Ep # 191 - Modern Flooring That Actually Works

Tile used to be the “safe” kitchen choice and vinyl used to be the punchline. That logic doesn’t hold anymore, and flooring pro Asad Assad, owner of AA Flooring and Design in Garfield, New Jersey, explains exactly why. We dig into what’s changed in modern flooring technology, how waterproof luxury vinyl plank and luxury vinyl tile can look shockingly close to real wood or stone, and what that means for busy households that need durability without giving up style.

We also get specific about where different materials belong. We talk about why wall-to-wall carpet is far less common now, where it still makes sense (think stairs and primary bedrooms), and why carpet in basements is largely “out” because of moisture and that musty smell that never really leaves. If you’ve been debating hardwood floor restoration, new hardwood installation, or an engineered wood floor, Asad breaks down the real differences: longevity, cost, seasonal expansion, and what to do when you’re installing over a concrete slab.

Along the way, Asad shares his story of learning the business from the ground up, the hardest part of starting a local service company in a new area, and why his in-home “mobile showroom” approach helps homeowners avoid decision fatigue. He also explains how small mistakes in DIY flooring can turn into bigger problems later, and why a trusted installer matters when you want the finish to look right for years.

If you’re planning a renovation in Bergen County or nearby, listen for practical guidance you can use right away, then subscribe, share this with a neighbor, and leave a review so more people can find the show.

AA Flooring & Design
201-903-2485
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61575622702716&sk=directory_links

Transcript

Welcome And Today’s Flooring Focus

Intro/Close 0:00

This is the Good Neighbor Podcast, the place where local businesses and neighbors come together. Here's your host, Doug Drohan.

Doug Drohan 0:11

Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of the Good Neighbor Podcast. I am your host, Doug Drohan from the Bergen Neighbors Media Group. Today we have a great guest. We um we're getting into uh the end of the summer. Uh a lot of people are um you know updating their homes. It's uh a great time to think about flooring. And today I'm joined by the owner of AA Flooring and Design out of Garfield, New Jersey. It's Assad Assad. Welcome to the show. Thank you. Glad to be

Waterproof Vinyl And Modern Options

Doug Drohan 0:38

here. Yeah, so you know, you guys are, I guess, um do modern floor flooring choices. So take me through like the I guess the changes in flooring, like if there's modern flooring compared to maybe 10, 15, 20 years ago. Like how is that changing?

Asad Asad 0:55

It's uh you know, changing because people uh have more information on you know what they're uh looking for, and flooring in general has changed now. You have uh like waterproof vinyl flooring that looks and feels like a you know beautiful luxury solid wood floor. Oh wow two-thirds the price. And uh you also have people that you know understand solid wood more. It's called the hundred-year floor for a reason. And that's what I mainly look for, like restoring old wood floors, bringing them back to life, and uh working with different species like pine, oak, maple.

Doug Drohan 1:35

Oh got it. So you so you do restoration as well as installation, yes, sir. Okay, so the waterproof, you know, the wood, it used to be, you know, if you want to go back right 20 years, 15 years, whatever it was, you know, kitchens always had tile, whether it was, I guess, ceramic tile or other kinds of tiles. You know, there was a a time when the Italian kitchen was really cool with that terracotta look. Um, but a lot of people have wood in their kitchens, but you used to think, oh, I can't have wood because it'll get wet and it'll get you know it'll warp, it'll it'll be destroyed, but that's changed, hasn't it?

Asad Asad 2:10

Yeah, now you can, you know, and the great thing about vinyl now too is you can get it in a very luxury like tile look too. So I just had a customer that wanted to put tile in their kitchen, but it would have been a mess. We would have had to reset their cabinets and do all these things. We got a very nice uh luxury tile vinyl that looked like tile, and it went with their design, you know, waterproof, very easy to maintain.

Doug Drohan 2:39

It used to be the vinyl was really cheap looking. Like when I bought my house uh 10 years ago, it had vinyl wood flooring, it looked like wood, but it was really like this peel and stick stuff that looked really cheap. I mean, you could tell it wasn't really wood, you could tell on the you know, when you walked on it, it was just laid over, you know, poured concrete. Um, but I guess that's where technology changes, right?

