The Carpet and Rug Institute (CRI) has released its first ebook designed to help retailers better serve their customers. CRI is the trade association representing U.S. carpet manufacturers.
The Carpet Chronicles: Highlights from the CRI Blog for Retailers and Their Customersis a three-section interactive electronic book that should prove to be a "handy" tool for the thousands of carpet retailers across the U.S. and beyond.
"This ebook is aimed at a particular audience - retailers - providing them with an easy training resource for their sales force as well as a handy fact book to use with customers who visit their showrooms," explains Werner Braun, CRI President."Retailers need to be able to give customers 'on-the-spot' answers, without having to wade through a lot of extraneous information. This ebook provides a wealth of talking points to help retailers pull up those answers seemingly 'out of hand.'"
Based on material taken from the most popular articles on the CRI Blog (www.criblog.org), the ebook is interactive, with frequent hyperlinks to take readers to relevant pages from all over the web.
The ebook is divided into three sections: The Benefits of Carpet, Indoor Air Quality, and Shopping for Carpet.The Benefits of Carpet section addresses the reasons why carpet is America's number one flooring choice, stressing the comfort, safety, warmth, sound reduction, relative value, and easy care that carpeted floors provide.
The Indoor Air Quality section focuses on asthma and allergy issues, as well as the strengths and benefits of CRI's Green Label Plus indoor quality standard The Shopping for Carpet section offers tips on choosing a carpet style, selecting the right pad or cushion, installing carpets in basements, and preparing for new carpet installation.
"These three sections cover topics that are particularly pertinent for retailers in the marketplace today," according to Bethany Richmond, CRI communications director, "because they provide answers to some of the most frequently asked questions (FAQs) posed by consumers when they are making decisions about which type of floor covering to choose.
"For example, many of the questions posed to me by consumers have to do with concerns about indoor air quality and allergens," says Richmond. "The section of the ebook on indoor air quality points to current research which debunks the myth that carpet causes or exacerbates asthma and allergy symptoms."
The Carpet Chronicles piggybacks on many of CRI's other communications materials in print and on the web by providing great advice on cleaning and maintaining carpet, including how to find carpet cleaning products and equipment certified by CRI's Seal of Approval testing and certification program.
"In all of our communications, we stress the importance of finding and using products and equipment that are of the highest quality," Brtaun notes, "and we try to educate the consumer on the advantages of buying equipment and products that have earned CRI's Seal of Approval certification."
CRI officials decided to create this ebook as a means of giving retailers access to a useful and attractive tool that provides them with the information they need "right at their fingertips."
Braun praises the ebook design, which features images of people interacting with carpet in their homes, schools, and businesses, as being "new, fresh, and colorful."
The Carpet Chronicles: Highlights from the CRI Blog for Retailers and Their Customersis free, and can be downloaded here
