Instead, Banjo, when launched, shows you the people around you. It’s a social network based on who’s present at any given location.

Banjo Wants to Bring Social + Location to the Mainstream

Banjo has three main goals. One is to connect you to your social networking friends you didn’t know were nearby – for example, a friend from Facebook or Twitter, killing time at the airport, only a few gates away from you. It also wants to help you find out what’s going on nearby by providing access to status updates and tweets from everyone around you, in a radius you specify. It also provides you with a way to virtually visit other locations, even when you’re far away, to see what’s going on with the people there.

This last feature seems custom-built for journalists, we think. Imagine being able to provide the app with the name of a location where bombs have just been dropped, an earthquake has occurred, or a plane has just crashed. But will mainstream users simply want to peek in and see what people tweet about at Disneyland, though? We’re not sure.

Still, the interesting thing about Banjo is its overall consumer-friendly approach. The app is well designed, and it attacks the combination of social and local in a very different way than some of its competitors. It’s trying to go directly after the mainstream user from day one.

How it Works

The people Banjo finds don’t necessarily have to have “checked in” using a location-based networking service like Gowalla, Foursquare or Facebook Places. While that helps, Banjo is designed to also pull in locations from geotagged tweets, uploaded photos, and other media from all social networking services. Wait – all? Yes, that’s the plan. Patton says they have 22 services they’re focused on integrating now, but the company’s goal is to become a federation of all social networks, big and small, from around the world.

Although you will get more use out of Banjo if you provide it with your Facebook and Twitter info (it will then put a small icon next to the photos of your friends), it’s not necessary. Upon first launch, the app is populated with the icons of all the social networking users it finds nearby. You can view this in a photo grid layout, or as a list also showcasing their status updates. Other buttons plot the users on a map and allow you to connect your own social services.

Banjo is simple to use and straightforward in its layout, design and purpose. It’s location-based social networking that even the least technically savvy user could grasp.

The application is a free download on iTunes and on the Android Market. A Web-based version (HTML5) is coming soon, and the company will look into building both iPad and Android tablet apps next.

Are these products first quality products? My local retailer says they are not because your pricing is so low.

Yes! This is definitely one of our most common questions we receive on a daily basis. The answer is quite simple, YES. Why wouldn’t they be?

Why would stores tell us that?

For some reason this is a scare tactic that some local flooring stores LOVE to use to scare you, the consumer, away from buying online. I’m sure that is works well on some consumers but the majority just don’t fall for it. When I was looking to buy a flat screen TV last year, the BEST BUY salesperson did NOT say that if I purchased it online it would be inferior quality or second grade. I just don’t understand this tactic by local stores, it’s just so obvious. I guess when selling products some business owners throw ethics out the door to keep the lights on.

So why is FloorMall.com cheaper?

As far as our pricing goes, I hope that is obvious also. If not then ask yourself this. Why is Wal-Mart so much cheaper than their competitors? Volume. The sheer volume of flooring that we sell can be staggering for a local retailer. In some cases we sell more flooring in our first hour of business than some retailers sell all month.

Why do you not display pricing on some of your products? Some of your online competitors do!

This has to do with Minimum Advertised Pricing (MAP). Some manufacturers are starting to request and require that online dealers advertise a minimum price. Let’s not get this confused with Manufacturers Suggested Retail Pricing (MSRP). They are worlds apart. MAP pricing is required where MSRP is suggested. Online sales, whether flooring or electronics, are so massive compared to any one local market it is hard to compete with companies like Floormall.com.

How does it affect Floormall.com to decline to advertise pricing on these products?

It’s simple, we WILL NOT gouge the customer with pricing. To be honest with you, from an industry insider, MAP pricing forces a retailer, local or online to mark up products, in my opinion, in excess of market value. In my opinion it is pure price gouging. We will not partake in overpricing products, EVER. Pricing has to be fair to the consumer. So, when you are shopping on our sites and see this “To accommodate Manufacturers and Local Vendors, we are withholding MAP Pricing for certain Product Lines. Call 888-932-3566 or click here for a custom quote on this product”, you will now know that we are protecting YOU, the consumer from overpaying on your next purchase.

