization, with prominent design features such as the central staircase that encourages activity and the orange louver wall that runs along the facade of the building, allowing ample daylight into the building. With an abundance of features focused on staff wellbeing, the Create Centre’s design seeks to enable a culture of sustainability. Envisioned to inspire Shaw’s talented professionals, the Create Centre also serves as a tool in recruiting new talent as the company continues to grow.
This new facility represents Shaw’s ongoing investment in its commercial business. In the past few years, Shaw has significantly grown its commercial sales team, opened new showrooms throughout the world and invested more than $275 million in new facilities, including the Create Centre, carpet tile manufacturing in Nantong, China and Adairsville, Ga. and resilient manufacturing in Ringgold, Ga.