Green By Design Episode 206: Eco Certifications with Annette Stelmack

Eco-friendly designer Annette Stelmack talks about her work serving clients with chemical sensitivities, the difference between LEED and WELL certifications and which one may be right for you, the impact socially-ethical companies have on the environment, and more.

Annette Stelmack, LEED AP BD+C, Principal Owner at Inspirit-LLC

Erica Reiner (00:06):

Sure. Hello and welcome to green by design. This is your host Erica Reiner from eco method interiors. And today I have with me Annette Stellmack, and she is the founding principal of Inspirit-LLC, where she has been bringing four decades of experience in the building industry as a nationally recognized sustainable designer, leader, educator, and author. So thank you Annette so much for being here. As I was mentioning before we were recording her bio has a lots more interesting things in it and accolades and awards and all kinds of things, but I'd rather have hear from you instead of me just reading it off. I want to hear about your story and all the cool stuff you've been up to. So thank you so much for being here.

Annette Stelmack (00:56):

Thank you so much for having me. This is such a treat. I really appreciate it. Good.

Erica Reiner (01:01):

So let's jump in and you can just tell me about your, your story, your journey of first of all, how you got into sustainability and you know, going green and all that. And also how you, you know, married that or got into the design and building world. And you can tell me a little bit about how those two things came together.

Annette Stelmack (01:26):

Oh, that's great. That's such a great question. And I love sharing because it definitely was designed first and in my adult life, I should say. Because, you know, as a young adult, you're excited to go out and forge your way. And I got a great position with a great firm down in Denver and absolutely loved it. But as I got older and had my one and only child, there was something missing and I couldn't quite figure out what it was. And I've eventually did. And it was through a process of, I received an invitation to a conference called environ design. It's a conference that isn't even around anymore, but it really caught my attention. And so I went to that conference the second year that they had it set and not for the first year, just to make sure that they would actually have a second one and they did.

Annette Stelmack (02:12):

And at that conference, I just felt like I found my home and I have, I have told this story so many times and every time I tell it, I still tear up because it was really like, I found my home back into the values that I grew up with. So my parents are immigrants and post-World war II. They moved to Colorado, individually, found themselves, you know in the big world of Denver back then. And they come from they actually came from Germany and my mom's side of the family. They were gypsies. So they were in several, you know in Campa type situations and my dad as well. So it's a really cool story, although I'm not Jewish, it's like we have a whole nother experience around that, but because they came from absolutely nothing and my dad literally came with a suitcase that was probably about the size of, of a double thick briefcase.

Annette Stelmack (03:04):

That's how small it was when he immigrated. What I realized is when I went to environment design and I got to hear all of these amazing speakers all these, you know, eco entrepreneurs who were literally starting to forge the way in sustainability in a very tangible, literal way, like lead was just first draft had just been written. You know, and we had people like William McDonough and Michael Bren Gard and bill Browning and penny bhandup penny bond is the grandmother of lead for interiors. I got to meet all these amazing people. And I just realized that I found my self back to my values and the values that I had grown up with my parents was, you know, where everything was reused, everything was reduced, everything was recycled. We lived, you know, we did our own gardening and we did enough so that we would have it throughout the year.

Annette Stelmack (03:52):

And all of a sudden I was like ecstatic that I could combine the values that I'd grown up with and found my way back to you as a mom with my business. So I was really excited. I actually, when I came back from the three-day conference, sat at my desk and wrote up all of my notes because I was so stoked and took them to the company that I was with and said, Hey, I really want us to do this. And, and if we don't, you know, I'll just go off and do it on my own. Well, luckily I was with a great firm and I was the design director at the time, and we did adopt sustainability. And that's when the book first book started to be written, as we were speaking on the subject matter, I was speaking on the subject matter.

Annette Stelmack (04:30):

We adopted five pillars of sustainability. One was to green art specifications for all the CSI divisions for interior specifications. In other words, to green and to our furnishings that we did research and design and select stuff for our clients. In other words, to green, our marketing and our business development, and start really reaching out to people that we aligned with. And one was to green our office. That was those, those are all very doable. The last one we had to let go of because we wanted to green our block that we lived worked on down in lower downtown Denver. And that was much more difficult because we couldn't control, obviously all of those people, we were a little,

Speaker 3 (05:03):

A little ambitious.