Will I receive a Manufacturer’s Warranty if I buy online?

YES, why wouldn’t you? We hear hundreds of consumers weekly say, “I just left Manufacturer X’s website and they say they will not warranty a product that is bought online”. The real question is, is it legal for manufacturers to limit their warranties based on whom you buy from.

When put that way, it would make some consumers mad.

And rightly so! Will you get a warranty? Yes! Here is why. In 1975 the Federal Government enacted a law called the MAGNUSON-MOSS Warranty ACT. Section 108 of the Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act addresses this question directly by indicating that:

“Generally, tie-in sales provisions are not allowed. Such a provision would require a purchaser of the warranted product to buy an item or service from a particular company to use with the warranted product in order to be eligible to receive a remedy under the warranty.”

Essentially, this means that the provision on your warranty which requires you to buy ONLY from a particular company or a type of company (i.e. online store or brick-and-mortar) as a condition to the use of the warranty is not allowed. Whether your point of purchase was from an online store or a retail establishment, the warranty can be used and applied as intended. You can find it here also: business.ftc.gov/documents/bus01-businesspersons-guide-federal-warranty-law.

Rest assured, we won’t sell you floors without reasonable warranty terms, this is part of our commitment to each and every customer.

Why is there a minimum order requirement?

This question can be a tricky one to be honest with you. It has to do with Shipping damages. Flooring, even though durable once installed can be very fragile during shipping. A great example is Ceramic and Porcelain tiles. Once laid down are virtually indestructible but on a pallet in the back of a semi-truck traveling 2500 miles can break like glass. This is usually NOT the case in orders above 200 sq ft.

Why is that?

When a customer orders 200 sq ft or more of product then the flooring must be banded and strapped to the pallet making the flooring more secure in transit. Anything under 5 boxes is usually shipped via UPS, DHL or FedEx, in single box format. What happens to these I’m sure I do not have to explain. With our volume and number of orders that are possibly under 200 sq ft, we would struggle to handle the damage claims that will definitely occur. We are always looking for new and improved ways to ship our products to our customers and this could possibly change in the future.

Why does my business have to be in a commercially zoned location? I.E. I run my eBay business out of my home. OR I’m a contractor and work out of my truck, can you bring it to my house?

These two question are quite common for us but both have the same answer. It is all about the freight companies. You see, when a freight company picks up your order from one of our warehouses or from the manufacturer they are usually picked up with a 53 foot long semi-truck. This truck will then travel the distance to your home with numerous stops along the way. These same trucks are NOT allowed in residential neighborhoods because of the length and weight of the trucks. Therefore the semi-truck must go to the nearest terminal and freight must be put on a smaller truck that is allowed into your neighborhood.

So this is really about money-saving techniques only possible for certain destinations?

That’s right! With this one extra step you now have extra man hours, fuel and time. With our FREE SHIPPING offer you can see how you must be in a commercially zoned location for us to keep your shipping process simple enough save you thousands on your order.

I just got off the phone with a sale representative and they offered me a special price. They said I have to buy within a certain time frame, like today. Why?

Another great question with an honest answer coming. A lot of our consumers are dumbfounded when we ask them “Are you in the market to purchase today?”. This might be the first time you have heard this and might even think it is an unorthodox way of doing business but we must do this simply to see if you are a serious buyer or in the beginning stages of buying.

How does my buying readiness help save money?

