Hardwood Floor "Styles and Trends" by Nikzad Import Inc.

Hardwood Floor "Styles and Trends" by Nikzad Import Inc.

"The traditional ever-popular unfinished oak "strip" hard wood flooring, whether nail down or glue down (Engineered) Prefinished or unfinished-OAK is still the leading species used in the United States for new construction and remodeling. Also with OAK being the top preference for most builders."

"Hardwood Floor Magazine reported Red Oak accounted for 50%+ of Distributor sales. The newest request are being made for cherry, birch, White Oak, maple, and exotic species from around the World. Distributors are seeing a growing demand in the request for custom-made borders and accents. This trend is in part because most builders and homeowners like to differentiate themselves to what is common place and what everyone else is using. Mixed Media is also becoming more and more popular."

"Bamboo flooring also is enjoying a new popularity with the West Coast and Southeast leading the country in this new trend."

"kitchens and hardwood floors are becoming more and more common place"

"hardwood floors account for about 7% of the flooring market. One of the larger wood flooring producers predicts that share will double in the next five years"

"Today manufacturers make many sizes, designs, varieties, and species of wood flooring. As the industry has grown, with new technologies, a wider variety has made the industry produce many precision-made products of enduring beauty manufactured and graded according to certified standards and grading rules. Today's engineered products now allows wood floors to be placed directly on concrete slabs and below grade installations."

"Wood flooring can be broken into 3 major groups: unfinished, prefinished and acrylic impregnated, solid or engineered, as to their manufacturing process. Each having there own sizes, colors, and species."

"These products are graded by appearance and cut. Select and Better (S&B) is the standard grade used in the industry. Grades lower are #1 and #2 common. Rift and quartered are cuts above the S & B grade."

"PreFinished Wood Floors (finish is applied at the factory) are becoming more and more popular in today's market place. It's ability to go over concrete, various colors and ease of installation and less down time than unfinished products has made it more in demand than ever. These products already stained and finished in the factory, along with new technologies (engineered) has made these products less effected by moisture and will not shrink or swell as much as its solid unfinished counter parts. This new technology has made for better urethane adhesives, adding to this products stability over a concrete slab. Extra care must be taken to avoid damage during installation."

"Wood Flooring Contractors reported recently in a survey by Hardwood Floors Magazine, that 71% of wood floor related work was remodeling projects, while the remaining 29% was in new construction. They also reported Contractors are selling 76% unfinished, vs 23% going to Prefinished Engineered and Prefinished solid."

To view the entire article by Nikzad Imports, click here.