Annette Stelmack (05:06):

Exactly. so it was fabulous being, you know, in this firm where I could do the work, but then what happened was I realized I was dragging people with me. This was my dream. And although people were going to some extent I then decided to look into starting the us green building council, Colorado chapter. And so I was a founding member of that chapter. And always had the question, an interior designer starting the us green building council, Colorado chapter. I'm like, well, yeah, why not? You know, because I was so passionate about this and literally that first meeting we had about 50 people that were interested in starting the chapter. It was so overwhelming to all of a sudden be with all these people who had similar aligned values and vision in the profession. And it was very diverse, architects, engineers, contractors you know, finance people and anyone in the built environment.

Annette Stelmack (06:02):

And it was both residential and commercial. And that was really the launch off for me to start my own firm, because once I realized that, oh my gosh, here I can be, you know, doing exactly what I want with the people that I want. I waited till my son was out of college at that point and then started my own company 15 years ago, actually June 15. Oh, wow. So I'm excited about that. So I was with associates three for 26 years, I think, 27 years and have had my own firm for 15. Yeah. That was a long run. So I'm not a baby anymore, but I still love what I do. Oh, good. I love hearing that. Wow.

Erica Reiner (06:38):

That's an incredible story. So what was, what kind of clients did you have and what were you working on when you first started and how has that evolved?

Annette Stelmack (06:49):

Yeah, that's a great question. So we had had a few clients that had children with severe asthma or chemical sensitivities, and we also had a few and very few in the beginning that were asking about, you know, what is eco-friendly and, and they were mostly, they were people that already had adopted in their lifestyle. And so they wanted them to adopt that in their interiors as well. But for the most part, we were the ones bringing the change. And so we had to, you know, first of all, really get to know our stuff and teach ourselves and learn, lead, and learn whatever we could that was out there around sustainability. And then start to implement that on our projects, whether we were doing a lead project or not, cause back then there were there, there was no lead for home, you know, it was just lead.

Annette Stelmack (07:37):

And you know, so we would just essentially take the outline and then you'll, you know, adopt it to what we were doing and really try and work very closely with our manufacturers to achieve the criteria specific to interior finishes and interior furnishing. So have always worked on comprehensive design where I'm, you know, doing from the very get-go the space planning and the layouts with architects and, or the client or all of us together. And then from there moving into all the interior finish aspects and specifications around that, and then also the interior furnishings. And so, like I said, it was us really driving that and eventually we would have clients that would come to us, but really still to this day, people are still learning about sustainability. Oh, I should say, homeowners are learning about it in the commercial world. You know, if you're a big developer you're going to know about lead because you're going to want to have buildings that attract the personnel as well as, you know, have a really high performing building in residential. Not so much. I certainly get sought out now for clients who have chemical sensitivities. And so at least on an annual basis, I have, I would say 30% of my clients. We're addressing indoor air quality, both from all the air filtration and HVAC, as well as all the interior. And then also the furnishings at least 30% on an annual basis. So would you

Erica Reiner (09:01):

Say the other 70% is our commercial clients?

Annette Stelmack (09:05):

No, they're still residential classes, primarily interior living spaces. So I do work with developers. I've done projects for developers that are lead, like apartment buildings or condo buildings. But then for the residential clients, you know, they're just looking to be smart. You know, in our market here in Colorado, it's all a lot about renovation because there just isn't enough housing stock. And so lots of renovation working with existing properties, bringing them up to and exceeding, you know, billing and standards and really adopting as many sustainable criteria as we possibly can in those particular homes, especially through the interior finishes.

Erica Reiner (09:43):

Now a lot of the reasons that I started this podcast was for other home pros. I was getting some questions from other home pros, like, like, what is this? How are you doing this? How do I get involved? What do I need to know? So maybe you could just tell us for those people. Maybe you could tell us a little bit about just very briefly what lead is and what well is, and the differences, if you like one more recommend one more for XYZ and the other one for X, Y, Z.

Annette Stelmack (10:20):

So lead stands for leadership and energy and environmental design. It was created by the us green building council, and it is a third party rating systems for buildings. So there are a variety of criteria that are set up under categories, such as water efficiency, energy efficiency materials and resources, indoor environmental quality, or indoor air quality. And it focuses on all of those aspects for both the commercial industry, as well as the residential industry, because there's lead for homes well is for human health and wellness. What's wonderful about, well, is it really targets first and foremost, the human health and wellness, whereas lead first targets, energy and atmosphere very second to lead now though, because I do teach lead on behalf of the us green building council. They also now have human health is second. So it's been really great to see the evolution of lead and how it has put human health. Second. I wish it would be here, but it's yeah. Yeah. So that's

Erica Reiner (11:23):

Kind of why well-developed, because that piece was missing leads. So it's like a little little late to the game, but good job.

