Small Business Solutions - Green Furniture

Small Business Solutions - Green Furniture Matt Deichmann: Well it’s no longer enough to have a business face or office that’s attractive, comfortable and conductive to productivity often office and business furnishings need to meet a higher standard but being environmentally correct even in the construction and renovation process. Our guest today is uniquely qualified to speak to equal friendly approaches and renovation and specialty flooring she’s Linda Goldstein. Linda welcome. Linda Goldstein: Thank you. Matt Deichmann: Linda is the General Manager of CI Select Flooring Solutions and in her spare time the Mayor of Clayton, Missouri where she is instrumental in getting green building initiatives rolling. Even involved in commercial and business flooring now for a long time and a leader in reclamation, what are some of the problems we have with old carpet and landfills? Linda Goldstein: Well, carpet is not biodegradable so it just accumulates over the years and years ago we were very pleased. We were approached by DuPont to help them do an experimental program about what to do with used carpeting. So before this was ever out there in the main stream, before people new what to do with used carpeting, we were shipping carpet back, shipping carpet to DuPont and they were trying to deconstruct it and figure out what to do with it. So we’ve been doing that for quite a while now because it is a problem to have carpet in landfills. Matt Deichmann: A big company is like DuPont doing any research towards what could be a biodegradable carpet, ham for some other — Linda Goldstein: Well, some of the carpet manufacturers are getting into carpet that’s actually biodegradable now and ultimately the goal is to have cradle-to-cradle type of process where old carpet becomes new carpet again. That’s difficult at this point but there are some manufacturers who are getting really close to having that happen. Matt Deichmann: So how much of the carpet now at a company like CI Select has reclaimed or recycled? Linda Goldstein: We have a company policy that every square inch of carpet that we pull up does not go to a landfill and we ship it off to a reclamation plant and various things happen to that carpet depending on what type of fiber, what type of backing. Matt Deichmann: So then if I’m a business and I’m getting new carpet you take out my old carpet, bring in a new carpet and the old carpet gets sorted, gets some of it reclaimed, some of it is not. Linda Goldstein: Well, all of it is reclaimed. What we do is we take the old carpet back to our warehouse and we fill a truck retailer full of old carpet and we ship carpet tiles, you know the carpet squares to one reclamation plant and most of that is chopped up and it’s made into carpet backing. Broadloom carpet which is the 12 foot wide carpet goes to a different reclamation plant and there it’s deconstructed. The glue is removed, the backing is taken off, then depending on the fiber if it’s nylon or wool or polypropylene. That kind of determines what ultimately is going to happen to that old carpet. Carpet like that is typically made into carpet padding or automotive parts, thin covers that kind of thing. It’s actually now I just recently read about noise abatement sound walls that highways are using so when you drive down a highway and you see a sound wall it might be your old carpet out there. Matt Deichmann: That’s a great display. Linda Goldstein: That’s amazing, isn’t it? Matt Deichmann: Yeah, it is. Is it more expensive for a business owner or contract to ensure that old carpets get recycled? Linda Goldstein: It started out to be more expensive to go through this process and when we decided to make it a company policy, what we did was we decided that it was a cause of doing business and we absorbed it and we didn’t charge our customers more. Now, fortunately the cost of reclaiming carpet is getting close to the tipping cease and traditional waste disposal. So that’s the good news and we track that and we’re getting really close. Matt Deichmann: So the great motivation for business is like you said we’re reaching that tipping point is that it starts out is getting something well, it’s a cause of doing business and it’s the responsible thing to do but at some point you know that horizon land is mainly we actually make a profit by doing it. Maybe it makes financially worthy which is the best motivation. Linda Goldstein: Right. Well, I think down the road there’s going to be a lot of industry that revolves around recycled products. We see it more and more. So at this point, people are not paying us for old carpet but there might be a point where old carpet and other products that need to be recycled are so much in demand that there’s actually a market for them. Matt Deichmann: Does your company’s policy to reclaim carpet have a competitive advantage? Linda Goldstein: Many of our clients are very, very pleased that we do it that we reclaim carpet and some clients are writing it in to their specifications when they are putting a project out to bid. They want to know that the carpet is not going to go on a landfill. But as far as the competitive advantage goes more and more it’s just the right thing to do and it’s accessible. It takes a little bit of effort but it’s not necessarily an exclusive to our company anymore. When we started out years and years ago when we were experimenting with DuPont and they ruled out their reclamation program it was exclusive to us but now there is so many options out there and that’s the good news for the environment not necessarily for my business but for the environment. Matt Deichmann: Well, in that tech you recommended business owners, specify reclamation as a part of the bid process for a contract? Linda Goldstein: I think that would be wonderful if everyone did because again it’s accessible. It’s not exclusive and it’s the right thing to do but not everyone does it so if an owner would like to make sure that there carpet does not go to a landfill be a good idea to specify it. Matt Deichmann: Well, can you tell us about the movement towards renewable flooring. Materials like cork and bamboo and I’ve seen some beautiful examples and is that primarily still in the residential because I know what you do at CI is commercial in nature? Linda Goldstein: Right, there are some beautiful cork and bamboo floors and that is a real movement in terms of the residential market and also some what in the commercial market. Typically though, those floors are for light commercial. So you have to be careful where you use them but, it’s wonderful that again like the carpet manufacturers who are trying to find biodegradable carpet where same flooring that’s made out of renewable materials. Matt Deichmann: Oh, great information, Linda. Thank you so much for being here. So Linda Goldstein is the General Manager of CI Select Flooring Solutions. You can learn more about her firm at CI Select.com. Look for other segments on Green Building Initiatives here on SBTV.com where small business is our only business.