Asad Asad 3:04

Yeah, now uh there's a lot of companies have uh like 3D prints and things like that, so it feels and looks like tile or wood, but it's actually uh, you know, water, it's a vinyl floor.

Doug Drohan 3:15

Yeah. That's great. I I guess there's some education that has to um, you know, for homeowners who think, oh, it's gotta be the real deal, it's gotta be wood, it's gotta be this, and that vinyl's always you know had that cheesy kind of connotation. So it helps to be able to walk in and actually see the samples, right?

Asad Asad 3:34

Right, absolutely. And that's uh what we do, we bring all the samples to your home.

Doug Drohan 3:39

Oh, okay.

Asad Asad 3:40

You know, so we're like a in-home shopping uh company. Oh, okay.

Doug Drohan 3:44

So nice.

Asad Asad 3:47

So

Carpet Today And Basement Reality

Asad Asad 3:48

how do you do it?

Doug Drohan 3:48

So and you know, I don't see too many people doing wall-to-wall carpeting anymore, but is that something that some owners are still choosing?

Asad Asad 3:56

That's something some homeowners are still choosing, more like on stairways or in uh, you know, mostly the master bedroom, not where the kids are. Kids still uh yeah, not that vinyl and wood are better options, you know. I I have a kid and I wouldn't put carpet in her room. Uh I'd be changing it every day.

Doug Drohan 4:13

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's funny. And that's also like it used to be, you know, uh plush carpeting wall-to-wall everywhere. That was the thing, maybe back in the 70s and 80s. But uh, you know, it's funny how tastes change, but I guess they also change because of technology and the way that you know uh materials can be shaped, as you're saying with vinyl, how how it can look like you know, authentic, even though it's uh two-thirds the price and a lot more durable.

Asad Asad 4:42

100%. And uh, you know, carpet has gone a long way too. They have a lot of things called like solution-dyed carpet, so very easy to clean and uh maintain. You just don't see it going wall-to-wall anymore. It's mostly very limited areas.

Doug Drohan 4:56

Do you recommend people put carpeting in their basement if they have like a um you know a basement that doubles as a playroom and maybe as a TV and things like that? Or or are people worried about you know, water damage if it rains a lot and their basement is wet? Like, do you do you recommend or are are people choosing carpets for basements?

Asad Asad 5:17

Uh carpets and basements have uh basically gone out of the picture, more more commercial style if they do.

Speaker 3 5:25

Right.

Asad Asad 5:26

Uh, but they're either putting tiles or vinyl because with carpet, you know, the moisture content in basements is usually very high.

Doug Drohan 5:35

Right, right.

Asad Asad 5:35

Uh so even with a moisture barrier pad or something, it's not a very good choice.

Doug Drohan 5:40

Right. And then you get that musty smell that just never leaves. You walk into those houses. You know, when you walk into a house in an open house and you just walk to the basement, you're like, whoa. Yeah, chances are there's carpeting, and there used to be carpeting that they pulled up for the open house. That's interesting.

Asad’s Path To Owning A Business

Doug Drohan 5:55

So, sod how how did you get into this business? Like, what's your background?

Asad Asad 5:59

Uh so I want to say it was uh about 15 or 16 years ago. I was uh halfway through college and I was just jumping from part-time job to part-time job. And one of my uncles told me uh he had a flooring company in the Dallas area.

unknown 6:15

Okay.

Asad Asad 6:15

I lived in uh Dallas, Texas back then. And he said, you know, you need uh a career. What are you doing in school? And I told him I'm studying sociology, and he said, Well, you can't do much with that unless you're gonna teach or sell to people.

Speaker 3 6:29

Right, right.

Asad Asad 6:30

I said, I don't want to teach, so he said, Come here, let me teach you sales, and uh I actually learned everything in the business the warehouse, uh, the customer service job, the operations, and uh sales, and that's how I got into it.

