When Mohawk introduced its License to Spill campaign to retailers, Christie Contraguerro with Carpet Showcase Flooring Center in Wheeling, West Virginia, knew immediately that her store would become involved.  “Mohawk’s SmartStrand carpet is truly second to none, and we verbalize that to our customers on a daily basis,” explained Contraguerro. “We knew we wanted to hold a License to Spill event because it would allow us to put our money where our mouth is and demonstrate firsthand how amazing this carpet truly is.” 

Mohawk’s License to Spill campaign has been making stops in major festivals across the country. In each city, consumers are able to get in on the action by spilling things like red wine, Kool-Aid and soy sauce on SmartStrand carpet and watching it come clean with just water. Mohawk is encouraging retailers to participate in the campaign by hosting their own License to Spill events. Carpet Showcase Flooring Center set up shop at their local chili cook-off festival, and their success was astounding.  

“Every person who stopped at our booth was shocked to see red wine removed from carpet with just water,” said Contraguerro. “One customer even said she got chills from watching the stain removal.” Of particular importance, Carpet Showcase Flooring Center received more than just positive reactions from hosting the event; they received solid leads. “We scheduled 10 measurements for installation of carpet within a three-hour window. In addition, we had an unbelievable amount of people commit to buying SmartStrand from our store as soon as it was time for carpet replacement. We honestly couldn’t have anticipated a better response.” 

Carpet Showcase Flooring Center’s License to Spill booth experienced heavy traffic throughout the life of the event, and its success can be tracked back to their aggressive marketing and public relations efforts. In addition to marketing the event on social media, the retailer received newspaper coverage and even secured a segment promoting their event on the local TV news station. The news crew followed up on the story by attending the festival and filming on-site, drawing further attention to the retailers’ booth.

 “We were overwhelmed with the results from our efforts. We had several people say they came to the festival just to see our carpet,” said Contraguerro.  “Best of all, the process was so easy because we used the resources Mohawk provided.” In addition to the License to Spill kit, Mohawk provides each retailer with social media tools and a customizable press release.  “All we had to do was fill in the blanks with our information and send it to our local media.” 

Contact your local Mohawk representative for more information or follow the tour on MohawkFlooring.com/LicenseToSpill.