CIRCLE OF INFLUENCE

Forging Relationships

Interface has developed a proactive approach to participation in external organizations and efforts focused on sustainability issues. We have created a model and a set of goals and metric systems to drive the implementation of sustainable practices within our own organization, and we have shared them with countless other companies and organizations.

By combining our own effort with a small measure of influence, we intend to satisfy our founder and chairman's (Ray Anderson's) objectives for becoming a restorative enterprise.

Interface Chairman and Founder, Ray Anderson completed a two-part interview by Big Picture TV in London in May 2005, while attending the "Be the Change" Conference. Click the links below to access the interviews.

Climbing Mount Sustainability – Part One (4m 55sec)
Ray Anderson describes when and how he became aware of the harm his and other industries were doing to the planet. He radically reoriented his company towards environmental sustainability with the goal of zero emissions on the journey to sustainability. He likens this journey to a mountain climbing experience and points out that there many faces – all of which are to be scaled if his goal is to be achieved.

Climbing Mount Sustainability – Part Two (4m 40sec)
Ray Anderson describes how his company's efforts to achieve sustainability have enhanced profitability. Costs are down and a new zero-emission carpet, created though biomimicry (taking design solutions from nature), is a best-seller. He sees great opportunities in a growing market niche that has proved receptive to this new kind of thinking. In attempting to become a "restorative" business - one that gives back more than it takes - Ray hopes to show competitors and other industries that sustainability can pay.

Ed Blamey, European sustainability director for InterfaceFLOR was interviewed by Sustain magazine for an article entitled, “We Take it All Back,” focused on product take-back programs and product life cycles. The article first appeared in Sustain’s sister publication, Corporate Social Responsibility CSR magazine, Issue 2. Click here to read the article from Sustain, v06 i01. For a free copy of the article, visit Sustain’s web site.

On January 11, 2005, ISdesigNET printed an August 2004 article from the Foundation for Interior Design Education Research (FIDER). Ray Anderson was featured in the article which named sustainability as an important element of undergraduate education.

Two articles recently appeared in the Australian Financial Review's BOSS magazine pertaining to The Corporation and Ray Anderson. InterfaceFLOR - Europe participated in Nordic Partnership's "Sustainable Production and Consumption -- Where is the Current Agenda and How can it be made Attractive to Business." Click here to read the story.

InterfaceFLOR - Europe also participated in a debate at the annual Respect Table meeting focused on corporate responsibility and recruitment. Click here to read the story.

Click here to read an article that Ray Anderson wrote for Engineering Enterprise, a publication of the School of Industrial and Systems Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. (Reprinted with permission).

Click below to see Interface's Sustainability Affiliations.

Certifying Organizations
Evaluating Organizations
Standard Setting Organizations
Testing Protocols
Rating Systems
Performance Tracking Systems
Reporting Organizations
Partnerships/Memberships

Ray Anderson has spoken to more than 700 audiences over the years since 1994, sharing the Interface story.

Click here to obtain a list of Ray Anderson's upcoming speaking engagements.

Sustainability through courageous innovation --
Our credibility has been formed through the eyes of others

Transferring Sustainability into People's Everyday Lives

Interface prides itself in not only sustaining the company, but also in sustaining jobs and families. Interface actively seeks ways to incorporate more family time into employee's schedules, as well as ways to transfer the company's ideas and knowledge about sustainability into people's everyday lives.

Click highlighted links to read more: Next: Renewable Energy