The Quality Carpet & Flooring Specialist

Are you worried about the environmental cost of your floors? Many of us consider aspects like landfill and disposal but there are so many other areas that have a large impact on our planet.

Have you thought about the chemicals, energy, transport costs and sustainability of the materials?
 
Over the last few years we have seen a much bigger interest in the effects that the flooring industry has on the natural world. Gone are the days when factories were so energy hungry, the disposal of old flooring was just something for the consumer to consider and inefficient delivery meant wasted fuel and time.
 
Innovation is coming from all areas:
 
Factories

• Wind turbines are starting to provide a significant part of the power
• Regulation and voluntary registration for chemical used is much tighter (see: REACH http://www.reachready.co.uk/about_us.php)
• Locating closer to customers – saving on long-distance transport/air or freight miles
• Limiting packaging and using recycled materials 

Products

• The use of recycled or natural materials such as old plastic bottles, corn & wool for carpet
• The use of recycled plastic in hard floorings such as vinyl tiles
• The use of old lorry tyres and waste wool to make underlay - http://bit.ly/1KkgGeV
• Water based instead of chemical dyes
• Anti-Allergen treatments for carpet
• Recycling schemes – i.e. returning old carpet like ECOCORD from Leighspinners - http://bit.ly/1VtVeaG 

(Manx Carpet's Eco Style - part recycled bottles)

Our Shop

• The recycling of old carpets rather than into landfill – used to form loose surface for racehorses to train on.
• The offer to allotment holders to drop off woollen carpet to help weed suppression/create paths
• Energy efficient lighting, recycling of paper, cardboard tubing, plastic
• The occasional cycle to work when time and weather allows! 

As you can see there is a lot of awareness now in producing the product, getting it to you and to what happens to the old.
 
If saving the environment matters to you then please do ask in store for details of those products and companies that can help you do just that.

The Making of a Video

Have you seen our new video on the home page? We made it with Hitchin TV and I have to say it was a really simple and fun experience (although it got a bit nerve racking when close ups were involved).
 
The wonderful guys from HitchinTV, Tony & Mark, visited us one Sunday so we could film it all without phones ringing and doors banging.  We now have the utmost respect for those who have to speak to camera. As you will notice it was only Mark who volunteered to do the closing chat, the rest of us were up for the old “silent movie” style a la “The Artist”!
 
Its amazing to watch the filming being done, there wasn’t a huge pile of equipment but the long arm for zooming up and down and round about was a great gadget as you can see from some the lovely shots Tony created for us.
 
HitchinTV also sourced the voice over for us, to our surprise it turned out to be the one and only Natalie from Heart FM’s breakfast show! Much better than one of us trying to sound like the M&S adverts’ husky tones!
 
We hope you like it and we’d love to know what you think!

http://www.charleswilsoncarpets.co.uk/index.php