Carpet poverty: ‘I cried when I saw our new home had bare floors’


Noah’s Ark Centre also provides services such as debt and budgeting advice.

A few minutes away from Kassie’s home, Andrew is back at his warehouse using a forklift truck to unload more rolls of carpet from a delivery van.

He admits that he’d never heard of “carpet poverty” two years ago.

“The original project came about because of a piece we did with BBC Look North about a client of ours and her son who was injured and ended up in hospital having an operation because of a splinter in his big toe,” he says.

“That was a thing at the time that shocked me because the mum was paying £14 weekly for a carpet for her lounge but couldn’t afford anything else anywhere else in the property.”

As Andrew drives back and forth, collecting and unloading carpets, he tells me that he rented a warehouse and created a community interest company, Carpets Like a Boss, after receiving a big donation of flooring.

John Clark from Mercado Flooring is watching the delivery being unloaded.

“We get quite a lot of end of lines, distressed stock and it devalues over time so we utilise that stock in a better way,” he explains.

“Giving a bit back to the local community is the best use of our resources, I would say.”

Since 2023 Noah’s Ark Centre and, later the Carpets Like a Boss project, have carpeted more than 600 homes in Calderdale, and there are still around 80 people on the waiting list.


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