One way this helps us keep low overhead is by saving time. An example is when a customer calls to buy part number CB1211. Our site pricing currently is $4.07 per sq ft. If the customer is in the market to buy 2000 sq ft then we would like to extend a discount and do not mind it if YOU, the consumer ask for a special deal. Its OK!! Here’s where the tricky part comes in. This particular product is NOT a stocking item for us. It is actually sitting in the warehouse of the Manufacturer, essentially making this order a drop shipped order. For us to offer you a deeper discount we now have to make a phone call to request cheaper pricing for your order. As you can imagine we are asked the exact same question from the manufacturers sales rep. “Is the customer going to be purchasing today?”. This is why you may hear “are you in the market to purchase today?”

This whole issue may seem like glorified penny pinching but did you know that debit card swipe fees provide banks with 20 billion dollars annually? And now with the new cap it has been estimated that store owners and consumers will be spared $7 billion. The fee on a $100 transaction will be about 27 cents, which is a far cry from the $1.50 currently being collected. Establishing the new debit card swipe fees has taken more than five years and it looks as if the process will be well worth it.

If you’re looking for a retailer which doesn’t have any swipe fees to speak of, whatsoever, you should turn to FloorMall.com. You can find great hardwood flooring at incredibly low prices, without any of those pesky hidden fees!

The 2011 state games will include a wide variety of sports, appealing to fans of cycling, golf and and long distance running. Shaw hopes that the design initiative will both draw interest to the games and make the participants feel welcome and valued through their contributions.

For a wide selection of rugs, including NFL area rugs, visit the online store at Floormall.

FloorMall has always been a staunch supporter of Mohawk flooring and they’re eager to see what amazing new products Susan Curtis and her team dream up. FloorMall has a great selection of flooring from the manufacturer. Visit their site if you’re looking for Mohawk hardwood flooring and check out their Blowouts! section for great deals on Mohawk laminate flooring as well.

This wasn’t a great concern in the good old days of the American frontier, when Nature’s bounty was there for the taking, and there were endless tracts of trees to use for dwellings and sustenance. However, rapid industrialization and explosive population growth have taken their toll – 400 years ago, half of the territory of the lower 48 states was covered in old-growth (also known as primary-growth), virgin forests. Today, only a tenth of those remain, and even they are threatened – 4 out of 5 acres of old forest in the Pacific Northwest are cleared for logging activities. Most of America’s remaining primary-growth forests are in national reserves and on public lands; while this provides a measure of protection, there are many business interests that constantly lobby for access to these resources, both the trees themselves and the minerals underneath; nature conservancy groups are engaged in a constant battle for preservation. Furthermore, protected forest enclaves are often cut off by man-made infrastructure, making it often very difficult or impossible for wildlife to cross from one patch of forest to the other, disrupting natural migration patterns, as well as reproduction.

Fortunately, deforestation both in the United States and other developed countries has stabilized, and even reversed in some cases. Second-growth forests that have risen in place of cleared-out primary forests don’t have the same soil profile and ecological complexity, but they do help fight climate change by sequestering atmospheric carbon, and provide shelter for many species of birds, animals and insects.

The most severe deforestation today occurs in the developing world, such as South America, central Africa and South-East Asia, where large tracts of forest are cleared out to make way for agriculture, or to provide consumers in developed countries with cheap and abundant exotic woods. Indonesia, Brazil and the Congo are particularly afflicted by this problem, with tens of millions of acres of trees felled annually; weak and corrupt governments make it difficult to enact and enforce protections. In total, over 2 billion tons of carbon are added to the atmosphere due to deforestation – more than the combined contribution of all forms of transportation put together.

This is why flooring manufacturers and environmentalists alike have come together to find sustainable solutions for flooring. Recycled particle-board and laminate floors are one way to avoid an impact on forests, but most people don’t find this type of cover nearly as appealing as real wood. For customers who insist on actual hardwood flooring, logging companies have selected and bred species of trees that make for a long-lasting and visually-appealing product, while also growing quickly and being easy to harvest.