Doug Drohan 6:42

So at what point did you decide that you wanted to go off on your own and start your own business?

Asad Asad 6:48

I want to say it's been about uh you know three years now. Okay that I've been on my own, and it's just you know, the family uh is growing. I meant to have a little bit more time for everybody, and uh you know, sometimes financially it's hard, but usually it pays off at the end.

Doug Drohan 7:08

Yeah, yeah, it's a risk for sure. But uh so what um I mean uh you know, I talked to a lot of business owners, and you say it's it's uh it could be hard. Like what was the hardest part or what continues to be the hardest part of owning your own business?

Asad Asad 7:23

The hardest part, uh, you know, getting started, especially like I grew up in, like I said, the Dallas area most of my life. Uh yeah. I came here a few years ago with uh a couple of years ago. Whenever we first started the business with my wife, she got a job up here.

Speaker 2 7:38

Okay.

Asad Asad 7:38

And it's just uh, you know, getting to know the people and being patient because you know, month one, month two, year one, not a whole lot of people know you. Yeah, so you're kind of banging your head in the wall, like what am I doing wrong? What am I doing wrong? But it just yeah, you gotta stay consistent and patient.

unknown 7:54

Yeah.

Doug Drohan 7:55

Yeah, yeah, no, it's true. Yeah, so you you mentioned you come to people's homes. Do you have a showroom or it's more of like a mobile showroom?

Asad Asad 8:02

It's a mobile showroom. I also have uh a distributor in Edison that has almost like everything you can pick from all in one place.

Speaker 2 8:10

Okay.

Asad Asad 8:11

Uh they they give us their showroom to also show around to uh homeowners.

Speaker 3 8:17

Yeah.

Asad Asad 8:17

So either either way, I I can bring you know about 20, 30 samples to your house, but if you need more than that, we gotta go somewhere.

Doug Drohan 8:24

Right, right, right, right. I mean, I I would hope somebody doesn't need 20 or 30 samples. You know, there's a uh the paradox of choice where the more choices you have, the more anxious you get because you like I don't know what I got, you know. I've got 15 shades of white paint to choose from. I don't know which one to choose. Um, you know, that's one of the things as a homeowner, like when you're doing a rent renovation like a kitchen, even the even the knobs that you put on your drawers, you got to make that decision, you know, and then not only the material, but then where does it go on the draw? And it's like so many, that's why you know it's good to have a trusted professional to guide you because 100%. You know, most homeowners obviously they're not they don't do what you do for a living and and they're busy and they need somebody they can trust.

Asad Asad 9:09

Yeah, and it's funny what people think they uh you know, like, oh, I can do this or it's easy. Then you're in the middle of a project and they're like, Oh, we didn't pick out the knobs yet. What about the shower? What about this?

Doug Drohan 9:19

It's like and when it comes to flooring, I've been to some houses where my friends are like, Oh, yeah, I did it myself, and it's commendable. I'm always impressed by people that can do stuff like that, but you could always tell if it was a DIY project because the edges aren't quite, you know, they're like, ah, it's good enough. You know, they're they didn't cut it the right way, but they're not going back and buying more material to just live with it or you know, put that we'll put that chair over there, cover that spot up, you know.

Asad Asad 9:47

True. Sometimes people don't know how much uh goes into it, you know, if it cuts off sometimes by like a quarter inch or something like that, could cause your floor to buckle throughout the whole area.

Doug Drohan 9:58

Now, what

Solid Wood Vs Engineered Wood

Doug Drohan 9:59

do you going back to materials? So, what's your um your take on engineered wood, right? Like when I was redoing that room in my house where we had that vinyl wood that was like a peeling stick, um, because it was on a concrete slab, you know, the choices were limited. And and you know, you love like you're saying the hundred-year-old wood when you walk into one of these old, you know, 100, 200-year-old houses, and you're like, wow, look how wide those planks are, and yeah, it's amazing, it's still around. So, what like what's the difference in terms of um I guess price and durability when you go from wood to engineered wood to vinyl, we'll call it wood, you know, for want of a better word.

