While there are a host of product sponsors for the Make it Right project, Shaw Floors was the first. Green Builder talked to the company's Sustainability and Corporate Communications Manager, Emma Williams, about the company's interest in the project and its commitment to sustainability.
"We were one of the original sponsors to come on board," notes Williams. "We believed it was the right thing to do; it resonates with people who simply want to 'make it right' and help a community get back on its feet."
Shaw has committed to provide flooring for all 150 houses. The company spec'd Anso nylon carpets and Epic hardwood floors. Engineered to be recycled, Anso nylon contains post-consumer carpet so it is, as the company explains it, "Carpet to Carpet" (not carpet to landfill). Anso nylon is also SCS certified, with 25% recycled content.
Shaw's Epic engineered hardwood holds a Cradle to Cradle Silver Certification from McDonough Braugart Design Chemistry (MBDC), a third-party product and design firm. Shaw was the first flooring manufacturer to earn C2C certification on hardwood flooring products. The product's inner layer, EnviroCore, is made from post-industrial recycled content, making it one of the most sustainable engineered hardwood flooring products on the market. Epic styles use approximately 50% less newly harvested wood than conventional 3/8" engineered alternatives.
Because Shaw has Cradle to Cradle products, it attracted the company to the project. "It's simply how we're wired," Williams explains. "Here we had achance to help rebuild a neighborhood and focus on not just the social issues but also the environmental ones. We also had the opportunity to put our products into affordable housing in a reviving community. How could we turn away from a project like this?"
To see more on Green Builder's coverage of Make it Right, please see the June 2012 issue in our Magazine Archive.