Florida Retailer Reopens in a Big Way

Charlotte Harbor, FL, July 14--According to Don Kaminski, his new Flooring Warehouse is the area's largest flooring showroom. Rolls of carpet climb from floor to ceiling on one side of the cavernous structure in the remodeled Schoolhouse Square in Charlotte Harbor. On the other side, six-foot-high pallets of tile and other flooring material fill a huge warehouse. "We're two to three times as big as any flooring store in Charlotte County," Kaminski said. Together, the two units cover just under 20,000 square feet, he added, and contain about 1 1/2 million square feet of flooring. Flooring Warehouse holds some 500,000 square feet of carpet by such prominent manufactures as Shaw and Mohawk, 800,000 square feet of tile, and 30,000 to 40,000 square feet of laminate, plus vinyl and hardwood flooring. Seventy percent of Flooring Warehouse's tile comes from International Wholesale Tile, an East Coast firm with a pair of 200,000-square-foot warehouses. Kaminski has been a resident of Charlotte County for 35 years, having moved from Wisconsin, where he was also in the flooring business. He started K&K Carpet One 17 years ago in Port Charlotte. Three years ago, he moved into a new building at 3616 Tamiami Trail in Sunnydale Plaza, located on the east side of U.S. 41 south of Harbor Boulevard. After the hurricane, Kaminski said he spent $250,000 restoring K&K, which has a showroom of just under 10,000 square feet. He said the store does $2 million to $3 million of business a year. "Most of the guys (carpet salesmen) say they do $3 million a year, but it's just b.s.," Kaminski said. "You've got to have a lot of installers to do $3 million." Kaminski said he was turning over the K&K operation to his daughter, Julie Leist, a Charlotte High School graduate who has spent 21 years working for her father. The owner's son, Robert Kaminski, recently became a city manager in the zoning and planning department in Las Vegas. He was a member of one of the first graduating classes at Port Charlotte High School, the elder Kaminski recalled. Kaminski's original Flooring Warehouse, located on the corner of Harborview Road and U.S. 41, was demolished by Hurricane Charley. "It blew the whole back wall down," the general manager said. "The place looked like Swiss cheese." All of the carpet in the old building was destroyed. The tile was not damaged, but the containers that held it were water-logged. Charley did a number on Schoolhouse Square as well. When the owner of Dollar General opted to remain closed and Buffalo Graffix moved into its own building, Kaminski decided to lease the two units. Since he had so much stock, he felt he needed to re-establish the business quickly, but renovation of the shopping plaza took longer than expected. "We were supposed to be in in December," Hensley said, "but it took until March." Kaminski plans to install a doorway to connect the showrooms. "We can't do certain things here we could do on 41," Kaminski said, referring to post-hurricane Charlotte Harbor Community Redevelopment District ordinances that are stricter in some cases than Charlotte County rules. "They limited our signage down to 25 square feet," Hensley said. "It's like you get whacked by Charley, then you get whacked again." Wholesale Flooring's recent grand opening celebration continued through the Fourth of July, offering what Kaminski called "everyday low prices" from 30 to 50 percent below wholesale. The company sells to homeowners, builders and developers. "You can buy by the carton or the pallet, and you can buy from us direct," Kaminski said. "You don't have to wait two or three weeks. If we don't have it here, we can get it in 48 hours."

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