Asad Asad 10:40

So, with the solid wood, I would say in terms of longevity, it could actually last, you know, a hundred years or so. Uh, it's more of an upfront investment, but you know, every three to seven years you can kind of just resurface it, bring the stain back to life.

Speaker 2 10:56

Yeah.

Asad Asad 10:57

Uh so in terms of like changing the color or dealing with it over time, it's gonna be cheaper than changing your floor out two or three times.

Doug Drohan 11:06

Right, okay. Um you can't install it on top of a cement base, right?

Asad Asad 11:12

Uh you can. You have to put a plywood, uh apply wood and kind of waterproof it and moisture proof the floor, but you can.

Doug Drohan 11:19

So now you're raising, but if you have a door and now you're raising the the height of your floor, so that could be a problem, right?

Asad Asad 11:25

Yeah, now you have to raise the door if you don't want to do that, then uh engineered wood's a great uh choice as well. Uh, if you don't want to raise the door and you still want that look, a lot of the glues they use for engineered wood over a slab come with a moisture barrier.

Speaker 2 11:41

Yeah, okay.

Asad Asad 11:42

Or you could put a primer on the floor, you know, before the glue you let it dry, like a red guard.

Doug Drohan 11:47

Okay. Uh and what it what's so and so the thing with engineered wood, it it looks like as I've been in flooring stores, you you can get them to look like say French oak or like that, you know, old-fashioned, you know, 10-inch wide farmhouse look, and it's real wood, right? It's just so what what's engineered about it?

Asad Asad 12:06

So the the top layers basically the uh species or the real wood uh part 100%. They call it like the veneer. Okay, so that's gonna be your French oak or your white oak or your red oak or your uh whatever species they put on. Yeah, and what makes it different is they put like uh the a core. I want to say it's it's not a plywood core, but that's the engineered part, so the floor doesn't expand in contrast, got it, like um like a solid wood does. Solid wood is like a very sensitive to moisture, right? Right.

Doug Drohan 12:38

Winter and summer, it's gonna be different. Right. Okay, okay. Yeah, because I feel like there's been more of um in the last 10 years or so, certainly engineered wooden when I walk into flooring stores, you see a lot of these displays. Um it's also eye-catching because you know, a lot of people do you watch these shows on TV where they the fix rubbers, and and uh a lot of times they're they're very into preserving, whether it's a restoration project, whatever. And um, you know, a lot of these shows, I think a lot of the trends go by what people see on on cable TV, but um, you know, I guess engineered wood has has gotten its popularity from things like that.

Asad Asad 13:19

Yeah, engineered wood, I think, is a great choice if you want a solid wood look without the maintenance, and like you said, if you don't want to have to uh lift doorways and replace trim and because uh a lot does come with it, right? And also, you know, in the winter you won't get that gap between your flooring or that between winter and summer.

Speaker 3 13:38

Right, right.

Asad Asad 13:39

Whereas some floors are gap because they expand, you don't have that with engineered wood.

Doug Drohan 13:43

Got it, got it. Yeah. So what

Mobile Showroom Scheduling And Free Estimates

Doug Drohan 13:46

like what um like what's the best way for people to find you? And and are you working with like homeowners that are doing new renovations, people that are building new homes, people that are buying new homes? Like I guess it runs the gamut, right?

Asad Asad 14:01

Uh we work with uh everyone, even uh commercial clients, you know, everybody needs uh floor, but homeowners uh they could uh find us. Uh we're working on our website right now. We do have a Facebook and Instagram page.

Doug Drohan 14:16

And what is and and how would people find you? What's your Instagram page?

Asad Asad 14:20

It's uh AA flooring and design.

Doug Drohan 14:22

Okay. Okay, and then how would how would they contact you if they wanted to have you come over for and and do you guys do uh like estimates, or how does it work if somebody calls you up? Like, do you come in uh to do a uh we kind of lost you? Hopefully you can hear me. Oh, I can hear you. Okay, cool. Uh a free estimate, or do you not do that? Because I know some companies don't do that.

