Award of Excellence: A glimpse behind the winners

This is our annual issue that honors FCNews’ Award of Excellence winners. The recognition has become exceptionally meaningful for manufacturers and suppliers for three decades. Why? While other award programs tend to focus on a particular product introduction or marketing/ merchandising concept, the Awards of Excellence honor companies based on an array of criteria as voted on by their customers. It validates what every supplier strives to do on a daily basis.

The competition has grown over the years to include 28 categories. We try to let the companies compete in their appropriate sandboxes. For example, suppliers go up against companies of similar size as the larger company simply has more resources at their disposal.

With all this said, you’ll find the well-deserved winners starting on page 26. But I always like to use this space to reveal voting nuances in some of these categories. Why? Some companies won in a landslide. You should know how much they are considered the best of the best. And in some instances, a company proved victorious by the smallest of margins, while some performed much better than in prior years, which says they are on the right track. So let’s take a deep dive into some of the categories.

If you’re wondering which companies dominate the voting by the greatest margins, the answer is Versatrim (66%) in the Moldings category, Mohawk (62%) in the Laminate A category and Unilin (62%) in one of the two Technology categories. Versatrim has dominated its competition in each of the four years since we launched Moldings. Unilin is also undefeated since we broke out flooring solutions into its own category. Flooring solutions include technologies that are licensed to manufacturers. A structural change in the Laminate category this year allowed Mohawk to coast. No surprise given its dominate position in laminate.

This year we launched our newest category, Best Distributor, which saw All Surfaces edge Herregan by less than 10 votes. Each commanded 13%. The next batch of distributors were exceptionally close in the voting: UCX, William M. Bird and Big D Supplies. UCX’s recent rebranding has one wondering if it would have garnered more votes if it was listed as Haines/Belknap.

I can tell most voters take the A of E seriously and don’t just vote one company across the board. Case in point: In the Carpet A category, Mohawk defeated Shaw by a sizeable margin. However, when it came to the higher-end Carpet B category, Anderson Tuftex handled Karastan by more than 50 votes.

Two more notes about carpet: Tarkett Home has taken the Carpet C category four years in a row, and Stanton has won the Decorative category in all four years since its inception. Tarkett Home has increased its share of the vote from 29% four years ago to 37% this year. Bearing mention in this category is Southwind, which constantly gets 22% to 25% of the vote.

Speaking of Stanton, they returned to the Area Rug winner’s circle after a two-year hiatus. Over the last 10 years, Stanton and Karastan have alternated victories. I do want to call attention to Couristan here, which increased its number of votes more than threefold from 2025 to 2026. The company has made efforts to be more visible this year, even taking home a Best of Surfaces award, and it’s showing in the voting.

When it comes to resilient, COREtec has dominated Rigid Core A for 11 years, the same number of years Mannington has won for Resilient Sheet. Both seem impossible to knock off. Karndean has taken Rigid Core B eight years running. Another model of consistency, either Korlock or Art Select gets 20% of the vote every year. This year it was 28%. Who finishes second to Karndean these last few years? TRUCOR from Dixie. And in the C category, kudos goes to upstart Canopy. Two years ago it mustered only 10% of the vote; last year the number ballooned to 24%; this year it was 29%. The Dossches are obviously working hard to create a viable brand in their second go-round.

Something I found interesting occurred in the Rigid/Wood Hybrid category. Last year HF Design’s AquaProof defeated MSI’s Woodland Hills by 25 votes. This year, MSI turned the tables for its first-ever A of E victory, winning by 30 votes. That shows the collection is gaining traction with retailers.

Let’s talk about one exceptionally close category every year: Laminate B. Inhaus returned to the winner’s circle after a two-year hiatus, defeating the likes of Cali, Tarkett and Stanton with less than 12 votes separating all of them. Stanton is the company to watch here going forward, basically quadrupling its vote count from 2025 and nearly tripling its share of vote.

When it came to Hardwood, three of the four winners were repeaters: Mirage (ninth consecutive) again garnered 45% of the vote in the Canadian category, while Hallmark (fifth consecutive) in the Asian category and Kährs (fourth consecutive) in the European category are entrenching themselves as the cream of the crop in the minds of retailers.

This year we modified the Installation category to strictly Adhesives, and Taylor captured its first A of E awards by single digits over Bostik. Interestingly, three other manufacturers garnered double-digit share of the vote: Roberts, Sika and Bona.

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Dealers contend with tariff-led hikes on goods

Carpet and other floor coverings ranked highest in price increases among categories impacted by Trump’s tariffs

U.S. tariffs have significantly driven up retail prices, research shows, with carpet and other floor coverings topping the list.

That’s according to research from the Harvard Business School Pricing Lab, which revealed that U.S. tariffs have led to markedly higher prices, with imported goods rising roughly 5% to 6.6% on average and domestic goods increasing 2.5% to 3.5% above pre-tariff trends.

