EUREKA: The World Floor Covering Association ( WFCA) struck gold—the mother lode. The innovative and indefatigable retail advocacy organization—the industry’s largest—has been honored by the North American Precis Syndicate (NAPS) with the prestigious Golden Thinker Award. The singular honor is presented by the consumer press across the country to select individuals and/or groups whose featured press releases have received extremely high pick-up and use by America’s newspaper editors. Here’s why we use words like, singular honor, prestigious and select individuals: The WFCA was selected from a group that included nearly all of the Fortune 500 companies, most of the 100 largest advertisers across the U.S., the 20 largest public relations firms in the country, over 100 associations and numerous government agencies. Kudos to Chris Davis and his extraordinary staff.

NEW POLL: The new year has started and so has the plethora of polls, surveys and studies. One of the earliest compilation of opinions has been issued by the National Association of Wholesale-Distributors (NAW) as part of its program Smart- Brief on Leadership. Asked, “What strategy will be central to your efforts to enhance profits in the new year?” respondents replied: 60.62%, product and service innovations to increase volume; 15.86%, organization consolidation to reduce costs; 10.62%, cost-cutting, including workforce reduction; 6.05%, no changes are contemplated; 3.49%, price-cutting to induce volume, and 3.36%, price increases to bolster margins. Interesting to note the largest segment plans on innovation to increase volume, while the others rely on more drastic measures.

FLIP SIDE: Another effort by NAW in the SmartBrief on Distribution segment asked, “In terms of the overall economy, what do you think 2010 has in store for the wholesale distributor?” The results were surprising, even startling; only 8.26% expressed a negative, depressing, hopeless attitude. The remainder of the respondents were upbeat and encouraging: 47.83%, somewhat better conditions than in 2009; 39.13%, about the same conditions as in 2009; 7.39%, somewhat worse conditions than in 2009; 4.78%, much better conditions than in 2009, and 0.87%, much worse conditions than in 2009. I’d rather see the few surprised than the many disappointed.

CHAMPS: Shaw Industries has set a new Guinness World Record for—surprise!—staging the largest pie fight with 434 participants. The record was established on Jan. 7 at the Embassy Suites in Grapevine, Tex. The epic pie fight was held on 3,750 square feet of Anso nylon carpet in Sandy Hollow II to demonstrate the carpet’s ability to repel stains and be easily cleaned. Here are the vital statistics of the event, which marked the ninth time the record has been set: Participants threw 1,200 pies in three flavors—chocolate, cherry and apple. After the fight, Shaw removed approximately 3,000 pounds of pie from the carpet before steam cleaning it. Shaw broke the previous record of 269 participants by a hefty 165 pie tossers. The previous record holder? “Live! With Regis and Kelly.” And, finally, Shaw’s Feeding America affiliate donation will provide 40,000 to 70,000 meals for hungry people in 13 Texas counties—that’s 50,000 to 90,000 pounds of food.

CALL FOR PAPERS: High quality studies of issues related to any aspect of carpet reclamation or recycling are being sought by CARE. Topic papers from all disciplines are encouraged in order to provide “a multi-disciplinary perspective on the current climate of carpet reclamation, from innovative carpet recycling processes to policy-oriented discussions. Special interest is focused on additional end-market opportunities, processing technologies, extended producer responsibility (EPR) policies and funding opportunities for entrepreneurs.” Submit abstract by Feb. 15 to jstroop@carpetrecov ery.org. Papers will be chosen based on the abstract, the informational needs of CARE’s 2010 conference (in Santa Fe, N.M., Apr. 26 to 28) and relevance to carpet reclamation as a whole.