Bamboo flooring is a champion in this regard – while technically a grass, bamboo is a very tough and fibrous material, and has been used in East Asia for thousands of years, in housing construction, furniture, everyday items, and even writing implements. Bamboo grows thin and hollow, and can’t be made into a solid plank, but with current technologies, it can be glued together in strips to create engineered floors that last for a very long time. The best-known advantage of bamboo is that it’s also probably the fastest-growing flooring material in existence – up to an astonishing 2 inches an hour, under the right conditions. Compare that with an oak tree, which can take over a century to reach maturity, and bamboo turns out to be the gift that keeps on giving.

Another fast-growing source for flooring is eucalyptus. In truth, “Eucalyptus” is a rather large and diverse genus of trees in the Myrtaceae family, with most people being familiar with only a couple of species. The most widely-used eucalyptus product – the fragrant essential oil – is mostly produced from the leaves of Eucalyptus globulus; while used for timber, this species has poor lumber qualities and is difficult to process. However, logging companies have, in recent years, developed Lyptus – a hybrid of two eucalyptus species (E. grandis and E. urophylla) – which is a flooring manufacturer’s dream. It grows extremely fast, for a tree – in the right conditions, a Lyptus plantation turns over in 5-6 years. The wood is dense, uniform and close-grained; it’s versatile, easy to process and is, in many ways, superior to mahogany. Lyptus is a great innovation that can satisfy customer demand for low-cost, quality hardwood floors, while helping preserve rainforests.

There are many second-growth forests that can be safely harvested for flooring in the United States, as well – Appalachia boasts large swaths of hardwood forest, with a prevalence of relatively fast-growing Red Oak (Quercus rubra); many flooring companies are based in states such as Kentucky, and control both the logging aspect and manufacture of flooring, in order to make the process easy and cost-effective. The website Wikiflooring.com goes into great detail about the various wood species used to make hardwood floors, their properties, ease of care and sustainability rating.

There is a number of non-governmental organizations that help track logging to make sure that old-growth, unsustainably harvested wood isn’t being passed off as environmentally-friendly. The most prominent of these groups is the Forest Stewardship Council; founded in 1993, the group incorporates both environmental advocates and industry representatives, and attempts to use market-friendly methods in order to promote sustainable logging. FSC runs a certification program for organizations that conduct inspections; FSC floors are guaranteed to be grown, logged and sourced without causing loss of primary-growth forests worldwide.

After the wood is logged, it is then shipped to be processed at a plant. This is another area where the customer can research their impact on the environment. Most fast-growing wood is raised on plantations in warm climates, with South America being one of the leading producers. Wood sourced in North America typically comes from slower-growing species. However, costs and carbon emissions incurred during transportation are also an important factor. Many American flooring companies, such as Somerset, also control the entire chain of production – they’re headquartered near forests where timber is logged, and have manufacturing and milling facilities nearby, so the logs only need to be transported a short distance before they can be processed. Since timber is mostly processed as close to the logging site as possible, in order to avoid shipping material that will be sawed off and discarded anyway, domestically-sourced wood indirectly provides jobs for American mill workers.

Modern technology has made it possible to saw a log extremely efficiently, using every part of the round to make various construction materials. The photo that accompanies this article is a sculpture by Swiss artist Vincent Kohler, showing all the different profiles and thicknesses of boards that are obtained by sawing a typical round log. The boards can then either be machined down to a solid hardwood plank, or be cut into strips to make engineered floorboards. One of the advantages of engineered boards is that the multi-layered construction varies the direction of the wood grain, which in turn makes the boards more resilient and resistant to deformation from the effects of heat or water.

The flooring market has recently seen another revolution – the advent of Internet marketing. Previously, the customer would need to go to a brick-and-mortar store to buy flooring, but today, they can browse much larger selections online without leaving their home. Online retailers can also provide great deals on engineered and solid hardwood floors, due to their lack of overhead costs associated with maintaining a physical store. On the Internet, it’s also much easier to instantly find information about the provenance of any given hardwood flooring line, its sustainability and environmental credentials. For example, Floormall.com has an entire section, Floormall University, which explains the difference between hardwood engineered and solid flooring, as well as a primer on “green flooring” and some of the alternatives to hardwood.

