The Huddle - Episode 71 - Sustainability, Recycling, & Going Green
This week the guys are joined by special guest Rachel Papopoli from Tarkett to talk about recycling, sustainability, and things we can all do in our business to go more green.
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The HUDDLE is where the flooring industry can get together and talk about everything! Lead by Paul Stuart from Go Carerra who is joined by Daniel and Jose Gonzalez from Preferred Flooring.
what's up floring family welcome to the Huddle come at you every Tuesday 3M
Central to discuss maintaining Ford progress in your flooring career with me
today as always I say as always but most days is Jose and Daniel Gonzalez from
preferred flooring out of Grand Rapids Michigan also today we have a special
guest Rachel and I'm not going to butcher her last name so
uh if one of you guys have a a proper pronunciation please uh go ahead but
we're going to be talking about sustainability and going green um both
from the install side and what that means for us but also manufacturers and
and and what it really uh enta tells um so without further Ado gentlemen how's
how's the week treating um we don't know yet it's
Tuesday well it's been a week since we talk so how did that week treat you
pretty well pretty well we were able to to catch up a little bit I guess and then find out the
things to fall behind on there you go as pretty usual so so pretty normal awesome well Rachel's traveling
today as well so uh if um if we have any
you know connection issues that that's uh might be expected a little bit but uh Rachel if you're there can you tell us a
little bit about yourself and what you uh do with taret absolutely so my name is Rachel
poipoi I am the director of circular economy for taret um I have been in the
flooring industry for about 20 years now so
um primarily my responsibility at taret is to focus just on end of life and
helping you guys actually collect the old flooring and how to properly do that
and how to get it to the collector sorder or to the recycler or back to taret or whatever it is and however we
can upcycle or donate or whatever we're going to do with that product at its end of life but especially to avoid landfill
and your waste to energy so thank you very much for allowing me to join you guys today feel free I can't promise you
I'm going to have the answers but I'll try and do my best more answers than us yeah that
that's that's uh a lot of the questions that we uh I think that we have is is
encompassed around the the collection and and where did
where does somebody send uh you know end of life flooring so flooring um and is that carpet is it all
products what what all kinds of of products can be recycled um and sent
back to either a collector uh or a uh or a
manufacturer so I mean obviously I would love to tell you that every project that you guys are going to do there's a taret
floor going in right that would be I mean that would make my life fantastic um and our company very happy but
obviously we know that that's not the case um so a lot of the times we have a situation let's say where there's going
in but let's say it's a competitor coming out right it could be a sh an interface product a milikin product so
can we help you with that we can so each different product type ultimately can go
back to somebody else um too so let's take a PVC back to carpet tile for an
example right so that you see a lot of us manufacturers make that product and
so right now there is a process um where you can separ create the fiber from the
backing on a PVC back carpet tile and you're looking to harvest the backing
ultimately that's the endgame there and it's because the fiber still contains
some PVC contamination when you're separating it um you can let's take Shaw
for an example Shaw will take their products back so you guys don't necessarily need me and on something
like that you guys can contact Shaw directly they've got certain requirements to participate in the
program um but if it's a Shaw eworks carpati it'll come back um carpati
obviously is is is fantastic it's the easiest product
that we think that we can collect commercial broom is incredibly difficult
um I feel for you I I I can't stand the product myself but it is sold and it's
still laid you know every single day and and I and I of course only look at it right from a recycling point of view
well you just jumped up about four points in our eyes as well so thank you for saying that about Brom we appreciate
you well good I I mean carpati just makes so much more sense but again
there's a place for commercial broadloom you know I'm not going to completely bash it um residential carpet is
obviously a totally different ball game so I mean let's we we should stick mostly to the commercial side right I
would think okay yeah we could talk about both because I think it's important that people
understand that there are some differences there and maybe how they can participate if they are a retailer in
our audience or if it's a residential um shop so uh yeah if you
wouldn't mind just what is the major difference from because I know you're
going to get into the the broadloom with commercial but what's outside of their's adhesive on the back in of commercial
broadloom that is probably not apparent on the residential products uh what else
is the the big differences so on commercial broadloom
it's a very low fiber right so typically on the commercial bom the fiber is really just tucked it into the backing