Asad Asad 14:47

Yeah, I do free uh in-home estimates. You know, usually I try to give you see get as much information on the phone as uh. Uh but definitely if it's something that you know you're interested in, we do come. Estimates are free. And you can call or text me at the our company company line, which is uh 201-903-2485.

Doug Drohan 15:14

That's great. Excellent. So I think one of the um, you know, one of the the values, I guess that were one of the attractive parts of your business. And I say this because I have a as a um a company we just did a story on called the blind spot, which is a mobile showroom for window treatments. So it's a family-owned business, and they come to your house, but they come with a truck, so you can walk onto the truck and actually see like samples of the window treatments, blinds and shades. So I think you know, because people are so busy, and you mentioned you have a family when you have kids and you're traveling back and forth with sports or tutoring or music lessons or whatever, um, you know, finding that time like on the weekend, it used to be traditionally, right? Everybody worked nine to five Monday through Friday. Yeah, a lot of us commuted into the city. And if you're in Bergen County, the only day you could go out shopping is on Saturday. So it was always a mad rush to fit everything in, you know. And then if you have kids and they have sports going on, it's like, when do I have the time? You know, and it gets stressful because you're looking at the counter, I could do it three weeks from you know that day. But the fact that you come to them, you can come on a weekday, right? A weeknight or something like that.

Asad Asad 16:26

Yeah, we can go uh really anytime. I've done estimates as late as 8, 9 p.m. for uh people. And you know, it's funny that you say Saturdays because that's usually the day, you know. I try to see maybe four people a day.

Speaker 2 16:41

Okay.

Asad Asad 16:41

I have ten people that want to see us every Saturday. I'm like, I can't see everybody.

Speaker 2 16:45

Oh my god, yeah, yeah.

Asad Asad 16:47

Uh but yeah, I do try to accommodate, you know, and for my family, it's funny. They look forward to uh weekends. I I have to pick a random day in the week to kind of reset, like Wednesday or Saturday's a work day for me.

Doug Drohan 17:00

Yeah, that's one of the challenges of owning your own business. It's having that that time to say no, you know, or the ability to say no instead of having that that sign above your door that says I'm open 24-7, yeah, you know, 365. Um, but when you're first starting out, you don't want to say no to anybody, right? You don't want to throw anybody away. So yeah, that's great.

More Than Flooring Plus Wrap Up

Doug Drohan 17:22

Well, Sa, this is great. I I really appreciate you you joining us today and and sharing your story. This is AA flooring and design. Uh again, you can find them on Instagram, you can find them on social media. The website is is coming soon. Uh, but certainly um, you know, the phone number is also going to be listed here in the podcast. So um is there anything we didn't cover that you wanted to just uh you know get out there to to our listeners?

Asad Asad 17:51

Uh you know, our specialty is flooring, but we do uh all sorts of uh remodels from painting to uh small kitchen and bathroom remodels, whether it's just refacing your cabinets or replacing new ones.

Speaker 2 18:05

Oh, okay.

Asad Asad 18:06

Uh you know, we kind of do it all on the inside. We handle handle everything. And um, that's really it where we we stay small, so we're focused on you guys. You know, we only do a couple of projects at a time. I don't have my crew everywhere.

Doug Drohan 18:23

Right, right. Okay. You know, very much that's where the flooring end design comes from, right? It's not just flooring. And I'd imagine that probably grew out of people saying when you're in their house doing their kitchen floors, they're like, Oh, you know, I need help with my cabinets. Do you guys do that? And then all of a sudden, like, yeah, why not? We can do that.

Asad Asad 18:40

Yeah, yeah. We became more a one-stop shop. I wanted to stay with flooring, but you know, people don't want to bounce around anymore, so which is fine.

Doug Drohan 18:48

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. All right, Asad, thank you very much for joining us, and you and I will be right back. Just bear with us. All right, thanks, Doug. Great.

Intro/Close 18:56

Thank you for listening to the Good Neighbor Podcast. To nominate your favorite local businesses to be featured on the show, go to gnpbergen.com. That's gnpbergen.com or call 201 298 8325.