Great Floors buys stone company

Great Floors is expanding into the granite business with the purchase of a stone fabrication company.

Great Floors bought Harrison Granite & Tile in Coeur d’Alene and plans to open a larger production facility somewhere along the Interstate 90 corridor between Spokane and Coeur d’Alene. The acquisition will allow Great Floors to meet growing customer demand for stone surfaces, said Doug Chadderdon, Great Floors’ president and chief executive officer.

“I thought this might be a trendy thing, but we’ve seen a significant and permanent shift in residential architecture,” he said. “It now includes any number of stone surfaces that consumers want in their home. We’re seeing … entire kitchens and bath areas where all the horizontal surfaces are stone.”

Demand for stone follows an interest in natural home accents, Chadderdon said. Last year, exotic wood flooring, such as Brazilian cherry and bamboo from Taiwan, was the fastest growing part of Great Floors’ sales.

“Blending these products is really wonderful,” he said. “It has a classy, timeless look, and it adds a lot of value to a home.”

New construction represents about 30 percent of Great Floors’ overall sales.

Great Floors, with headquarters in Coeur d’Alene, had sales of $110 million last year. According to Floor Covering Weekly, an industry publication, the firm ranks third in sales among specialty floor retailers in the United States.

Great Floors employs 420 people and has 15 retail outlets in Washington and Idaho. The company was founded in the 1960s and operated in the past as Carpet Center.

The stone fabrication plant will serve markets in Spokane and North Idaho. Because the cost of shipping stone is high, Great Floors will eventually open other production facilities in the Puget Sound and Boise areas, Chadderdon said.

Eric Harrison, founder of Harrison Granite, will become part of the Great Floors management team, focusing on expanding the firm’s granite business.