and so you're not harvesting a tremendous amount of fiber so it's interesting so when you look at carpati
what are you looking to what are you looking to harvest most of the time carpet tile it's the backing but in
commercial broadland you wouldn't look to harvest the backing you want the Fiber Well there's a very low fiber
right whereas in residential carpet well we all know how high that fiber is so when you look at recycling it or
deconstructing it you get a tremendous amount of fiber off of a piece of residential carpet so so those are the
main differences you know from commercial you know and of course you're right the adhesive you know on
commercial is just a nightmare for anybody looking to to deconstruct that carpet it's just horrible
yeah yeah and there's although we don't like um we're not all the uh biggest
fans of commercial broadloom you can't get away from it in the residential world uh
and you know there's still a lot of commercial broadloom that was installed pre carpti that's still going you know
hitting its into life so we still tear up a fair amount I'd say uh the flooring
company I that that I work at that I own is
um certainly well heavier or much heavier on the
carpet tile installation by far than broadloom So eventually I'm I'm saying
we'll probably work ourselves out of the broadloom scenario um but anyway building on that
so the backing is the most important part do do do we need to know or
understand the different backings for them to be accepted by a manufacturer or is it just if it's a tarat product
coming out uh tarat carpti for example will you guys take back any uh
or does it have to be a certain type of backing you mentioned PVC but there's also already recycled backings on the
market so um does the actual backing system matter to its capability and
ability to be recycled yes it absolutely does so if we
look at another competitor so let's take a milikin product um most of the time my
only recycling that I can potentially do on that is going to be donation or reuse
right so so it's interesting if you can't harvest the back through a recycling process that's when I would
ask you guys to look at the front of it the face Viber and say okay how old is
it does it have another life like would you guys potentially put this in your garage or would you maybe donate it to
you know um a poor Community or maybe Habitat for Humanity or restore and so
there's a lot of different aspects to when you're you guys are facing a a a
project um taret has some unique printing that's typically done on the
backing that as you get experienced in dealing with taret products you'll understand some of those numbers that we
print on the backing that you can kind of know it's taret Shaw bless their
heart I mean they do a great job I mean it's literally it's ecoworks and it says for recycling dial800 shw so it doesn't
get any easier than that um interface typically uses the word glassback and it's g a ba AC on the back of theirs
sometimes you guys don't know but you can always um email me and say hey
here's the front and here's the back of it any idea who this might be right we
can't figure out who the manufact is and so you can you can always sort of rely
on some of us in the industry to kind of help you most of us are crazy enough that we've got a passion for this that
we don't want to see it go to the landfill so like I said ultimately we would love it it's a taret job but if
it's not it doesn't mean that I'm not going to help you and it's because there's grandchildren at some
particular point in my future and I need to protect the Earth for them so we want
to make sure that we're keeping it out of the landfill and if we don't have to incinerate it that would be even
better yeah so there's uh the the social responsibility and
and aspect of like if it can be recycled let's recycle it and you don't have to
be um you know a a full on you don't have to fully
you know uh think the overall um trying to tread lightly here but as if it's you
know global warming and getting into the the whole uh aspect of the environment
to know and at the very basic level if it can be recycled it probably should I
mean I guess that's kind of like the the Baseline of of being environmentally
conscious is throwing your bottles in a a place where they may end up in your
carpet later uh because a lot of carpet fibers are made out of you know recycled
pot bottles uh there's plenty of commercial products that the whole the whole uh wear layer is is uh recycled
pot bottles so the the key it sounds like to me is understanding the
different process or products that can be recycled and then reaching out to uh
to you or is there a recycle does does taret or any of the manufacturers have
like recycled hotlines that you call or is it just um uh the the your local rep
will get you in in you know in uh in contact with somebody that can help you
I I'm talking in other markets obviously sure so your local sales reps I I mean
you know any of your local reps definitely hold their hand to the fire right so you know at taret if you had a
question and let's just say you forget my name and and you've got a taret project they they are well aware of our
restart takeback program um and some of our competitors are too but with enough
of you out there yelling and screaming about recycling then you're going to
trigger a lot of those conversations that may not be taking place and listen demand answers and ask questions because
