“It’s always a great honor to be recognized by your customers, and our thanks go out to every one who voted for us,” said Piet Dossche, USFloors President and CEO. He continued, “The importance of receiving this prestigious award cannot be understated. It validates what we are doing in the areas of innovative product development, product assortment, value proposition, quality control and customer service. We will continue to strive to become an even better supplier to our customers, but it is nice and encouraging to get their endorsement, we are on the right track. I like to thank as well the entire team at USFloors for their daily commitment and dedication. This Award of Excellence is a result of their efforts and I assign it to them”

This year’s ceremony marks the 17th year that the Award of Excellence has been presented. Sponsored by FCNews and the WFCA, the Award of Excellence is a means for manufacturers’ customers to acknowledge companies that consistently provide the best service, professionalism of sales force, management responsiveness, value, design, B2B, handling of claims and ease of doing business. This year, thousands of ballots were cast online and at Surfaces 2013 for the prestigious floor covering award.

The newly released website is designed with a clean, fresh look and user-friendly navigation features, updated with the latest information about USFContract products and specifications. The site contains information about existing products as well as new products like the Citadel and Bretagne FSC® Certified hardwood collections. Comprehensive information about Natural Cork™, Natural Bamboo™, and Natural Wood™ for commercial markets is now available under one “roof”.

The site features product photos with several perspectives, accompanied by complete technical specifications and related technical data easily accessible on each product page. In addition, samples of the products can be ordered quickly and easily from the product page.

“Our primary goal was to build a user-friendly site that is simple to navigate,” stated Mark Brunelle, USFContract National Sales Manager. He continued, “With the new site, clients and prospective clients are provided access to extensive product information and product visuals which will allow for exceptional quick reference for presentations and specifications. This site will no doubt increase and strengthen our business relationships with the specifiers and end users.”

Piet Dossche, President and CEO of parent company USFloors Inc., commented, “As the only commercial supplier of a complete line of sustainable cork, bamboo, and FSC® Certified hardwood floors, our new website allows commercial interior designers to have one stop shopping for the largest selection of sustainable flooring designed for commercial applications. The new website confirms our commitment to serving commercial markets and targeting them for additional growth opportunities.”

About USFContract
USFContract is a division of USFloors, the only US-based cork, bamboo, and FSC® Certified hardwood flooring supplier with manufacturing facilities located in the U.S. Founded in May 2001, USFloors features state‐of‐the‐art finishing and profiling lines for flooring and moldings. USFloors’ manufacturing facility is the only manufacturing facility in Georgia utilizing photovoltaic panels to generate clean, renewable energy. USFloors manufactures and distributes the industries widest assortment of cork, bamboo, and distinctive hardwood products engineered for specified commercial applications. USFloors is a member of the U.S. Green Building Council.

USFloors, Inc. has signed a license agreement with Välinge for production of 2G mechanical locking systems on its cork flooring and wood flooring.

Dalton based USFloors, a leading manufacturer of unique and sustainable flooring, has signed a global, non-exclusive, license agreement to use Välinge’s patented 2G technology for mechanical locking systems with Fold Down installation, on its Cork and wood flooring products. The Fold Down installation method is fast, easy and suitable for glue free installation as well as glue down or nail down installation methods.

USFloors is a partner with one of Välinge’s first licensees – Amorim – the leading cork producer in the world, who acquired a 25% ownership in USFloors in 2008. This partnership has allowed USFloors to work closely with Välinge and its technology for a long time.

“It is with great pleasure that we welcome another US manufacturer to use the Välinge technology. We have been working together for about a year with the Amorim products. This agreement expands our cooperation with US Floors and reinforces a welcome trend towards more flooring production with mechanical locking systems in North America.”, says Mr. Per Nygren, EVP Marketing, Välinge.

“We are excited to extend our relationship with Välinge. Our Natural Cork® collection combines great styling with a great installation system. This agreement further prepares us to expand our US based production in a growing market for sustainable flooring enhanced with mechanical locking systems.”, says Mr. Piet Dossche, CEO, USFloors.

Välinge is pleased to announce the new agreement with USFloors.

United Renewable Energy, which has installed many of Dalton’s solar energy sites, hosted a tour for Dalton leaders, business owners from across the state and officials involved in promoting renewable energy in Georgia.

The tour included a rooftop solar array at USFloors, a newly installed array on top of a landfill at Textile Rubber and Chemical Co., Dalton Utilities’ solar system and a solar tracking panel at IVC.

