City planning first LEED-certified furniture store
By Heath E. Combs -- Furniture Today, April 6, 2008
Fort Lauderdale, Fla. — City Furniture is planning to build what is believed to be the first furniture store in the nation certified by the most widely recognized standard in environmentally responsible architecture, the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Green Building Rating System.
City Furniture President Keith Koenig said the company has acquired property in Cutler Bay in Miami-Dade County for the 57,000-square-foot facility, which is in the early planning stages.
The property is next to a 33,000-square-foot City Furniture store in Cutler Bay that will be renovated into an Ashley Furniture HomeStore.
"We're clearly seeing communities and municipalities are really savoring green construction and talking about providing some benefits for green construction," Koenig said. He said one such benefit may be quicker approvals from regulators.
There currently aren't any LEED-certified furniture stores, said Ashley Katz, communications coordinator for the U.S. Green Building Council, which administers the LEED program.
Koenig said an optimistic schedule would have construction start in Cutler Bay by October or November and be done by the third quarter of 2009.
The company will use recycled materials in construction and more natural lighting than current stores, and is looking at other ways to control energy usage such as solar panels, Koenig said. City also is considering methods to capture rainwater and waste water for uses in the building.
The LEED program has fast gained favor as a preferred U.S. green building program. It also has spawned competition from home organizations that have released their own standards.
"We've been learning about it over time," Koenig said. "We're delighted it has moved into the forefront of construction conversation. When we talked about it years ago, costs were more prohibitive. Now it's a big premium, but it's affordable."
City is still working on costs, but he said the "green" construction premium will be less than 20% and may be closer to 10%, depending on how aggressive it is in earning LEED points. He said a key factor will be the building's energy management.
"Over the last couple years, we've invested a lot in retrofitting or building new energy management systems into our new buildings, not because of LEED certification but to become more cost-efficient long term," Koenig said. "We're learning the methods of their point systems. A lot of our developments would have gotten a lot of points."
LEED promotes a whole-building approach to sustainability by recognizing performance in five human and environmental health areas. They include sustainable site development, water savings, energy efficiency, materials selection and indoor environmental quality.
In other green efforts, City has an aggressive recycling program and moved to all soy-based upholstery cushioning a year ago in its Kevin Charles factory in Mississippi, Koenig said.
"We all want to leave the world a better place and minimize our carbon footprint wherever we can intelligently," said Koenig about the company's initiatives.
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