Annette Stelmack (11:32):

Yeah, exactly good job. And they dovetail really nicely and there are opportunities, like there are projects now that literally are a lead project and a well project. So they dovetail really well. No pun intended or maybe pun intended.

Speaker 3 (11:46):

Yeah. Fun in time then.

Erica Reiner (11:50):

Now how are you seeing out of pure curiosity for me actually, no, for it, this will be helpful for everyone. Are you seeing much, many residential clients that are just straight up homeowners who want lead or well certification? No, right. Yeah. No, I didn't. I didn't think so. It's more just like the credential like you having the credential is more what they're after than getting their house certified because that costs money

Annette Stelmack (12:21):

And truthfully I think for me, what it's really come down to and for, for the, the pros that are out there, this was a ball about my passion, you know, and it was something that was important to me as an individual and as a designer, because I feel like it designers, we are responsible for the research that we do and the design and products that we present to our clients. So we are ultimately the consumer on behalf of our clients. So to be a responsible consumer, as a designer was really important to me. So for me, I became self-taught, you know, became a lead AP became a well AP. And then we were, because I was presenting in the circle of sustainability. I was asked then by Wiley, they approached us to write the first book, sustainable residential interiors. And our first reaction was, well, we're not the experts. And they're like, well, no, actually you are, there's nobody out there doing this. And this was back like in 2003 or 2004, right. About the time that we had, I had started the USBC Colorado chapter. And so we kind of took a step back and I went, you know, yeah, I guess, I guess this would be great to share what kind of our story and how we approach things. And then I wrote the second edition in 20 12, 20 13, somewhere in there. Okay. I'm going to

Erica Reiner (13:34):

Go back to the book, but I interrupted you. You were right about to tell us about what well is and sort of what you may or may not recommend.

Annette Stelmack (13:43):

Yeah. So, well is terrific. If you are working with either residential or commercial client who really is concerned about the wellness of the occupants in the space. So, you know, if you're looking to support and, or encourage advocate for wellness, I would definitely pursue the well certification because it addresses things like, you know, the quality of the water, not the quantity and how much we use, but the quality of the water, the quality of the indoor air. They also look at nutrition and mental health and they take into account, you know, the lighting, which lead does too, but in a very different way. So they're looking at the circadian rhythm and, you know, how is the light patterns in the building, reflecting what the sun does so that we are healthier beings and happier in the space. So it just has a lot more criteria and categories that really focus on the human health and wellness.

Annette Stelmack (14:37):

So I think it's a fantastic program for that. And, and truthfully, you can utilize the gut, both guidelines readily they're available online. It's not like you need to run out and become certified per se because I have people ask me that, you know, well, should I become a well, or should I become a lead AP or both? I would start with just utilizing and getting familiar with the programs that are out there and then find the one that fits your niche and what the work is that you do. Because it really does vary, you know, between leading and well and the clients who are asking for it, my residential clients don't ask for it. They're thrilled then I know, but they're not coming to me and knocking on my door saying, well, I've hired you because you're a lead AP or you're well, AP they're hiring me because somebody else has referred me. You know, that's usually where our work is coming from.

Erica Reiner (15:24):

Okay. So let's go back to the book. What is it cover and who is it for?

Annette Stelmack (15:32):

So the sustainable residential interiors, the second edition covers my, my eco mentors and who would I call eco entrepreneurs? So for example William McDonough is in there. Janine [inaudible] is in there. So, so individuals who have been working in this arena within design for longer than I have, and really inspired me in those early days of when I was going to environ design and then eventually Greenbelt, which is hosted by the us green building council. It also has a slew of case studies. Cause I, I know for me, you know, designers, we're, hands-on, we're visual beings and that's where we get inspired and that's how we learn. So I felt it was really important that we have those examples in the book. So there's some well projects and there's some lead projects and then there's just some great green projects are sustainable projects.

Annette Stelmack (16:24):

It also dies into how do you create a healthy interior? There's a, that's a new chapter. There's also a new chapter on certifications and standards, both with regard to products and materials, as well as buildings and the rating systems available to buildings. And then from there, we broke it down into the construction specification Institute divisions of all the different categories that we specify. So everything from plumbing to lighting to interior finishes, interior furnishings you know, concrete windows and doors and all the light fixtures and, you know, anything you could possibly imagine, interior designer might, wow,

Erica Reiner (17:02):

You're listing out like what to look for with those particular things like, so in concrete, watch out for blah-blah-blah, you're going to want to look for the so-and-so.

