When Redi Carpet began in 1981, my father, Bruce Caress, and his partners started with a few people in a
small building in a suburb of Houston. Their hopes were high, and their dreams were big. They believed
there was a viable opportunity in the local multi-family flooring market for next-day carpet installation.
Although there were bigger competitors with more resources, they believed in the hard work and the
determination of Redi’s employees.
To put things in perspective, I decided to look back at what life was like in 1981 and how things have
changed since then. It was the beginning of a decade filled with fluorescent colors, mix tapes, and
arcade games. MTV (Music Television) was launched, the Oakland Raiders won the Super Bowl, and IBM
released the first personal computer. Since then, the music videos that made MTV popular have shifted
to YouTube, the Raiders have moved to Las Vegas, and today’s smartphones have infinitely more
processing power in the palm of our hands in comparison to the 38 pound PC IBM put out in 1981.
Redi Carpet has also changed over the years. We have grown to be the largest multi-family flooring
provider in the country with 33 locations and over 500 employees coast-to-coast. We recently moved
into our new state-of-the-art corporate headquarters which is 10 times the size of the original building
we started in. We also offer a wide variety of flooring options, most of which weren’t offered back in
1981.
I have also changed with Redi over the years. My first full-time experience at Redi Carpet was in 1988
when I started as a warehouse worker in our Houston branch. I eventually worked my way into the
supply room, customer service, and sales. After moving to Denver for a few years I returned home in a
sales role and was then promoted to General Manager, Regional Vice President, Executive Vice
President, and Co-President before moving into my current role as CEO.
As I moved through the different positions within the company, I noticed two constants that have never
changed. From day one, our company has been driven to improve the customer experience and
customer obsession has been embedded in our DNA. We aim to provide the most compelling customer
service and exceed our customer’s expectations every single day. Of course, this could not be attained
without having a world-class staff of employees that live and breathe this mantra of being customer
obsessive. While each employee has talents and skills that are uniquely theirs, they all share our
company’s unrelenting commitment to our customers.
Today, we are not the same company that we were thirty or forty years ago, and I don’t expect that we
will be the same company in another five or ten years from now. We will continue to grow into new
markets, offer new products, and lead the way as the nation’s largest multi-family flooring provider while
still staying true to our core values.
Here’s to many more years and countless memories!
Brian Caress, CEO
