May 22, 2009—Jim Seger, VP of Flooring Industry Sales for GE Money, and Kemp Harr discuss the consumer credit market and how the market has changed with rising unemployment and declining net wealth. Listen to the interview to hear about GE Money's leadership position and service improvements it will be implementing soon.
May 21, 2009—Kevin Sanders, Vice President of Shaw Hospitality, and Kemp Harr discuss last week's Hospitality Design trade show in Las Vegas. Listen to the interview to hear more about the show, the hospitality market overall (including design trends) and Shaw's new programs for 2009.
May 19, 2009—Jack Ganley, President of Mannington Commercial, and Kemp Harr discuss Mannington's new post consumer recycling program, which takes used vinyl composite flooring and recycles it back into new commercial product. This process took 18 months to develop and is on track to divert 19 million pounds of VCT from landfills. Listen to the interview to hear more about Mannington's long range plans to ramp this program up to 40 million pounds a year.
May 18, 2009—Recorded at Coverings 2009, Jeanne Nichols, VP of Sales with GranitiFiandre, and Kemp Harr discuss the company's new product introductions and the latest design trends in the U.S. ceramic market. Listen to Jeanne talk about a movement toward contemporary and away from the quarried look. GranitiFiandre is an Italian based company that also owns the StonePeak plant in Crossville, Tenn.
May 15, 2009—Patrick Fitzgerald, Flooring Sales Director for Weyerhaeuser, and Kemp Harr discuss the history, selling benefits and price points of Lyptus Flooring. Listen to the interview to hear more about this plantation grown product and Weyerhaeuser's new Mastercraft Distributor in Florida.
May 14, 2009—Mark Johnson of Tate Access Floors, and Kemp Harr, discuss the growing popularity of access floors in the U.S., which lags the U.K. and Asia in the use of this environmentally friendly flooring. Listen as Johnson describes why access flooring, which now has a 12% market penetration in the U.S., could be the next major trend in office flooring, due to its potential energy savings and how it gives architects more design options.
May 13, 2009—John Wells, President of Interface Americas, and Kemp Harr discuss how Interface was able to recover 43 million pounds of post consumer carpet in 2008. Listen to the interview to hear more details about Interface's ReEntry program, which continues to thrive even in this soft economy.
May 12, 2009—John Baugh, managing director at Stifel Nicolaus, and Kemp Harr discuss the lack of relationship between stock price and quarterly earnings. Listen to the interview to hear John's thoughts on the forward looking nature of the stock market and his outlook on the economy for the remainder of 2009. John is one of the leading market analysts who focuses on the interior furnishing business, which includes the flooring industry.
May 11, 2009—Two weeks ago, the Carpet America Recycling Effort (CARE) organization held its annual meeting. In this interview, Georgina Sikorski, Executive Director of CARE, and Kemp Harr discuss the current status of CARE's efforts. Listen to the interview to hear what recycled carpet is being used for today, details about CARE's annual meeting and who won the annual awards.
May 8, 2009—Gary Cissell of Nebraska Furniture Mart, former president of the NFA, discusses the benefits of NFA membership, Best Practices at Retail, and the outlook for the future.