Furniture retailer City Furniture has announced its operational goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2040.
Image: City Furniture pledges to become carbon neutral by 2040. Photo: Courtesy of skeeze/Pixabay.
City Furniture’s 2040 Green Promise goal encompasses the company’s showrooms, warehouses and offices, its statewide delivery fleet and recycling initiatives, according to firm President Andrew Koenig.
The company leads the U.S. furniture industry with 240,000 square feet of LEED-certified showroom space and is converting its delivery truck fleet to run on compressed natural gas (CNG) instead of diesel fuel. Operating the industry’s greenest fleet, Koenig’s team expects delivery of five all-electric Tesla Semi trucks in the near future. In-house recycling equipment annually keeps 6 million pounds of cardboard, plastic and Styrofoam waste out of landfills.
“We’re all about helping people create and take care of home, and there’s no home that needs more care than our planet,” said Koenig. “That means investing long-term in innovations that reduce our carbon footprint, improve operations and create a greener future.”
City Furniture is an early leader among Florida-based firms making a time-certain pledge to achieve net zero carbon emissions. Regional retailers must take green commitments to the next level for their brands’ health and the environment, Koenig explained. “Our customers expect us to lead positive change in the communities we serve,” he said. “With fresh ideas and by taking intelligent risks, Florida companies can create scalable green approaches.”
Operating six Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED)-certified showrooms, City Furniture will nearly double its green-designed showroom area to 460,000 square feet by the end of this year, with opening of two new Florida superstores.
Achieving carbon neutrality demands operational advances, Koenig noted. “By 2040, we plan to run many showrooms on renewable energy to offset our electric use,” he said. The company’s 29-store network continues growing throughout Florida.
Koenig is overseeing transformation of the company’s delivery fleet to trucks running on USA-produced CNG, and the firm invested $1.4 million in a CNG fueling station at its 900,000-square-foot headquarters and distribution center in Tamarac, Fla. The retailer has logged over 12 million miles with the clean-running trucks since 2014 – cutting greenhouse emissions by 45 percent, while saving more than 60 percent on fuel costs.
City Furniture recycles 98 percent of its waste stream, condensing 5.5 million pounds of cardboard and 500,000 pounds of plastic and Styrofoam annually.
City Furniture has earned honors including Top 50 Greenest Fleets in the U.S. each year since 2015, Clean Cities Coalition Awards and the 2018 national Industry Leadership Award from the Southeast Diesel Collaborative, part of a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency program.
“We encourage other regional brands to join us in sharing best practices,” Koenig said. “Twenty years isn’t much time to accomplish all that’s needed for fast-growing companies to achieve carbon neutral status.”
Source: Company Press Release