there is still some green washing out that's going on but you know you mentioned before at the very beginning
of the call I would be remiss if we didn't talk about what are we putting in right so this is also where you guys can
flex your muscles a bit and encourage your you know your facility managers your customers your M users if you have
that influence to make sure that they're buying from a manufacturer that has a recycling or a takeback program because
at the end I'm hoping that you guys are in business for the next 50 years right so maybe this same customer is going to
be flipping that floor two three times well you would sure like to be able to say 10 years from now I'm gonna go back
in and I know it's taret all I have to do is just get a hold of them and they're going to take it back makes your
life a lot easier 10 years from now um you know I can remember doing a project
in a hotel in Phoenix where I was able to recycle the carpet but they were
putting down lvt now this goes down this is a couple of years ago when there was no recycling solution for lvt and I
basically looked at them all and I was like well just here's the deal don't call me 10 years from now because I don't know what I'm GNA do with that LBT
that you're putting in you know because there wasn't a recycling solution for it so you know I think listen anything that
goes into the landfill today 500 years from now it's so be there it's not going to break down it's not going to
decompose and I think that's part of the problem so I think we all need to do our part to see what we can we can do to
better future Generations now when you guys when we Rec when we recycle are you
guys putting them back into the products or are different products coming out of it because uh we have Paul fiser um he's
actually from the UK watching on YouTube and he said that he's noticed that when
um some of the products come back you know with recycled contents in them uh
the science behind it changes right and it's he he calls it that it's trash now
but I think what he means is just it's not what he's used to right so are these products going back into the new floors
or are you guys making other things out of them as well so let's talk a little bit about um residential carpet first
right where you really can Harvest everything so if you take a nylon s piece of residential carpet the carpet
fiber can go back into carpet fiber the polypropylene actually gets put back
into different polypropylene products so you actually turn it back into a pallet and then the
filler which is the calcium carbonate actually can go into um concrete into
the aggregate Arena so you can call it upcycling it you can call it down
cycling it it's it catch 22 on how you want to word it um what have we done this year you guys I think you been on a
call with me where we talked about lvt recycling flexible lvt right now
internally we don't have a process to take it back and turn it back into LBT
so instead we're upcycling it and we're making Automotive mats your all- weather
Automotive mats out of it so it is giving the product another life um and I think that is you know
ultimately the end game um your polyester is tricky you know the the the
carpet that's made out of water bottles gets incredibly incredibly tricky it is recycled in California but in the rest
of the 49 states it does wind up in the landfill wow I have a question and it
might be a little off track but um at what point uh for all of the recycling will the chemical composition of the
Recycled products that this is being turned into um be considered useless or
rendered useless um when when you say they're making floor mats is because they can no longer
break it down efficiently enough to use it uh for for other items is that just
trying to figure out like at what point does the recycling of the product stop and you hit the brick wall
so again I'm not a chemist nor am I an engineer so I you
know I I know enough to make myself dangerous um I would say to you that PBC
can be recycled up to eight times before it'll actually start to I believe lose
its Integrity call it maybe um nylon you
know if you guys haven't ever seen what aquafill um is doing here in in the
United States as well as what they do over in Slovenia is they'll take the nylon 6 and it's infinite so that fiber
can be turned back into fiber and turned back into fiber and back and back it's infinite so it'll just continue going on
um one of my biggest Hang-Ups when it came to polyester and listen guys taret has a residential line and it's
polyester okay so I mean you got to call a spade a spade you know I'm not trying to bash it it's just that polyester it
you know those old water bottles in my opinion and that's mine only should stay water bottles because again outside of
California that polyester carpet is going to the landfill so what was the point in that
we we made another product and now it's just going to wind up in the landfill and in some of those cases a lot of
that's multif family right so we all know that multif family what are we looking at three years four years Max
short life cycles for sure 100% sorry guys I'm just sharing
information here well I don't know if we lost Rachel
um but I would say that um was it Paul Daniel from uh UK
yep I my guess is he's talking specifically about recycled backings on
carpet tile because they can be uh more sensitive to Old adhesives and and
things I mean one of our rules is do not install over old glue just because old