With myriad options available to today’s consumer, it’s possible to buy hardwood floors that are cheaper and more environmentally-friendly than ever before.

With many Floormall facilities based in Virginia, the company is trying to make sure that orders and deliveries on hardwood flooring and other types of floors are processed as speedily as possible under the circumstances.

The Forest Stewardship Council is a nonprofit organization that has been fighting deforestation worldwide for almost 20 years, doing this by working with flooring companies and other wood-processing industries in order to make sure that the raw materials are sourced in a way that’s renewable and environmentally conscious.

Award FSC hardwood flooring includes a number of lines, such as Cascade, Natural Advantage and Endurance. These floors are both hand-processed to give a vintage feel, and coated with the latest in protective shielding to make them virtually impervious to wear and tear. FSC floors from Award are some of the most durable and style-conscious, and at the same time, environmentally responsible flooring lines available.

The site is meant to help both consumers and builders find green FSC flooring for affordable prices. This includes FSC eucalyptus flooring, a sustainable resource that has been gaining popularity in recent years due to the hardness and resistance to wear that flooring-grade eucalyptus possesses, as well as the incredible speed with which those trees grow.

Buying FSC certified flooring is one of the easiest ways to remodel one’s house while also fighting deforestation.

Tomorrow our prices have to increase because we’re undercutting EVERYONE! Don’t miss this opportunity to save hundreds in the greatest deal on Mohawk flooring we’ve seen all year!

Part of Mohawk Flooring’s Artiquity collection, the Zanzibar line offers hand-beveled exotic hardwood floors for the discerning customer. This exciting line contains such seldom-seen wood varieties as Tigerwood, Teak, African Padauk and Ebony.

The Zanzibar floors are hand-beveled and feature a classic, vintage distressed look. At the same time, all the floors are protected by an CrystalShield aluminum oxide coating, and offer a 25-year finish warranty. With these floors in your home, your guests will never look up. For unparalleled originality and sophistication, Zanzibar floors are just what you need!

You can receive FloorMall’s newsletter via the sign-up at the bottom of every page of their site.

Also, in celebration of the holiday FloorMall has added 8 special products to the top selling section of their homepage.

The writers here at Flooring Now wish everyone a safe and happy Memorial Day Weekend.

Hand-scraped floors have gained a following in recent years, and it’s not difficult to see why – the texture of a hand-processed floor plank is much more expressive and interesting than that of a flat, machined one. Sunlight plays on the delicate grooves, adding a sophisticated roughness and unpredictability to the floor. It’s a texture that you just want to feel with your bare feet.

In addition to the hand-made aesthetic, Virginia Vintage floors also incorporate 50 years’ worth of Anderson technological know-how, including their exclusive Luster-Lock® Ultra finish, which preserves the organic and warm surface of the wood while offering serious protection against erosion, moisture and other damage – there’s a reason these floors are covered by a 25-year warranty.

If you want a home that breathes with individuality and a personal touch, Virginia Vintage floors from Floormall are at your disposal.

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Of special note is Columbia’s patented Uniclic feature. The company’s hardwood planks are manufactured with tongues and grooves that snap and lock without glue, nails or flooring staples, making assembly unbelievably easy and painless. Uniclic floors are ideal for do-it-yourself installers, since the feature drastically cuts down on the need for loud and expensive equipment, there is less chance of improper alignment, and it doesn’t take ten minutes with a crowbar to fix a mistake.

There are enough remarkable offerings from Columbia to satisfy the most discerning customer. Come and explore the hundreds of hardwood flooring products on Floormall today!

In addition to exotics, the company has dozens of different product lines which coax familiar oak and hickory wood into showing every conceivable texture and surface across dozens of product lines. The same wood species may glitter with a serious purple and gold, or leap into the sunlight with a pale pink, or ground the room with a vintage Colonial gravitas.

