Hicksville, N.Y.—There is no doubt about it: When it comes to flooring, many people are looking for something new. From the consumer who wants to differentiate her home from her neighbor’s, to the dealer who wants to do the same with the competition by offering his customer something different, the popularity of alternative flooring products such as bamboo and cork is on the rise. The question is, how does the manufacturer make the consumer aware of the product, and how does the retailer sell it? “The most important thing for the retailer is, he has to look at bamboo and educate himself as far as what are its characteristics, applications and its do’s and don’ts,” said Dorothy Wong, vice president of marketing for D&M Bamboo.

“For us,” she explained, “how we get that point across consists of three things: Education, communication and expectation. We have to educate the sales force so that they can communicate well with their customers so that they, in turn, will know exactly what to expect and will not be disappointed. It is about education, communication and expectation.” “In general, bamboo is an easy product to train folks on, primarily because it’s driven by people’s natural curiosity,” said John Himes, head of the wood unit for Mannington Mills. “When you tell someone that bamboo is actually a grass and initially grows incredibly fast, they are immediately wanting to learn more.

 “You can them follow up with the great durability of bamboo and how color consistent ours is and retailers can be comfortable selling it very quickly,” he explained. “It’s really a fun product for retailers to sell and for consumers to buy. “Exotics in total have been outstanding this year,” he added. “Bamboo has really allowed us to break out from our competitors since we are the first major player to introduce bamboo flooring on a national scale. Distributors and retailers are much more comfortable working with this type of flooring when it comes from a company like Mannington, rather than a regional agent. “It’s only been in the market for 90 days but the reaction has been excellent,” he continued. “The biggest surprise is how large some of the initial orders have been, We’re getting orders from some customers that I thought might have been a little slower to adopt to this type of product.”

Ironically, one of the people happiest with Mannington’s entrance into the bamboo arena is Wong, who believes, in addition to D&M Bamboo’s increasing involvement with the commercial segment and its introduction of a glueless product, that the company’s recent success is due to the increased awareness of bamboo in the market created by the mill. “We’re doing phenomenal sales for the first part of the year. One of the reasons we’re doing well because our competitors, such as Mannington, having taken on bamboo. That has given the bamboo segment a lot of visibility. Although it offers only solids, everybody wants to take a look at bamboo now because Mannington has more outlets than anyone else and it has the advertising, especially at Surfaces, so it brings the awareness up very much. Although it is a competitor, it is not going to hurt us very much because people still want to compare prices.”

Cork, much like bamboo, has seen a recent growth in sales for several reasons. “It’s been a busy year,” said Wendes Jones, marketing director for Natural Cork. “There has been a very noticeable increase in the people getting involved with cork flooring. We are a distributor so it’s kind of hard to know the end user because we sell to the retail stores. But we’ve had a definite increase in the number of retailers who are carrying our lines and an increase in overall sales. “In my work in marketing and in touching base with the different magazines we advertise in,” she explained, “I feel like the consumer is becoming more educated about alternative flooring. We marketed our product a lot more to the consumer in the past 12 months, thinking that it would drive the consumer to the retailer and that has been working. So, there has been a big increase in consumer awareness.”

Education Is The Key One of the ways Natural Cork has educated the consumer as to what the product is all about is by sending out a magazine explaining its benefits. “There is more education involved with cork,” said Jones. “If a consumer comes into a retail outlet and she is simply looking for flooring for a renovation project or for her new home, she is familiar with carpet, hardwood and ceramic tile, so education of the consumer would be required on the part of the dealer to steer that consumer. “We’ve sent out a magazine, Fabulous Floors, to many of our buying group members, which has selling tips about cork flooring, in hopes that it will help,” she added. “It’s a magazine written to the consumer, not the retailer.”

“The green aspect of cork would be the thing that is bringing more architects to us,” Jones noted, “because those who are working on projects where it’s an issue, or where their customers have asked that their home be as VOC-free as possible and environmentally-friendly, those are the people who the architects are more likely to specify our products for. The green aspect is also positive because it’s a crop that grows very rapidly and is easy to harvest without damaging the environment.” “The number one application for cork is kitchens and often that will spill over into surrounding areas like breakfast nooks, family rooms, entryways, hallways, and others that connect to the kitchen. It’s very hygienic and you don’t have to worry about any type of bacteria growth, as it’s very clean.”

“Our cork line, in particular, is geared more toward the residential market and the other flooring we do, recycled rubber flooring, is targeted to the commercial market, so we have two completely different ways of dealing with the customer,” said Kathleen Keller, director of marketing for Dodge- Regupol. “My involvement with our cork division is fairly minimal because it really sells itself. “They don’t need a lot of marketing support from us as we’ve been doing it for so long,” she explained, “people recognize the name, they know the product as opposed to recycled rubber, which many people are still learning exactly what it is and what it’s benefits are.” Offering different types of product has also helped spread the word about bamboo, which, like hardwood flooring and laminate, has gone glueless.

“We have seen an increase in a different bamboo category with our click-on glueless 5/8-in. product,” said Wong. “In the beginning, we thought it would replace the glue longstrip, but what we’re seeing is, increasing sales without replacing the longstrip because some of the people who have been using longstrip continue to do so. “So, we are finding new customers who, will go for the click-on glueless product,” she added. “And then we have the engineered, multiply substrate and, while that one is not doing phenomenal sales yet, it adds one more category to our lineup.” “People are just getting more creative with their flooring choices,” concluded Keller. “They’re moving away from carpet and are putting hardwood, ceramic tile, linoleum and cork into their homes. They really are becoming more creative.”