carpti was there doesn't mean you can pick up a piece of that carpti and put a new piece down uh specifically if that old glue
was over uh existing broadloom back in the day you could do that uh obviously
milikin still says you can do that but most manufacturers say you don't go over
you know broad Loom adhesive with pressure sensitive there's a lot of issues from plasticizer migration and
all that stuff that can happen but so the caution there is don't take
up an old piece of carpet put down a new one but when that happens the Recycled
backings are are um we have some I have some personal experience with
this they they're not as forgiving little particular yeah you need to make
sure you're following the rules to the T removing all the old adhesive um primer or encapsulate the uh
residue that's remaining and then apply your new adhesive and apply your carpati
uh you got to be real careful when you're dealing with recycled backings and I think that's probably one of the
things that I've seen installers say you know this stuff is junk it's not it's
just way more particular it's got to be done exactly the way you don't have as
you know you have those products you can kind of figure out a way to move to get around some of the industry
recommendations or standards or whatever uh but recycle backing carpet tile uh
you don't want to you know try to get around anything remove that glue all the way to the concrete encapsulate it with the the
manufacturer's primer and then apply your new adhesive in your carpti so I'm
just making a big assumption there that that's what he's kind of referring to maybe it's because I personally have the
same same uh heartache from a similar uh situation
um that I'm I'm sure he's been through yeah he says safety floors but I don't know what they consider safety floors in
the UK so gotcha and then um like as far as the Recycled contents you know we
this was probably 10 years ago now where you know a manufacturer was like it's the best thing we started recycling here
comes the new product coming out and then they didn't change any of the installation specs and then things start
failing and it's almost like um a TR error when you're on the job site and
it's it could be something like that too to where the manufacturer thought that
things were going to go exactly the same way and it just doesn't and then you had
at least we do we we don't we're not we're not quiet right so we're going to go right to the manufacturer and say hey
this isn't working what what do we need to do now and that's I think that's what a lot of people need to do instead of
saying hey this is trash it's more or less hey this isn't working I want to
help you guys out with the solution because I don't want to see this failing all over the place yeah and that's a matter of documenting all the steps too
and say this isn't working where did we go wrong this is where what we've done
from step one till right now um and for the most
part I've done a fair amount of taret and and dealt with their recycle program
because we do Bank of Americas and for taret they their tarat one so I'm
familiar with palletizing all the old carpet and they take it back um I think
as an industry that process getting more streamlined could help
um you know you don't want a dealer who's committed to recycling things to
have to and this isn't always this isn't to say it's just taret or this happened
um just with taret but when we've recycled products in the past you can
have pallets sitting around for longer than you would like waiting to be picked
up and taken and I think that as an industry the better we get at this at
the um at the process of recycling the more that dealers will want to uh
participate and and um because it's
important to do this it is important that like if it can be recycled we should recycle it like don't just throw
things in the the landfill that can be recycled but in in practice and in the
real world if it's not streamlined people are so busy and and time is such
a commodity or such an important piece of our life that if if it's not
streamlined if if the if it's not easy people are not going to do it can you
guys still hear me y we can we can now you kind of uh went away from us there
for a moment okay um and you're you're absolutely right if it isn't easy I'm
gonna lose all of you so and I understand that and it isn't sometimes it's not easy and sometimes when there
isn't a full truckload it makes it incredibly difficult especially when there's some carpati coming out that I'm
really not quite sure what to do with it and then you get a Freight Quote and they tell you that you know from Ohio to
Phoenix is going to cost you $3,200 to move nine pallets and you're like okay hold on a minute like I really need to
think about this um so it it it can be challenging and you're right but the
more people we get involved and the more we can stream and build a program and
again even if it's across competitors I still think it's the right thing to
do um and I think that you guys are going to start to find that you're going to have more than just the banks
demanding that you recycle you're going to have more end users and more clients saying that they want to recycle their
products well and and some of projects that we come across um like some of the I want to say the Govern government
projects some of that is right in their specs it requires recycling um so and it
all obviously it all depends on what material we're taking up um but that's going to lead me to my next question is
