April 25/May 2, 2016; Volume 30, Number 22
By Ken Ryan
Shortly after the “60 Minutes” expose on Lumber Liquidators that charged the retailer with selling laminate flooring from China containing high levels of formaldehyde, Flooring America sprung into action by purchasing Made in the USA point-of-purchase (POP) kits for all of its members to display in the stores. A variety of formats are available to retailers to accommodate different configurations.
“I’m pleased to say the investment we made in sending these Made in the USA kits to all of our members certainly paid off,” said Keith Spano, president of Flooring America. “Our members were very appreciative of our quick reaction and it certainly helped differentiate Flooring America from other flooring retailers.”
Spano said the “60 Minutes” report accomplished two things: it soured consumers on certain imported flooring products and it elevated the stature of Made in the USA products.
“As Benjamin Franklin famously said, ‘The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.’” In order to instill confidence in the consumer, Flooring America marked all of its domestically made products accordingly and provided members with letters from the vendor partners stating their CARB 2 compliance. “This gives our customers peace of mind they are buying a quality product furthered by the fact that Flooring America provides a lifetime installation guarantee to give her additional assurance she’ll be happy with her decisions for the life of the product,” Spano stated.
In addition, Flooring America updated its Product Gateway database to include country of origin on all products so retailers can keep consumers informed.