Carpet One Floor & Home recently announced the appointment of three new members to its advisory council. Cathy Buchanan, Independent Carpet One Floor & Home in Westland, Michigan (Central Region); Dave Wonka, Creative Floors Carpet One in Vero Beach, Florida (Southeast Region) and Jeff Wyatt, Paradise Carpet One Floor & Home in Lawrence, Kansas (Mid-West Region); were selected to join the group, which serves to represent the perspective of Carpet One Floor & Home’s retail members to the leadership team.
The advisory council meets periodically throughout the year to advise senior management and help shape the direction of programs developed by the flooring retailer cooperative. Members are selected for their dedication to the cooperative and proven track record of business success.
"The Advisory Council plays an important role in the success of our co-op because they give our leadership team direct feedback and opinions from members about new initiatives, products and directives,” said John Gilbert, president of Carpet One Floor & Home. “While we’re very excited about our newly minted members, we have so much gratitude for our outgoing Advisory Council members Dean Kelly, Kelley McDonald and Laura Rosborough, who all served during the challenging time of quarantine and who met far more frequently during the pandemic than those of previous councils, in order for us to keep up with timely advice and feedback for members. Thank you for your great service, and for paving a great path to success for our new Advisory Council members.”
The new advisory council members are:
Cathy Buchanan, Independent Carpet One Floor & Home
(Central Region: Indiana, Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, West Virginia)
Cathy Buchanan was born into the flooring industry. In fact, she remembers how an early mentor to her dad, when he was with Trend Industries, was Sandy Mishkin, who later became the first president of Carpet One. In 1997, Independent joined Carpet One; Buchanan – who is in her third term with the advisory council – is proud to be the second female and one of the youngest individuals to serve on it.
Dave Wonka, Creative Floors Carpet One Floor & Home
(Southeast Region South Carolina, Florida, Mississippi)
“From ashes, we grew into Carpet One and never looked back,” is how Dave Wonka of Creative Floors describes how his company joined the Carpet One Floor & Home family. In 1995, a fire destroyed their store in Vero Beach, Florida, and everything in it. Soon after this disaster, the opportunity presented itself to reopen as Carpet One and Dave and his wife Teresa agreed that Carpet One aligned with their customer-centered approach, overall strategies and basic values found at the core of Creative Floors. Wonka is grateful that the legacy of Creative Floors continues to flourish after 47 years and that today, two of his four children have joined the business as the third generation.
Jeff Wyatt, Paradise Carpet One Floor & Home
(Mid-West Region Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico)
Eighteen years ago, when Jeff started Paradise Carpet One Floor & Home, he and his partner agreed that if they ever did join a group, it would have to be Carpet One, due to its professionalism and focus on profitability. Three years later they made the move to join Carpet One. Wyatt values the open atmosphere of the coop and the networking and camaraderie between the members. He regularly makes the semi-annual trek to Texas to join with the other members of his RNG, The Flooring Bandits and always receives an excellent ROI in terms of the friendship and ideas gained with each trip. Wyatt likes to share with others Paradise’s profitable practice of using in-house installers and why floor prep has become a viable profit center for their company.