are there incentives for the community for the flooring stores for installers
and clients um to look at the recycling option versus just throwing it in a a
dumpster you mean you mean outside the fact that you're say doing the right
thing outside of doing the right thing and and sending stuff to the Landfield that'll be there in 500 years correct I
mean I I'm coming from the the real world here right like some people want to have their name on something and
something for to show and some of the businesses or or larger corporations
where we go in and they have hundreds uh of hundreds and hundreds or thousands of square yards they want to not only are
they have their their environmental print is smaller but do they have something to show that they're
supporting is there a program they can sign up for and say Hey you know I own this many buildings and this is what
we've been doing in recycling um they they like adding that to the resume I'm not saying that everybody's like that
I'm saying I've been asked that question quite a bit is that's a fair that's a
fair question I mean you know like I care how do I show I care if I'm doing
it uh on my own accord and in the background some people you know want to
display their commitment to the environment so is there ways that the manufacturer can do some or are they I
guess that's a good question is manufacturers doing things that promote it uh or promote the companies
that are recycling in a positive manner is there anything like that Rachel um you know I think right now for
us I mean our biggest Accolade there is is you know is the certificate not only for the flooring contractor but right
for the end user sorry um that you've recycled um you know and I hesitate
because the last time we were on a a webinar we had a a contractor in
Missouri right that was doing everything without any state eppr bills or anything
along those lines because this was one of the core beliefs that the flooring contractor went on and it's gotten him
further business because everybody knows that he's going to recycle the product
so the facility managers will call him because they don't have to worry about it going to the landfill you do have epr
you know um you've got it passed in California you've got it passed in New York listen guys I think I may have you
know said this before but on a pallet of carpet tile that gets donated in California there's 35 cents a pound for
that do the math you you st and palti that carpet tile and donate it for to
restore or habitat or whomever give it away for free you have the opportunity
to potentially make some extra money um let alone you can get rid of it for free
in California you're not going to get charged to bring it anywhere so I mean there is still a savings um and like you
said before it is about doing the right thing but I I hear you incentives are always nice I get it and you want to
know what for those of you who have been around a long time you used to get paid to take it yeah I know that even tur
used to pay me 10 cents a pound to collect the stuff and unfortunately
those days are sort of gone that the
I'm sorry is that from was Dupont was that the old company they used to do that
um yes so you had honey well you had dupon um taret was paying like I said
years ago when I was collecting for Candice they were paying me 10 cents a pound on
cup wow so I mean but unfortunately those days are gone
umel am I know you're getting ready to go and I just had one last question uh I
could tell from the background that you're probably uh going to have to jump off but one last question how can we
regionally impact so we're talking California New York we're in the middle of the country these guys are up in
Grand Rapids Michigan what can we do uh that is it getting local recycling would
that improve like what would your dream be uh from a recycling standpoint
because you're obviously very passionate about it what what could we do from a local perspective to lower the cost of
of you know shipping a pallet to California for example is there local is
there ways we can lean on our government from a local perspective to be able to recycle in a local manner or is that
just the technology requires it to go out there well it just again it's going to depend on the product I would say to
you that I think everybody needs a win right so I think that you guys need to
maybe consider taking on a project and seeing how easy you know it can be um
yes localized warehouse space would be amazing right so that when you do have that smaller 500 square yard job or
thousand square yards you've got a spot to put it in where we don't we can come and swing in and pick up an entire
truckload versus just coming in for a couple of petts um you know but I do
have friends all over the states so that do do some collections like I like we've
talked about before in Indianapolis there's a company that does some carpet collection um and there's somebody in
Ohio that does it um so you guys just sort of just need to reach out and just keep asking me questions and I'll help
you however I possibly can because you're right I do believe in it incredibly passionate um your local
governments may be able to provide grants you know there's a lot of them that are doing some stuff with recycling
right now that they may be able to provide you some grants where you can either maybe get some racking within
your warehouses to maybe stack you know stack carpet tile or Gaylord boxes or something along those lines so I mean