Annette Stelmack (17:11):

What we did is we set it up in such a way that first, it just talked about the material from a historical standpoint and how interior designers started to use the product. And then we talk about what are the the good things you should look forward to product and what are the things to avoid and how to specify it. So we did get into a lot of details to really try and help interior designers basically use it as a how to guide.

Erica Reiner (17:36):

Great. And then certifications are always great. It's always good to have a third party standards you know, like transparency, all that good stuff that comes with it. What some of your favorite or at least like most commonly used certifications that you're looking for on your projects from a day to day basis?

Annette Stelmack (18:00):

Yeah, I've got my go-to. So I'm going to start with cradle-to-cradle. I will also look for anything that I can find through the living building challenge and their declare listing or standard, whichever you want to call it. Also anything with regard to indoor air quality. So I'd be looking to GreenGuard. I would be looking to the California department of health and education. They have a standard that I look to carb carb. Well, well, no, this is actually the CDP, H E M. And I can't remember the number that goes with it, but it's the California department of health and education and it's, it was specifically designed originally for schools, but his now translated into many other products and then the, and then the carb to complete

Erica Reiner (18:44):

That's California air resources board, correct? Yeah. In my yeah. Startup life. Yeah.

Annette Stelmack (18:52):

That's great. So, you know, those are just a few of my go tos. If I'm looking at tiles, I'm going to make sure that that tile is green squared. If I'm looking at wood, it's going to be FSC. Hopefully not always, but that'll be my go-to usually it's the forest stewardship council for any wood type products or wood materials that we'd be acquiring. What were you going to ask?

Erica Reiner (19:14):

I was going to say, I think you just taught me a new one. I have not been so familiar with green squared. Can you educate me a bit about that?

Annette Stelmack (19:22):

Yeah. So green squared came out through it and this is how most of the certifications come about. Usually a an industry organization like this was the tail industry comes together with ANSI, the American society of American national society of industry standards. They come together and they develop standards around sustainability there's performance standards that we've all had, but not really probably looked at really what to detail, but they came together and created a green squared. And so green squared looks at how is the tile, the tiling materials, the grout, you know, the mastic, the mortar, whatever else it is that you might be using, how, what different criteria is being met and how sustainable is it? So wonderful company. And I, you know, I know the company promotion, maybe not something we do, but you can go for it. One of the first companies who adopted essentially all the criteria that needs to be addressed under lead was Crossville. And so if you look at a Crossville tile, you will see that many of their Crossville tires are green squared. And so literally a big G with a, I think it has a two in it still, and then a green box. And if you see that, you know, that it meets all the sustainability criteria, I'm so excited. You taught us about

Speaker 3 (20:40):

This. I'm going to have to add it to my list. I

Erica Reiner (20:43):

Have been independently looking at tile companies looking to see, you know, poking around their website and kind of like doing the Google

Speaker 3 (20:51):

Keyword search. So do like

Erica Reiner (20:54):

What is sustainable? And I have found a couple and Crossville has come up, but I have totally missed out on the certification. Cause then that's a lot easier. It makes

Annette Stelmack (21:04):

It so much easier. And then there's, there's great websites that you can go to to get a short list of manufacturers. You know, so there's, there's the underwriter's laboratory has one called UL spot. There's mindful materials if

Speaker 3 (21:17):

You're we've had them on here. Yeah.

Annette Stelmack (21:20):

They're fantastic. And they have done, like for me, who's the the senior in the room, so to speak, it's so exciting to see how much change there has been and how the manufacturers have rallied around these certifications and they maybe can't always afford them and I'll throw it out here in a minute. But they really understand how important this is that we're getting to a place of transparency that hopefully eventually we'll have products that have labels on them very much like our food does so that we can see right from the get go, you know, okay, this beats, everything is that we're looking for on a job. I was going

Erica Reiner (21:54):

To say that reminds me of the wine industry. Sometimes when you go into a store, they're like, okay, these guys are organic and biodynamic and wonderful. They just a small family run operation, didn't get certified. So it's like,

Annette Stelmack (22:07):

For example, one of my favorites and you're in California, right? Everything is fire clay. Fire. Clay is like one of my all time favorite companies. I

Erica Reiner (22:14):

Thought you were going to say when you said Crossville, but they were the first one I found doing a great green job and they have beautiful, oh, everyone out

Annette Stelmack (22:23):

There they're, I mean, their product is exquisite. And the other thing that I look for is social responsibility. So are there a certified beef corporation, which I know that could be a whole nother podcast, but that means that they're, you know, being responsible on a social as well as environmental and sustainability platform as well. So I love them. They're, they're my go-to those two are my two main tile companies.