Piet Dossche, CEO of USFloors, told the group that for him solar isn’t just about the environment — it makes good business sense for his company.

The company has saved 40 percent on utility costs since installing the panels, he said.

“I’m not a tree-hugger; I’m a business person,” he said, amidst laughs from his listeners. “And the numbers do make sense.”

Dossche said he also prides himself in being a leader, creating a more diverse economy in Dalton’s carpet-heavy manufacturing world and helping the county become more energy independent.

To read the entire Times Free Press article, click here.

USFloors 350 kilowatt rooftop solar array in Dalton, GA

The article highlights USFloors’ tremendous contribution to Georgia’s renewable energy supply, in spite of the state’s lethargic embrace of its growing solar industry. Notable are the 1701 solar photovoltaic panels which cover a large portion of the 100,000 sq. ft. roof of USFloors’ Corporate Center and Manufacturing facility in Dalton. The system generates 350 kilowatts of clean, renewable solar energy and is a significant portion of the 500 kilowatt total system that makes USFloors the largest commercial solar power producer in the state of Georgia. According the USFloors President/CEO Piet Dossche, the companies commitment to solar power “takes our commitment to sustainability another step further.” USFloors is the leading supplier of sustainable cork, bamboo, and FSC-certified hardwood floors in the US.

USFloors 500 kilowatt system captures enough energy to power 54 homes and will offset more than 11,000 tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) over the 25 year lifespan of the panels.

To read the Georgia Trend article in it’s entirety, click here.

Mark Brunelle of USFContract with BON Gold award

Cork Décor is a vinyl-encapsulated cork tile that carries a 15 year heavy commercial warranty, likely the only commercial cork floor with such a warranty. Cork Décor Volume 2 made its debut at Chicago’s Merchandise Mart during NeoCon 2011, the National Exposition of Contract Furnishings.

Best of Neocon, presented by Contract Magazine, is awarded by the Best of Neocon jury, composed of 45 corporate, government, and institutional facilities management executives, interior designers, and architects, who are responsible for selecting and buying furniture and furnishings for their specific organizations or clients. The seven jury teams visited Merchandise Mart showrooms and temporary market suites to judge each product in person. Manufacturers or product designers had the opportunity to explain and discuss details of the entered product and answer jurors’ questions.

A mere two years in existence, USFContract has managed to capture this coveted award which has eluded many mature contract commercial companies with many more years in the contract market. Other companies with products entered in the resilient category included Mannington, Johnsonite, Amtico, Centiva, and Karndean among others.

Cork Décor:
USFContract’s Cork Décor from Natural Cork® takes traditional cork flooring and adds extreme durability to create a collection of eco-friendly flooring designed to perform in the most demanding commercial applications. The high performance attributes are achieved by applying an acrylic nano bead lacquer finish to the surface of the vinyl clad cork core. The nano beads are embedded into the top layer to provide improved scratch, scuff, stain, and slip resistance. Cork Décor also utilizes Acrodur®, a water based binder that significantly reduces the level of emissions without compromising the technical performance of the

Best of Neocon Gold winner Cork Decor Volume 2 from USFContract

floor. The vinyl backing provides dimensional stability and strength to the Cork Décor tiles making it highly resistant to tearing and moisture. Natural Cork® Cork Décor Tiles are certified by the very stringent GreenGuard® Children and Schools Indoor Air Quality certification program for low emitting interior building materials, furnishings, and finish systems. GreenGuard Children & Schools Certified products can also be used as a strategy to earn valuable credits in the CHPS Best Practices Manual for K-12 schools, U.S. Green Building Council’s LEED Green Building Rating System, Green Guide for Healthcare, NAHB Green Building Guidelines, Green Globes, Regreen and many other local green building codes.

About USFContract
USFContract is a division of USFloors, the only US-based cork and bamboo flooring supplier with manufacturing facilities located in the U.S. Founded in May 2001, USFloors features state‐of‐the‐art finishing and profiling lines for flooring and moldings. USFloors’ manufacturing facility is the only manufacturing facility in Georgia utilizing photovoltaic panels to generate clean, renewable energy. USFloors also manufactures a wide assortment of bamboo and distinctive hardwood products. USFloors is a member of the U.S. Green Building Council.

To learn more about Cork Décor or order samples, visit usfcontract.com.