Consider the three flooring varieties in the charmingly literal Anderson Floors Gnarly line. These indestructible oak planks are sold in variable width and length, presenting an engaging tangram puzzle that can be put together in a myriad different ways, each expressing the temper of the room and the personality of the owner. The wood texture is a resolute turbulence of dark growth rings over various shades of classic brown. These floors have enough character that one could compose a still life on them, and only cost $3.52 per square foot.

With their experience, skill and prices, Anderson will never disappoint you.

This is important when using varieties such as tigerwood, which shines and sparkles like a flowing stream of golden dust marbled with jets of calligraphy ink. Fortunately, under Johnson’s expert treatment, the grain, sheen, coloration and character of each wood type are given a chance to shine.

Furthermore, Johnson offers a mind-boggling, multi-generational 50-year residential finish warranty on their Forevertuff exotic line. The pricing is equally impressive – each of the 10 different wood types in the line costs 5-6 dollars per square foot. For a Brazilian walnut, mahogany or rosewood floor that will enliven your house for at least half a century, this is a steal.

We are proud to offer Johnson floors, and recommend them to all of our customers.

Mullican floors are made with a process is truly impressive. Instead of spot-checking the lumber, Mullican goes over every inch of it during every stage of the process. The wood is pre-dressed to the same thickness, stacked to be slow dried to prevent distortions, then ripped to remove any bend. Then, each board is kiln-dried and checked by a moisture meter.

This attention to detail is the reason Mullican products – both solid and engineered – are considered top-tier flooring worldwide. The floors are easy to install, and their customers save considerable amounts of money on labor, waste and returns.

With the great number of American and exotic offerings, painstaking quality and environmental guarantees, a Mullican floor will improve any room

Mohawk also manufactures woven floor products such as carpets, area rugs and mats, with designs by world-renowned artists, craftsmen and designers. The company is a leading recycler of plastic bottles in the nation, with the polyester being re-purposed as a carpeting material. Finally, Mohawk also owns a distribution network with hundreds of delivery trucks and dozens of storage facilities.

The company has excelled in creating hardwood flooring products that are stylish, affordable and durable. Mohawk floors are distinguished by the numerous fantastic lines of exotic hardwoods that the company offers – Teak, Brazilian Cherry, Merbau, and beautiful Eucalyptus are just a few of the wood types that can add style and character to your home. Best of all, many of these product lines are affordable for a middle-class budget – most of the floors are priced at under $5 per square foot.

We are proud to offer Mohawk products because the company has always thought of its cust0mers first, and offers a balance between price and quality that few other manufacturers are able to match.

Somerset pledges on its website to procure the materials in an environmentally responsible and renewable way. The company cuts most of its timber in the Appalachian mountains of Kentucky, where its headquarters are also located.

Somerset Flooring is committed to the most optimal usage of the raw material, and offers products made out of every part of the tree. The trunks are sawn into floor planks, but the company also manufactures mulch and pellet fuel, so not even the tree bark goes to waste.

Moreover, the company puts together a 100-year plan for the sourced areas, in order to replace the lost forests for future generations. Somerset is one of the nation’s premier suppliers of kiln-dried Appalachian hardwood flooring, and a model in sustainable and responsible development.

First, the site’s search has been made more accurate and now has the added functionality of auto-complete. This was done to provide customers with faster, more meaningful results. And because the search algorithm is more accurate, minor mistakes made while inputting queries should still provide the correct result.

In addition to the revamped search, FloorMall has also developed a custom quote system for their site. This quote system gives FloorMall’s customer representatives the ability to provide tailored quotes on all their products, including popular brands like Mohawk flooring and Mullican flooring.

Shoppers seeking a custom quote will be guided through the process of selecting the right flooring for their needs by a customer representative. Once this is done, an email containing the quoted price including shipping will be sent to the shopper. From there, they have seven days to purchase their order at the quoted price, or use it as a reference while shopping around.

For more information about the changes FloorMall has made to their site you can review the official release here.