In partnership with the Floor Covering Industry Foundation (FCIF)
When It’s Your Child: How FCIF Supports the Whole Flooring Family
Most of us think about the risks of this trade in terms of our own bodies: the knees, the backs, the long days on concrete. What is harder to plan for is a crisis that hits someone else under your roof.
When a spouse or child faces a serious illness, everything changes at once. Someone has to be at the hospital. Someone has to manage the appointments, the therapy, and the paperwork. And often, one income disappears just as the bills start to climb.
That is the gap the Floor Covering Industry Foundation exists to fill. FCIF is the flooring industry’s own safety net, providing direct financial assistance to industry members and their families who are facing a catastrophic illness, a life-altering injury, or a disability. That support reaches the people in your household, not only the person who works in the trade.
One flooring family shows what that looks like in practice.
Shane and Landon: A Family Changed Overnight
Shane has spent 19 years in the flooring industry as an IT technician for a flooring manufacturer, taking pride in providing a strong foundation for his family.
In 2021, the family’s life changed overnight when Shane’s 14-year-old son, Landon, was diagnosed with leukemia. Serious complications during treatment, including a stroke, led to extended hospital stays and ongoing intensive rehabilitation.
Landon’s mom ultimately had to leave her job to care for him full time, turning the household into a one-income family.
During that overwhelming season, FCIF provided a grant that helped cover the family’s mortgage, medical bills, utilities, and essential living expenses. The support gave them stability and peace of mind, allowing them to focus fully on Landon’s recovery. Today, Landon continues therapy and rehabilitation with renewed hope.
Shane’s story is also a reminder of how wide FCIF’s reach is. Shane works on the technology side of the business, not on the floor, and the person who needed care was his son. FCIF assistance is open to anyone who earns their primary income from the floor covering industry, and to the immediate family members in their household.
Watch: Shane and Landon tell their story
Video courtesy of the Floor Covering Industry Foundation.
What FCIF Actually Does
FCIF traces back to 1980, when the president of the Carpet & Rug Institute suffered a debilitating stroke while traveling for business. Leaders in the flooring industry organized to provide for him and his young wife, who were new to Dalton, Georgia and just getting started. The Foundation was chartered in 1981 in Washington, D.C., found homes in Chicago and Anaheim, and returned east in 2016 to Dalton. Its mission has not changed: helping families get back on their feet when battling catastrophic injuries, severe disabilities, or other life-altering illnesses.
According to FCIF’s 2025 Report to the Industry, the Foundation provided financial assistance to 41 families last year, bringing the total served to more than 1,440 since 2003. Many were battling cancer, orthopedic conditions, and neurological disorders while unable to work. Operational revenue reached $870,000, driven by a record-breaking annual campaign and long-standing support from the WFCA and the CCA Global Partners golf event.
Grants are needs-based rather than a set dollar amount, and they cover three broad areas:
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- Living expenses — rent or mortgage, utilities, groceries, transportation, and home accessibility updates
- Medical needs — prescriptions, medical supplies, testing and imaging, wheelchairs and equipment
- Care and support — doctor visits, hospital stays, nursing care, and physical therapy
Assistance is awarded for up to six months at a time, and recipients may reapply every six months if they remain eligible. Funeral and postmortem expenses are the one category FCIF cannot cover. Beyond the money, the Foundation provides case management, connecting grantees to support groups, hospital assistance programs, and budgeting tools. Full details are in FCIF’s Info Sheet.
Who Qualifies
This is where a lot of installers count themselves out before they ever ask. The criteria are broader than most people assume.
Industry connection
The applicant, or an immediate family member, must have earned their primary income from the floor covering industry for at least five years. Those years do not have to be consecutive. Employment must be current or have ended within the past five years, unless it ended because of retirement or because of the very illness or disability in question. Self-employed installers qualify, with employment verified through Schedule C tax returns.
Household
The grant can be for you or for an immediate family member: a spouse, parent, grandparent, child, or grandchild who lives in your household and is financially supported by you or your spouse. An installer whose spouse or child is the one who is ill can apply.
Medical and financial need
There must be a life-altering hardship, such as a severe medical crisis, a life-altering injury, or a disability, diagnosed by a practicing, licensed physician. And there must be demonstrated financial need, meaning limited income and expenses that exceed what the household can cover.
How to Apply
The process starts with a short inquiry, not a mountain of paperwork.
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- Review the Info Sheet and Grant Steps Overview on the FCIF Grants & Applications page.
- Submit a Grant Inquiry Form, available in English and Spanish.
- Complete the full grant application and send it to outreach@fcif.org.
Supporting documentation typically includes a recent tax return, household bills, relevant medical records, and employment verification. Questions can go to FCIF at 706.217.1183 x 109.
Help Spread the Word
Contractors, shops, and manufacturers can put FCIF materials in front of the people who need them. The Foundation’s marketing toolkit includes ready-made posters, flyers, break-room signage, social graphics, and the grant inquiry form in English and Spanish. Hanging one flyer in a warehouse or a job trailer is a low-effort way to make sure an installer who needs help learns that it exists.
Ask Before You Need To
Shane did not plan to need help. Like most people in this industry, he had built a steady career and expected to keep providing for his family the way he always had. A child’s diagnosis does not leave room for planning.
What the flooring industry can do is make sure nobody in it finds out too late that help existed. If you work anywhere in floor covering, whether you are an installer, a shop owner, a distributor, a manufacturer’s rep, or part of the team behind them, and you or someone in your household is facing a serious illness, injury, or disability, FCIF is worth a phone call. And if you know someone in that situation, pass this along.
The people who built this industry, and the families who stand behind them, should not have to face the unimaginable alone.
Learn more or apply at fcif.org. To support the Foundation’s work, visit the FCIF donation page.