In the interest of full disclosure, Jim Ed Oberst works for a company called Brewco Marketing Group. Brewco designed, built, and manages the Decor[k] mobile cork showroom that is touring home shows across America, educating consumers about the unmatched beauty and virtues of cork flooring. Decor[k] is an outreach of APCOR, the Portuguese Cork Association, of which USFloors is a member. If you want to know more about the Decor[k] tour and mobile showroom, or you want learn about cork flooring, or your interested to see what HGTV celebrity designer Candice Olson thinks about cork flooring, or you just want to browse a really cool website, visit www.realcorkfloors.com. Now back to the story…

Having learned, in depth, the virtues of cork flooring via Decor[k], Jim Ed and his lovely better half, Tara, became cork flooring converts and decided to install our beautiful Leon Natural Cork Floor in their house. Leon is from our New Dimensions collection and is a 7′ wide plank Natural Cork floating floor with beveled edges and ends. You can get more details on Leon by clicking here.

Upon installing their new Leon cork floor, Tara snapped this photo of their daughter and sent it to Jim Ed who forwarded it to us with the following testimonial:

Powerless to the comfort of a Natural Cork floor

“I just had to send this short testimonial about my new cork floors. My wife sent me this picture from her phone on Saturday. My daughter, age 4, was playing with her Leapster comfortably on our new LEON USFloor and got so comfortable that she simply put her thumb in her mouth and took a nap. Now part of the reason she is on the floor is we haven’t put our furniture back in the house yet. As you can see, the shoe molding is not down, but is being put in as we speak.

We love our floor. I just wanted send a picture to prove it.

Jim Ed”

Thanks, Jim Ed and Tara. You’ll also be glad to know that the LEON Natural Cork floor is indoor air quality third-party certified to the Greenguard Children & Schools standard, one of the most stringent testing standards for formaldehyde and other VOC emissions. You can breathe easy knowing your cork floor is a healthier floor for your kids to nap on.

We are glad your daughter digs the floor as much as you do.

November 12, 2010, Dalton, GA – USFloors has commissioned its third solar photovoltaic (PV) project intended to supply half of the facility’s energy. This installation of 365.04 kw is the largest solar array in Georgia, eclipsing the record once held by the Georgia Tech Natatorium, installed for the 1996 Olympics. Alpharetta-based United Renewable Energy installed 1521 Suniva solar panels and an SMA Sunny Central Inverter for this ARRA, GEFA Grant funded project . The combined output of all three USFloors solar arrays will total over half a Megawatt, and makes USFloors the largest producer of solar energy in the state of Georgia. USFloors is producing enough solar energy to power 54 average American homes, offsetting 11,400 tons of CO2 and nearly 23 million vehicle miles.

Commerce in Dalton has thrived for decades, providing jobs, growth and a competitive marketplace. In recent years, the manufacturers that made Dalton the Flooring Capital of the World have been challenged to survive changes in the economy. USFloors, a distributor and manufacturer of eco-friendly cork and bamboo, has “greenstreamed”

their operations, adding jobs while much of Dalton struggles with unemployment, and making investments in renewable energy. USFloors has installed over 540 kW of solar panels and is in the process of developing a LEED certified facility and has emerged as a leader in sustainable flooring. Now, they have commissioned the largest solar array in the state. USFloors is reducing its carbon footprint by walking the talk.

Piet Dossche, President of USFloors, Inc., began his green campaign in 2007, becoming the only cork and bamboo flooring supplier with manufacturing capability in the country. A recipient of the Green Step Award in 2010, the company is committed to exclusively using sustainable resources for its flooring, and complying with rigorous U.S. and European environmental standards. By following strict Forest Stewardship Council guidelines, USFloors avoids clear cut or non-managed plantations, and promotes green building through renewable energy and LEED initiatives. This has earned them a position of respect within the sustainability community. USFloors is now the largest producer of solar energy in the state of Georgia. To install this solar array, the company took advantage of a 30% Federal Grant and a 35% State Grant given by the Georgia Environmental Finance Authority.

USFloors’ expansion of their solar investment sets an example as a cleaner, greener way to power a manufacturing business. According to Dossche, “USFloors strives to be an example of how a privately-owned company can be a part of the effort to contribute to the solution of cleaner power.” In building the state’s flagship solar array, USFloors partnered with local, Georgia-based companies to ensure that the state’s economy was benefitted as well. Norcross-based Suniva provided the solar panels for the array. Georgia-based United Renewable Energy expanded its Dalton workforce to maintain a commitment to developing skilled labor in the communities it services.