you're you're right there's probably some options there um I am GNA have to hop off thank you so much for inviting
me for this you know to this and I was happy that I was a was last minute but it worked out perf
thank thank you for joining us Rachel we appreciate your expertise in this matter because we we had a lot of questions and
and you did great answering them so we appreciate you coming on and safe travels thank you so much and feel free
to reach out anytime you guys you guys now so so expect a call from me you got
it sounds good thanks so much all right bye
Rachel so pretty awesome that was some good information that I I didn't I might not
have thought of so I I I appreciate her joining last minute I got some notes here so yeah I I think that it's it's
there's some interesting nuggets in there one being you know is are there
grants in your local area where you are you could be incentivized so it may be worth something looking into we I wrote
that down so certainly worth looking into um you know what I was saying
earlier and I think Rachel got it was you don't have to be uh you know a
climate change you know that we're so divided on some of these issues in
America this one in particular if it can be recycled it just makes sense to
recycle it so if we can find ways that are localized and easy maybe you get a
grant that would pay for a warehouse where you and some competitors can go p ize their products and then call a truck
once a month or every other month or whatever to come grab a whole you know a
whole storage unit or you know a whole Warehouse full of the stuff so there's
there's certainly I think some incentives from promoting yourself as a
recycler sounds like she's got a dealer in Missouri that's successful at
promoting yourself as look we're going to recycle everything that we can so less of your products are going to end
up in the landfill so there's probably some hay to be made there from a marketing perspective not to turn it
into just that but there's obviously like some maybe some possibilities there
where um you know a lot of big corporate entities want to know their stuff's not just going into the landfill to sit for
500 years plus you know so um I think there's some some uh opportunity there
you got to work with obviously Crews and and everybody to palletize things um for
tarat one when we do the uh Bank of America for them we just palletize it
and put it in the back lot and then they come and pick it up now it's not always
and she spoke of this when it's not a full truck truckload it can take a while for that stuff to get picked up so uh
possibly a localized collection point in each City could solve that problem and
have a a greater impact that's just my thoughts oh that's that's you're
absolutely right I just wonder why they haven't talked to any of the local uh like uh uh recycling companies do they
have any spots allocated to that if if it's lucrative and they can make money some of these places might jump onto it
um well I think the only way they'd be able to make money from what she was saying is if they
actually like resold it or something but you know she had an emphasis on donating
other than that you're paying the freight to get it to where it needs to go yeah but I mean that's why I asked
her about the product because protect all recycled product right you can create an entire business
off of one you know one company's waste going into another product that yeah
that can go somewhere else yeah there's clothing clothing lines it's that way
100% recycled products as well you know I think we we have um you know one of my
purposes for this podcast in for this topic was you
don't because I've mentioned it uh to other people and they're like dude take
that climate change crap somewhere else and I'm like you don't have to be some activist to believe in just recycling
the most basic items that we are consuming or you know using I should say
so I just wanted to get you know a a perspective that if it can be we should
probably try to find the most effective way to recycle things that we can uh she
gave some great advice uh you know engage um talk to her
I think that you know a good follow-up um podcast here in the near future would
be let's see what it's like what if we both both of our companies do a project
it's not driven by the specs we just recycle it and report back on our
experience that could be you know very telling and uh I'm I'd do
it I think we're gonna have to check into it I mean um the Project's gotta be it's Gotta Be Right It's gotta be the
right one for it um absolutely yeah well I think it's like in the bid Market it
may be hard because you know they're focusing on that low bid but if you're going in somewhere and you're that's
where the marketing comes in right hey guys like this is what it sets us apart we're going to recycle your stuff it's
not going to hit the landfill and that could be the Tipping Point on why would we go with someone that's just going to
fill the landfill when this is only you know a couple percent higher and then
they can see why that percentage is there as well like this is only this much higher it's because they're going
to be recycling so be really cool to send your end user a report once it delivered
too yeah you know showing them that you actually did recycle it you saved this
much you you prevented this much curs Inogen to enter the atmosphere you know that that's a that's actually a pretty
cool point right there like yeah I I wonder how much
