Interface

Introduction

Interface, Inc., began in 1973 when Ray C. Anderson, currently Chairman of the Board, recognized the need for flexible floor coverings for the modern office environment. In the mid-1990s, Interface’s Chairman and CEO Ray C. Anderson shifted the company’s strategy, aiming to redirect its industrial practices to include a focus on sustainability without sacrificing its business goals. Anderson wrote a book entitled Mid-Course Correction, in which he discussed his own awakening to environmental concerns and presented a model for businesses to achieve sustainability (Interface, 2008).

Mission and Vision

Ray Anderson’s Mission is to become the first name in commercial and institutional interiors worldwide through its commitment to people, process, product, place and profits. They want strive to create an organization wherein all people are accorded unconditional respect and dignity; one that allows each person to continuously learn and develop. They want to focus on product through constant emphasis on process quality and engineering, which they will combine with careful attention to our customers’ needs so as always to deliver superior value to our customers, thereby maximizing all stakeholders’ satisfaction. They will honor the places where they do business by endeavoring to become the first name in industrial ecology, a corporation that cherishes nature and restores the environment. Interface will lead by example and validate by results, including profits, leaving the world a better place than when we began, and we will be restorative through the power of our influence in the world. Ray Anderson’s vision was to be the first company that shows the entire industrial world what sustainability is in all its dimensions: People, process, product, place and profits by 2020 and by doing so they will become restorative through the power of influence (Interface, 2008).

Ray Anderson had a vision for interface to no longer use virgin nylon yarn to...