Every two weeks, FCNews seeks out flooring retailers across the country to offer their advice on hot topics of the day. This week, we asked: Has the summer brought any surprises?
Here are their responses:
“Our summer business has been a pleasant surprise, exceeding our expectations. Our diversified approach across various market segments has proven to be a strategic advantage, helping us navigate the downswing in the builder market with resilience and success. Looking forward to the builder market picking up some steam moving into the third and fourth quarters.”
—Ryan Commerce, Indoor City of Lancaster Lancaster, Pa.
“Summer so far has been steady and definitely better than the start of the year. The only surprise is we are still having issues getting certain LVP styles due to the import regulations.”
—Dan Mandel, Sterling Carpet and Flooring Anaheim, Calif.
“Retail store traffic stayed consistent right through June. July hit and so did the summer traffic. Definitely slower since the 4th. But some decent-sized commercial projects are still moving. I hope to keep the trend of the first half of the year going, but we know we may see challenges ahead.”
—Ben Case, Carpet Collection Lockport, N.Y.
“Retail traffic is slightly down, but commercial in Chicagoland is up. I wasn’t expecting the high increase in Chicagoland commercial projects, so that’s a nice development.”
—Kevin Rose, Carpetland USA Rockport, Ill.
“We are ahead of our 2022 sales YTD, with June being one of our best months. Yes, we are pleasantly surprised as the industry predicted about a 25% decrease for 2023. The residential side has been steady, and we’ve had growth in commercial sales.”
—Roy Tokuhama, Abbey Flooring of Hawaii, Honolulu
