Great Floors Starts Work on Store in Spokane

Spokane, WA, Sept. 2--Great Floors LLC, a Coeur d’Alene-based flooring chain with 15 retail stores and three distribution centers, has started work on a 48,000-square-foot retail outlet just west of the Spokane Valley Mall, which will be its third Spokane-area store. "This is the biggest retail outlet we’ve ever built," Doug Chadderdon, Great Floors’ CEO, who adds that Great Floors plans to use an identical design to build another 48,000-square-foot store at the intersection of Southeast Martin Way and Horne Avenue, in Lacey, Wash., that it also expects to get under way this month. In addition to its 15 stores, Great Floors operates a 65,000-square-foot distribution/commercial center on East Alki Avenue, near the Spokane County Fair & Expo Center, and another large distribution/commercial center in Tukwila, and Kent, Wash., says Steve Wheeler, Great Floors’ spokesman. Chadderdon asserts that Great Floors is the fourth biggest specialty floor covering business in the U.S., and says its sales will exceed $100 million this year. By expanding into contiguous markets throughout Washington, Idaho, and possibly moving into Oregon, Great Floors expects to reach revenue of $250 million within the next five years, says Chadderdon. It will do so by building new stores and possibly making some acquisitions of other stores, he says. Ten of Great Floors’ stores are located in the Puget Sound area, and all but two, in Boise and Coeur d’Alene, are located in Washington. Its other Spokane store is located at 231 E. Francis, in North Spokane. It also has a store in Yakima. The company acquired existing stores when it formed in 2000, the oldest being Carpet Center Inc., of Coeur d’Alene, which began operations in 1971 and was owned by Chadderdon’s parents. The biggest acquisition was 10 Carpet Exchange stores in the Puget Sound area. Chadderdon says neither the Carpet Center nor Carpet Exchange name was retained because carpets had become only one of the new company’s many flooring lines, which now include tile, hardwoods, linoleum, slate, and bamboo.