Best Practices: Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville and Floor Trader Hickory – May 2024

By Jessica Chevalier

A Mannington executive recently told Ed Israel that his Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville, North Carolina store features the most beautiful showroom in the U.S.

Israel works hard at it. The store, built in 2018, is already undergoing renovations to its bathrooms and will, this summer, get an update to its Kiba Studio. “Retail 2.0 took us to a different level,” says Israel. “You always have to invest.”

BUILDING THE BUSINESS
Prior to purchasing the Asheville store, Israel was a Kentile distributor until the company’s demise. In 1990, Israel-not wanting to leave Asheville-took a job with Lowell Pearlman at his Asheville flooring store, tasked with launching a commercial division. Pearlman’s family had been in the furniture and rug business since the 1920s, with Pearlman opening his flooring store in 1970.

In 1993, the store became a part of Carpet One, and in 2007, Israel purchased the business from Pearlman.

Initially, business took off under Israel’s leadership, but, when the Great Recession hit, it took a downward spiral. “The lessons learned during that time have been invaluable over the years, especially during slow times,” says Israel.

Thankfully, the market and Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville recovered, and, in 2018, Israel decided to relocate his store from downtown Asheville, which lacked parking and was limited by city ordinances and the like. He chose a location in west Asheville along a major four-lane highway to build his new store, which comprises of a 7,500-square-foot showroom-with a 1,500-square-foot designer gallery-and another 10,000 square feet of warehouse and office space. The showroom is set up with better-end products to cater to affluent customers, with the designer gallery featuring high-end products by manufacturers such as Karastan and Stanton.

Only two years later, Israel purchased the assets of a Carpet One location in Hickory, which is about 90 miles from Asheville. “It’s a totally different market than Asheville,” explains Israel. “Floor Trader approached me, and I liked that business model for that area.” The Hickory Floor Trader location is cash-and-carry and stocks about 100,000 square feet of flooring.

Israel travels between the two stores a couple of times a week and says he has good managers at each location.

GROWING THE BUSINESS
Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville has four divisions-commercial, residential remodel, builder and a Kiba Studio, CCA’s kitchen and bath remodeling division-with commercial the largest at around 60% of total business. Builder, Kiba and residential remodel are all characterized as residential and, together, account for the other 40%. The company’s builder business is largely custom with some spec/track business; Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville is heavily involved with its local Home Builders Association chapter.

Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville’s commercial business is primarily specification work with jobs in the education, medical and hospitality sectors. Israel has recently brought on a new employee who will focus on building his mainstreet business. The company services a 50-mile radius, especially in its commercial business.

Israel was one of the first Carpet One dealers to sign on to its Kiba program in 2020, which focuses on kitchen and bathroom remodeling. “It is a great business,” he reports.

In addition to all this, Israel’s Asheville location offers on-site custom rug fabrication.

Israel says he leans heavily on CCA for his advertising, which is, today, around 75% digital. His company’s digital marketing is divided between advertising on streaming television services, social media and pay-per-click. About 20% of its remaining advertising budget goes to traditional television, and the last 5% goes to traditional print in local magazines. “I see us going to 95% digital within the next couple of years, while maintaining a presence in two to three local magazines,” says Israel.

BUILDING A TEAM
Israel believes that his business’ greatest strength is its people. “We have great sales professionals,” he reports. “We use CCA’s Online University, Fast Start and on-boarding program for initial training. With this system, they can be selling in a few weeks.” To keep his sales professionals sharp, he holds biweekly sales meetings and brings in manufacturers’ representatives, including from Engineered Floors, Shaw and Mohawk, to keep RSAs up to date on product knowledge.

Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville has four interior designers on its sales team. Israel reports that, staff-wise, some positions are harder to fill than others, such as scheduling, which can be overwhelming, but he feels like he has a strong team overall at present.

Carpet One Floor & Home Asheville is challenged by a lack of qualified installers. The operation has about 12 crews in the field daily. “Even with 12 crews, we are out even three to four weeks,” Israel reports.

That being said, Israel notes that the subcontractor installers he does have are a great bunch. “We pay them more than other local companies and treat them like family,” he says. “We invite them to quarterly breakfasts with the whole staff. I’m on a first-name basis with all of them. We’re tight-knit.”

His commitment seems to have paid off. Israel reports that his operation has very few callbacks.

Copyright 2024 Floor Focus 

Related Topics:Shaw Industries Group, Inc., Engineered Floors, LLC, Carpet One, Karastan, Mannington Mills, Mohawk Industries