Of note, the category “carpets and other floor coverings” bore the largest increase—with prices surging by as much as 54.6% for imports. By contrast, prices for clothing and accessories rose by 21.9%; and coffee & tea increased by 12.8%. Least impacted were household appliances at 5.3%. To measure the impact of the 2025 tariffs, Harvard Business School constructed daily price indices using online data from five major U.S. retailers. These prices were collected on a daily basis by PriceStats. Harvard obtained detailed information on country of origin and tariff classifications for about 350,000 goods, sourced through UPC lookups or generative AI model. It used a simple unweighted matched-model approach to build the price indices, tracking the products over time and chaining geometric averages of daily price relatives within each group.

That carpet and other flooring products finished No. 1 on the list for price hikes came as little surprise to flooring dealers, who say they have felt the weight of the tariffs since the beginning. “There is no doubt we have felt an impact from the tariffs and the war,” said Pete Rubando, president of Giant Carpet One, Scranton, Pa. “We recognized this would be an issue early on and have maintained an aggressive promotional campaign stressing affordability. This has allowed us to maintain reasonably strong retail traffic, but the price increases have affected margins.”

For dealers like Home Carpet One’s Joel Schreier, the fear is that many of the importers will keep their pricing elevated now that the tariffs have largely been ruled to be illegal.

Several flooring retailers said tariffs have been hitting all products, which in turn has stifled business in some areas. “We certainly have seen costs and, correspondingly, our retail pricing go up significantly over the last 18 months,” said Joel Schreier, president of Home Carpet One in Chicago. “We aggressively purchased inventory of our best-selling imported carpets and imported tile before the vendors raised pricing, which has allowed us to keep our stock retail pricing more than competitive. In part, this has contributed to continued growth throughout this period. Now that the tariffs have largely been ruled to be illegal, my fear is that many of the importers will keep their pricing elevated, and I encourage all dealers to push back against this. We have seen a couple vendors back track already and a couple others trying to maintain those increases.”

In most instances, dealers have been able to navigate around the issue by raising prices or focusing on higher-end goods that continue to sell. “We’re just beginning to see price increases take hold on the carpet side, with most adjustments landing in the 5% range,” said Bruce Odette, president of Denver-based Carpet Exchange, with 17 locations. “So far, we’ve been able to use those pending increases as an opportunity to help customers move forward on quotes before higher pricing takes effect, which has softened the immediate impact. Because of that, it’s still too early to fully understand the long-term impact these increases may have on overall demand and buying behavior. At the same time, the broader issue continues to be rising energy costs. Surging gas prices are affecting nearly every part of the supply chain, from manufacturing to transportation, and that pressure continues to influence costs across all flooring categories.”

While many retailers report slower-than-normal activity, they say sales per square foot and margins continue to rise due to the continued cost of materials. “The consumer is asking for higher-quality goods in a smaller quantity for carpet meaning installation is highly skilled resulting in more pay for the labor as well as the better goods,” said Carlton Billingsley, owner of Floors and More, Benton, Ark. “For now, we will continue to see carpet volume decrease and sales per square foot increase.”

Tom Connell, owner of M&M Carpet Showroom in Houston, said it’s difficult to know the effect of increased prices to his business because his business has been up during this period of inflation. “We have seen periods where we receive multiple price increase notices in the same day or week from suppliers. From that standpoint, it has been much more challenging to keep up with and implement all the changes. It has also forced us to tighten the window that a proposal can be honored.”

While retail owners deal with the headache of fluctuating prices, most flooring consumers have managed to deal with it, according to Tom Heffner, owner of About All Floors, Douglassville, Pa. “I feel like the talk of tariffs has become noise for consumers and they’ve adjusted and accepted them,” he said. “Our retail, builder and commercial business this year has been strong. I suspect that gains in the S&P 500—and the continued rise of home values—have given homeowners/investors’ confidence to push forward with projects. We’re optimistic for the second half of 2026

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Next-level digital innovations raise the bar on visual designs

Hymmen’s Jupiter JPT-C print-to-board lines deliver intelligent and highly precise register accuracy.

Design technology is transforming flooring through advanced digital printing and other innovations. Direct digital printing and 3D technology allow manufacturers to create ultra-realistic visuals and textures that mimic natural wood or stone.

A leader in the digital printing space is Germany-based Hymmen, whose Jupiter JPT-C print-to-board lines deliver intelligent and highly precise register accuracy. This ensures the highest levels of color stability and print quality output while maintaining printing speeds of 25-50 meters per minute.

To expand its presence Hymmen entered into a technology partnership with i4F that includes exclusive licensing rights for all Hymmen digital-printing patents and technologies for flooring productions.

