10/4/2010 – Lewis Floor & Home working with recycler company

Lewis Floor & Home is thrilled to announce that effective immediately we will be working with a recycler to recycle both carpet and pad taken up from our customers’ homes as opposed to having these materials end up directly in our landfills. Presently, it is estimated that over five billion pounds of carpet are sent to landfills each year. Our goal at Lewis Floor & Home is to divert as much as possible into recycled products. Old carpet can be recycled into composite lumber (both decking and sheets), tile backer board, railroad ties, auto parts, carpet cushion, park benches, roofing materials and new carpet. Many of these products have a longer useful life than those they replace and avoid the use of new lumber and chemicals as preservatives. Since most carpet is made from crude oil, every yard recycled has the ability to lower our dependence on foreign oil. Recycling is not free because it costs money to pick it up, identify what kind of face fiber it is made of, break it down into the components and convert those components into a form that someone will buy and use to make new products. In addition there are transportation costs to move the materials to a recycling center and to the manufacturer. However, Lewis Floor & Home believes that the costs of not recycling far outweigh the costs of recycling. Hopefully other flooring retailers will follow our lead and work to recycle products when possible and keep them out of our landfills.