um emphasis you know I've got some clients in mine I won't mention but I I I
wonder uh if we did that how how
how much it would matter to them but it also feels good to do the right thing and if you can and it doesn't cost you
an arm and a leg and that that has to I mean the economics of this thing is exact I mean that's why she she stated
that it's difficult it's the economics are difficult and uh but if it can be
economically incentivized by getting clients that care about the the the fact that you
recycle and I think most um people people I think most people are down for
recycling right I mean it's not like again you don't have
to be full-on climate change activists to to believe in recycling this is the
most basic um uh almost fundamental just
idea of keeping stuff out of the ocean and keeping your landfills with less
product in them it's something that we do at home without even thinking about it now like like my we my kids do it I
do it um I remember going to school and it became a big thing when I was in elementary but now we have trash and we
have recycle like yeah there's my wife posted on there like a list of
everything that that's accepted to go in the recycling and what's not so and it's just simple things like that
it's like is it g to make a difference absolutely even if it's just this big of a difference it's making a difference
right drop in the bucket is still a drop in the bucket but you could prevent a couple of those drops throughout your time I think that's yeah well we ought
to keep exploring how how it's uh I'm going to actually try try to find the right project to do it on as well and
just see see what the experience is outside of being in tet's umbrella which
is what it was when we're doing the Bank of America you know you tear it out and it's required that that product get
returned um so getting a hold of a carrier and going through the process
and Reporting back what that's like I think uh I think that would be good for our
audience yeah so I do want to mention a couple of things this is a off topic but
we're getting ready to uh to do our Sim scholarship again at go Carrera so just
uh from now I believe it's through I would have to get the exact date but I
believe it's through um the end of this year
um that we are doing the the Sim scholarship again so we'll start um you
know taking applications uh oh I just was read uh through December
18th so we'll be taking applications for that if you are not sim uh I mean we'll
give you we'll we'll give you all the details and the upcoming episodes as well as on our website and everything
about I was just there like I just went through the two days to sim and it is a
lot of information so um definitely see yeah look at
that we we don't just talk about it we're being about it right that's what we're we're here for it's I'm not just
going to say that it's a like he's been a SIM for like three years now right yeah almost three years so it's it's a
lot of great information a lot of great people and I mean it anything that you can
learn any little nuggets that you can take away are are really beneficial and it is very very much focused on the
commercial aspect of things so um there was a a gentleman in in there and he was
like they just threw me into an office position I have no idea what I'm doing
and the amount of attention that he was able to get oneon-one to make sure he understood everything that was going on
was it was crazy to see how much they actually cared about him understanding
everything that his job that they just threw him in entailed so I mean if you're brand new into it it's definitely
great information and we've been doing it for years and it's still great information still great information yeah
and and if you're an installer you get a glimpse it's it's a good precursor to
maybe going into your company and becoming you know one of the uh project
man managers or an installation manager it gives you insight into
what the office kind of why the office has to make different decisions I I just
think it's good even if an installer wins it make sure you go to it and and take a lot of notes um just a little bit
we'll announce the winner on January 9th it goes live the scholarship will go
live on Friday so next week we'll have everything all the links and everything so uh
so yeah we'll be able to uh give you that information next week again it goes
through December 18th and we announced the winner on January 9th so it's all
happening real fast uh it's our commitment to trying to provide at least one scholarship a year to you know our
our audience and and hopefully uh at the end of the day I know that if last
year's was really well received and uh the winner you know we've had a little
bit of contact afterwards it sounded like you know got everything that you could dream out of getting going to a
class like that and you just echoed that too Daniel so yeah I mean it's it's a great class and like you said even if an
installer gets it instead of someone that is in an office position you can actually the translation between what an
installer doesn't see what goes on in the office could really benefit the installer side too and then it just
gives you that that push that like like I didn't you know I didn't realize that all this went on so let me be more
mindful yeah of you the office staff I I went from the field to the office and uh
I I know that the way the field thinks about the office and you
know it was a big learning experience and you can shortcut that learning experience if you do become Sim because