The new patents cover advanced functionalities that enhance the quality of digitally printed flooring products.

Another company that has relied on Hymmen’s digital printing technology is Classen—first for laminate production at its Baruth facility in Germany and later at Kaisersesch for the company’s proprietary Ceramin material, a PVC-free floor covering made from polypropylene.

At Classen’s dedicated design center in Kaisersesch, wall- and floorcovering designs are developed entirely digitally and seamlessly integrated into production. Wood, stone and fantasy motifs are processed in such a way that individual structures can be flexibly adapted, mirrored or rotated. This enables multiple variations to be generated from a single base pattern, efficiently and with optimal resource conservation.

Forbo Flooring Systems leverages advanced high-definition digital printing technology to offer custom, photorealistic and bespoke flooring solutions. This process allows for complex color gradients, large pattern repeats without repetition and highly intricate visuals on commercial vinyl and textile floors without compromising durability. Its new Flotex production facility in Pennsylvania uses digital printing to produce high-performance carpet (see Forbo story on page 1).

When it comes to surface innovation, there’s Daltile’s StepWise technology. Enhancing safety in wet areas is at the crux of StepWise. Because of its waterproof performance, bacteria resistance, low maintenance and versatile design options, tile is the best flooring product for wet areas. Daltile takes this capability in wet areas to an even higher level by featuring its proprietary StepWise technology in many of its best-selling products. StepWise is said to provide 50% more slip resistance than regular tile—making these Daltile products the ideal flooring choice for safety in bathrooms, kitchens and even outdoor areas.

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Portobello America introduces Cristallo collection

Baxter, Tenn.—Portobello America introduced Cristallo, a new porcelain collection inspired by luminous quartzite and the movement of light.

The collection translates fractured veining and crystalline depth into porcelain surfaces designed for contemporary interiors. Portobello America said Cristallo brings radiance, dimension and refined clarity to the built environment.

Cristallo explores how light moves across material. Layered graphics, expressive reliefs and carefully tuned finishes create surfaces that appear to hold light within the stone itself. The result offers a softer interpretation of quartzite.

Collection features multiple finishes and colors

Portobello America offers Cristallo in three finishes: Matte, Polished and Soft. Matte provides a calm, architectural look. Polished offers maximum clarity and luminosity. Soft delivers a satin, silky-touch finish with controlled sheen.

The collection also introduces Concavo, a sculpted relief made in the U.S. Portobello America said the relief transforms shadow into a design element and adds rhythm and dimension to walls.

Cristallo is available as a global collection in Bianco, Oro and Rose. Bianco offers luminous continuity. Oro brings warmer depth and golden movement. Rose is available as a special order in 48 x 48 inches.

The collection includes integrated mosaics, multiple relief expressions and a complete surface system approach. Portobello America said the line gives designers flexibility to create spaces defined by light, depth and architectural sophistication.

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J+J Flooring launches Color Wash collection

Dalton—J+J Flooring introduced Color Wash, a new carpet tile collection inspired by watercolor painting and artistic texture.

The company said the collection combines fluid beauty with nature-inspired movement to create interiors that feel calm and expressive.

“We wanted to interpret the subtle wash of color and movement within watercolor paintings with this collection; that very textural look that is hard to achieve with traditional tufted yarns,” said Laura Holzer, design director of commercial division. “Our technology and construction innovation has allowed us to do more patterning to achieve the desired effect.”

Collection features layered color and texture

Brushlight serves as the collection’s bolder expression. J+J Flooring said the style features large-scale, highly textured design with rich depth and color. The company added that the style creates a refined counterpart across a broader range of settings.

Color Wash launches with 13 colorways inspired by natural elements. The palette includes calming blues, warm rust tones, grays and greens. J+J Flooring said the collection also includes neutral shades inspired by mist, fog and rain.

J+J Flooring offers the collection in 18 x 36 tiles that coordinate across its flooring platform. This new collection also includes optional modular carpet backing options that provide PVC-free alternatives and support sustainability goals.

J+J Flooring engineered the collection for workplace, hospitality, education and healthcare environments. The company manufactures Color Wash products domestically.

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Sika unveils ‘Bring It On’ campaign

Lyndhurst, N.J.—Sika launched its new “Bring It On” marketing campaign designed to show contractors, installers and flooring professionals that the company offers a complete range of flooring installation solutions.

The campaign focuses on helping flooring professionals achieve reliable, high-quality installations across a range of project types. Sika said the portfolio includes primers, patch and repair products, self-leveling solutions, moisture mitigation systems, flooring adhesives and tile-setting materials.

The “Bring It On” campaign made its official debut earlier this year during TISE in Las Vegas. Sika said the launch generated strong engagement and positive feedback from the industry.

