JJ's Floor Covering Outlet Covers Floors in Style

, located on 1874 Fall River Ave. offers as much personality as it does carpet and flooring.

Installers Bud Dwyer and Don Felizberto greet customers with a smile and boundless knowledge on floor covering and installation, but the most gregarious personality on the premises is owner, John Furtado.

"Look me up online under Seekonk flooring," he says as he rushes to his computer on the east side of the store. Struggling to find the information he wants, he asks Felizberto for help as Dwyer looks on with amusement.

"Donny, go in there, all these things go up, but we don't come up."

Don, also online at his desk, says, "Yes, that's because we're working on the new website."

"Wouldn't you be better off listening to our YouTube spiel?" says Furtado.

Clearly there is plenty on information on the establishment online.

Redirecting himself, Furtado begins to eagerly represent his store, which opened in 1983, and was purchased by him in 1993.

"We sell  residentially. We sell commercially. We sell anywhere from new home buyers to contractors. We do business with a lot of different people. Anywhere from entry level homes, to, you know, mansions. We do the gamut."

JJ's Floor Covering does not just sell carpet, either.

"We sell tiles, wood, carpet. Maybe not in that order. Maybe you want to say carpet, tile, wood, " he laughs. "We offer installation. We sell product, we sell installation."

He walks towards the back of the store, where a showroom awaits.

" We have a 7,200 square foot showroom. We have thousands of feet of tile and wood on stock to choose from."

Furtado believes in keeping plenty of new and original product on hand.

"We buy in volume. I try to buy specials that I think are of value. People come in here looking for carpet once every five years. I look at carpet every day. I can pick out a quality, valued piece of carpet better than anyone."

Speaking of the people who come into the store, he speaks of his client base, which covers Seekonk and much of the East Bay.

"We have a lot of regular customers. We have a lot of word-of-mouth-customers. Word-of-mouth is the best and cheapest advertising out there."

Because of this loyal clientele, Furtado has managed during these difficult economic times.

"Well,things are a little rough, but we have a pretty good foothold in the area, " he says.

We've been around long enough we're not going anywhere, but I'd be lying if I didn't say business wasn't off a little bit."

Perhaps another reason customers come back to JJ's has to do with his employees.

"The people that work here are all floor coverers. They're not people that don't have floor covering backgrounds. That's what separates us from the big box stores. When you come in here, the least amount of experience a person would have would be Don."

He looks at Don.

"How old are you, Don? 37?"

Don looks up, "Yeah."

"And you've been doing this what, since you've been 20?"

"I have, " replies Don.

"See, that's 17-years, and that's the minimum experience we have; he's the youngest guy. Everyone here is really knowledgeable. We have a lady who is in her mid-60s and she's been doing it since she was in her early 20s."

The same applies to Furtado.

"It was my part-time job when I was in college. I was one of the ware-house guys, " he explains. I know this business from the ground up. I started from the bottom and worked my way up to owning it. I've owned the place for seventeen years, though it opened in '83."

He plugs his website once again. "If you go to jjsfloors.com, you'll find my YouTube thing. You'll get the same thing I just did, maybe a little better. It's a ton of information, and it's unrehearsed.