like you said it kind of bridges that the two and let you know kind of what actually goes on how much
work it takes to bid a job win a job order a job track materials set up
deliveries do all these things make sure the job's ready all the stuff that goes into getting one project and um I think
it's it's overlooked by the installation Community frankly right um I know I did
as an installer I know both of you guys have mentioned that before and you're uh installer so I think there's something
to this like we we don't know what the office goes through if you've been in the field your entire life and you win
this thing you're going to get some really good information so I would I I wish the best to everybody and and uh
we're we're just really happy to be able to offer that again this year so yeah that's that's awesome we appreciate that
like the industry needs uh needs more people to to step up like
that because what what a lot of people don't realize is like I said that guy went from an installer to an office
position but as an in installer just looking at it like a lot of these installers and we've talked about it
before just don't have that that type of capital to just drop everything and go do a class or and pay for that class at
the same time so it's just alleviating a lot of that stress so appreciate uh everything that that you do Paul thank
you yeah we are are happy to do it and and love the Sim program love the FCA I
and and what they do over there um so to close out our topic I
think you know understanding that that that often the right thing is not the easiest way
so have a little patience if you go through this and start trying to recycle some of your products but take Rachel's
advice and talk to yourselves rep and find the you know the get get in the
them getting you to the right person uh a lot of times will uh lower your
headache uh quite a bit and I'm going to go through it outside of the taret umbrella and and see what the experience
is like and and uh yeah hopefully here in the next six months or so depending on what project we can do it on we'll be
able to report back some of the some of the experience that that you know and the headaches and as well as the it
feels good I can tell you that when when you're not s sending stuff to the dump
and you're not throwing in your dumpster and you are sending it back somewhere where it's going to get reused there is a good feeling that comes along with
that so and like uh like T she said I don't know if she mentioned it on here
or not but in uh they do take other people's LBT too as long as you know
it's not the rigid core stuff so what she call it flexible LBT is what she called it so you know just save up your
lvt and tarto take and start turning it into a Flor
awesome well we might get uh Rachel's information and share that on uh in our
description on YouTube and mentioning YouTube if you're watching this on YouTube or one of our social channels
consider giving us a like give us some comments let us know uh what you think
about Recycling and how you feel it's impacted the industry give us your feedback it's always welcomed and and we
thrive on that stuff we read all the comments and uh try to incorporate that back into the podcast in in later
episodes so consider giving us a like And subscribe this is our first time uh
actually streaming on the actual hoto podcast page too so yay yeah it's my
first time that page there you go you got you got other ways and means of of
uh consuming and I I hope everybody uh finds value in what we bring
um on a week toe topic basis we sometimes take comments sometimes it's just a topic that that comes up from a
show and then uh brainstorming so we come up with topics as best we can your
comments really do uh kind of Drive some of that so if you if you have a topic that you'd like us to bring on an expert
and uh chat through that with them in this conversational style and you get
value out of this then you know drop us a comment tell us what you want to hear about and if you're an expert drop a
comment tell us yourself and and so so everyone knows we are all about education and everything because we
preached that I just said that I was at the Sim last week or the week before and Crystal's actually over at Nora right
now at their certification so yeah um poor poor baby sister this is her first
time traveling by herself so she was like I hope I don't get [Laughter]
lost she doesn't have is Crystal directionally
challenged I think she was worried about navigating airports by herself because usually when we're when we're with her
she's just right behind us like doesn't even ask questions she's just right there this way follow you right in the
[Laughter] bathroom all right guys well thanks for joining this week it's a pleasure as
always I love these uh these uh times when we get to get together and just wrap about the industry today's topic
was I'm not an expert in and so thank you guys for reaching out to Rachel and getting her on I think that uh her
Insight on you could feel her passion for it but
then she had you know she was able to articulate good quality um answers and
and and how we can go about you know improving how much product we do
recycle I I got to say her uh passion for it was somewhat contagious so you
can feel it you can feel it right through yeah all right guys well thank you as
always we'll see you next week and uh for all those it's every every Tuesday
at 3 pm Central come join