At the center of the campaign is the Sika Secure System, a complete lineup of flooring installation products designed to address contractors’ day-to-day challenges. Sika said the system combines technologies from the Schonox, SikaBond, SikaLevel and SikaTile product lines.

“Sika is a global leader in the flooring industry, recognized for delivering innovative, solution-driven products that empower professional contractors,” said Marlene Morin, senior director of floor covering and interior finishing at Sika Corporation. “With our state-of-the-art formulations and the opening of our new 250,000-square-foot mortar production facility in southern New Jersey, we are uniquely positioned to offer customers one of the most comprehensive installation supply portfolios in the industry.”

Morin said Sika’s nationwide sales force combines technical expertise with responsive customer service to support contractors and installers across the country. She also noted the company’s network of manufacturing and warehousing facilities helps Sika deliver installation materials efficiently.

Sika said the Secure System provides a multi-tier product offering designed specifically for professional installers. The company added that the integrated system helps professionals address flooring installation challenges with confidence regardless of project size or complexity.

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Latest advancements transform soft surface

The flooring industry has always been driven by innovation, but recent advancements in technology have taken soft surface to new heights.

Acting on consumer feedback for better goods, mills are turning to advanced technology—including CAD software and computerized tufting machines—to enhance design precision and increase production efficiency. Automation enables intricate patterns and high-speed manufacturing, while AI and nanotechnology create durable, water-resistant flooring that meets modern demands for quality and eco-friendly practices.

A closer look at who’s doing what:

Engineered Floors is at the forefront of technology centered around PureColor. “Because we manufacture everything under one roof, we have been able to innovate our soft surface technology straight from the extrusion process,” said Eric Ruppert, vice president of soft surface product development and marketing. “PureColor is the catalyst for our performance and sustainability story.”

EF’s extrusion process uses 87% less water, 32% less energy and emits 42% fewer greenhouse gases than traditional carpet manufacturing—a great selling point for eco-conscious buyers.

The mill’s twistX technology takes the inherent stain-proof benefits of PureColor and engineers it for maximum durability and organic aesthetics. “We use a unique twist multiplier that results in a 3-ply construction with 50% higher bundle sizes,” Ruppert said. “This means there is significantly more yarn and higher density per square foot compared to conventional synthetic carpets.”

In the twisting process two cones of single-ply fiber are wisted together to create a two-ply fiber (2 is better than 1) thus increasing the strength and durability of the fiber.

Shaw’s proprietary Anso High Performance fibers combine solution-dyed technology, advanced yarn engineering and built-in stain and soil protection to deliver durability, cleanability and lasting beauty.

Another Shaw technology, R2X, bonds to the carpet fiber during manufacturing so the protection is intended to hold up over time, even with routine maintenance and professional cleanings. LifeGuard Spill-Proof Technology remains a key differentiator as a residential carpet with a built-in moisture barrier, helping protect against spills and pet accidents while also minimizing concerns around lingering odors and long-term subfloor damage.

A few mills use ColorGuard technology, which provides carpets with built-in color and fade resistance that withstand stains as well as long-term exposure to the sun.

Mohawk’s SmartStrand portfolio with Pur-Ease technology recently earned the Asthma & Allergy Friendly Certification as the first treated carpet product to meet the program’s requirements under its enhanced textile flooring standard. Pur-Ease technology uses natural probiotics to reduce certain common household allergens such as pet dander, pollen and dust mite allergen.

“Innovation at Mohawk has always been about more than just creating beautiful, durable products,” said Joe Semaan, president of residential carpet of Mohawk. “It is about improving the way people live.”

Two other technologies that figure prominently in Mohawk soft surface products are ColorMax, which uses a tri-color yarn twist and advanced dyeing to create rich color saturation, superior color fastness and high-style design; and EasyClean, a specialized technology providing enhanced soil and stain resistance for easier, faster cleanup.

The Dixie Group uses beck dyeing, a carpet dyeing method in which large rolls of uncolored carpet are immersed in a heated dye solution for several hours, for some of its luxury brands. Ideal for solid colors and smaller production runs, this process produces even color penetration throughout. “The beck dye process is the best dyeing process for color penetration and consistency,” said T.M. Nuckols, president of the residential division of The Dixie Group.

Stanton Design says choosing the right flooring is a meaningful investment, and to that end says customers should feel certain in their decision. The Advanced Visualizer brings that confidence to life by allowing users to see products within their own space or designed environments. Bridging imagination and reality help eliminate uncertainty and empowers customers to move forward knowing exactly how their space will come together, according to Stanton.

Kaleen uses AI and data tools in areas such as research, marketing and analysis to better understand trends, organize information and support stronger communication with customers. It is also developing a more interactive custom rug design tool to help dealers, designers and retailers guide customers through the process of selecting a collection, color, shape, size and finish. The goal is to make custom rugs feel more approachable, accurate and efficient from the start.

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