On March 17, Bob Peoples stepped down as executive director of the Carpet America Recovery Effort ( CARE) to join the American Chemical Society (ACS) Green Chemistry Institute in a similar position. He was the organization’s first and only executive director since the industry founded CARE in 2002 and is credited with bringing it from birth to where it is today— recognized as a leader in environmental stewardship and innovation.

Considering he had no model from which to work since nothing like CARE had been in existence in any industry prior, his undertaking was not an easy one. In addition to setting sail on unchartered waters, he had to bring together not just different factions of the industry but actual competitors, who were forced to set aside their differences and work toward the common good.

Prior to leaving for his new role with ACS, Matthew Spieler, FCNews’ senior executive editor, caught up with Peoples for this exclusive interview.

As the first and only CARE executive director, give me your perspective on how the organization has progressed since it started in 2002.

I believe we have made great progress considering we are building a brand new industry and started with a blank sheet of paper. My 28 years of technical experience taught me it takes two to three times longer to do most things. Why, because you always encounter unforeseen issues/barriers. The technology rarely works exactly the way you intend or design it to. If you are lucky it is a short-term delay, but it is not uncommon that it is a bigger issue that takes time to sort through and correct.

That is even more critical when all the decision making is not under your control. I mean, this new industry is being built by a group of capable businesspeople, but each has their own perspective, priorities, decision-making heuristics and tolerance for risk.

If you look at the cumulative pounds diverted from landfills we hit one billion in 2007—no small milestone. Each year we have seen a double-digit increase in diversion growth. Our membership continues to grow, the number of collection centers is now at 60 and we have centers in more than half the states.

What has not grown significantly is our budget, and that has hampered our ability to do some of the things we need to accomplish. CARE needs a full-time executive director, which means salary, benefits and a retirement package. We also need to be able to engage the right talent to work on projects to advance our mission, and that takes money. The economic slowdown has also thrown us a big curve as it has really caused market outlets for our materials to shrink significantly.

How does that compare to the expectations you had going into the job? What about compared to the expectations the industry had?

I think we have been able to accomplish a lot. The recycle of post-consumer carpet is technically very challenging and many people do not realize this. It is exceptionally difficult to go back into carpet fiber itself. But, it is being done today by Shaw, Nylene and Universal.

There has been well in excess of $400 million in investments in the development of new chemistries, new products, new processing technologies and equipment to enable this new industry. It takes time to do that kind of development work, and we are now seeing the fruits of those early investments.

Shaw’s Evergreen Nylon Recycling is now up and running, Mohawk’s GreenWorks is coming on line, Interface’s CoolBlue and ReEntry are operational and Tandus has actually been at it for a long time. These are big commitments and big steps.

My personal expectation was and is the creation of a new industry. The entrepreneurs that are part of the collection infrastructure and those who started processing were amazing people to work with, full of energy and ideas. They are driven to succeed. LA Fiber Co. has been doing post-consumer carpet longer than anyone I know of, and it continues to process more pounds than anyone else. That will change once the big guys are fully up to speed.

Being that CARE was the first of its kind, how difficult was it getting things started in terms of getting everyone on the same page, working together?

It took several years of facilitated dialog with a broad stakeholder group. There were some tough “discussions,” but through perseverance we achieved agreement on the basis that, “we should not let perfect get in the way of good enough.”

What are the two biggest highlights/accomplishments to date?

Hitting the one billion pounds diverted milestone, and building a conference and network that is of value to people engaged in this important and groundbreaking effort. This was the first national product stewardship agreement.

Have there been any disappointments?

• Lack of any real significant funding support from the public sector.

• Failure to get procurement guidelines in place and being used by governments (federal, state, local).

• Failure to really fund CARE at a level to make a bigger impact (we are working on some very creative ideas).

• Perhaps for me one of the biggest is the sub-prime meltdown and the adverse impact it has had on our market outlets. This is a real setback for us since it hits the collection community very hard.

Looking back to the start and where things are today, is there anything you would do differently?

I would have paid more attention to the funding aspect to ensure the ability to execute programs to advance development of products, technology and markets for post-consumer carpet materials.

CARE goes well beyond flooring in that it has helped create a new industry for companies who use carpet to make other products. How has this area progressed compared to initial hopes?

Slowly. It takes time to develop and get the word out. We have also had several negative events around recycling operations and product lines—the first time around for Evergreen it shut down; and bankruptcies by Polyamid 2000, U.S. Plastic Lumber, the original United Recycling in Minnesota, Nyboard in Minnesota, Wellman, etc.

Until the economy turns around it is going to be a slow climb.

Anything else you want to add?

The people working in this arena are really committed to building this new industry. Their creativity, energy and dedication have been my inspiration. I have shared their successes and felt their pain. It has been a tremendous learning experience.