Erica Reiner (22:47):

Yes. Now I'm going to put my professor Reiner hat on just for a quick second and explain a little bit for anyone listening about why social responsibility is almost the same thing as environmental responsibility, besides the whole other ethical component to treating people correctly and respectfully there is also a connection to the environment. When any time you can get like the fair trade, anytime you can get someone, a fair wage or good working conditions, preferably both you are helping to keep people above the poverty zone and give people just better opportunity in life. And anytime we can do that for any kind of community, especially women and women workers, there is a impact on the environment because people can't think about going green and a, or doing the right thing. If their bellies aren't fried and there's a roof over their head. And anytime you provide more opportunity, again, especially to women population goes down. So overall, like I've said a thousand times on here before every single thing is connected. There's no like there's no, you know, it's not like it's like, I can't articulate that any better than I just did, but it's just all very connected. That's all I do.

Annette Stelmack (24:16):

It's very connected. And you know, one more thing that I would mention is in addition to platforms like UL spot and mindful materials, if you want to dive a little deeper and do more research there's a great company called building green and they used to have the green speck that, which has now turned into designer pages. So if you aren't already signed up for designer pages, I would definitely recommend doing that. Because again, it'll give you a lot of options around some pre-vetting that has been done on your behalf to make our jobs a little bit more straight. I wonder

Erica Reiner (24:45):

Why they didn't call it like designer pages or something to clue me in a little bit more. I couldn't agree more. I was maybe they're trying to broaden their umbrella and like,

Annette Stelmack (24:56):

I think they are, and I know you can go in and, you know, they have filters for you to go through and search and such, but yeah, it was, I was kind of bummed when green speck went away. Cause that was my go-to versus yeah.

Erica Reiner (25:08):

Okay. So designer pages, note to self and to others. So in your day-to-day work a lot of like material specifying, it sounds to me like, oh, so overwhelming, like you could just spend because each and every product has a list of however many say ingredients and raw materials and you are in my right that you are looking at all of those or at least cross-referencing the materials in, I don't know, a wall panel or a wall tile or whatever to anything that might be in the red list or red zone, danger zone, Clare, or other websites, et cetera. Tell us a little bit about what that work is like and how you get through it.

Annette Stelmack (26:04):

How do you get through it? So what I recommend is set up a general spec outline for yourself. So have one for all the different categories of products that you research and specify for your clients. So if you're doing, you know, interior finished specifications for a home whether it's new construction or renovation, get that outline set up in such a way that you already have a lot of your work done that, you know, the grout is going to be from this company, it's going to be hydrated and it's going to be these different qualities, you know, within the hydrant plan. So the, and, and that might be an ongoing process. Cause that's how we, it in the beginning, you know, we kind of took one category at a time, paint, tile, grout, you know? And so every time you learn that, then just add that to your spec outline so that you have that to reference.

Annette Stelmack (26:58):

Because the more that you can do that, the more it will, first of all, get ingrained into your everyday thinking that will also make the specifying process go more quickly and easily. So having some of those guidelines and criteria set up, whether you use the lead criteria use, you know, the well criteria or, you know, the declare, you know, living building challenge, or, and I don't normally do this, but I'm going to plug my book or you use my book outline because the book that's what it does, that's what we intended it to do for people. It already helps you to understand it. We don't go into products because the warning, I do want to give around products because I have so many clients who come to me and say, well, can I just pay you for your shortlist of products? I don't do that either.

Annette Stelmack (27:46):

Let me tell you why. You know, because companies get bought, they get traded, they get sold, they get, they change their formulas and it happens constantly. So for me, you know, I really will jump in and check every product every time, which is why the third-party certifications are so important. If you know that you're specifying grout and tile, that is already green squared, you have so much of your work already done for you, unless you were working with a client who's chemical sensitivities, and you have to look at specific protect, perhaps ingredients that you have to avoid. Then it's a whole nother level of research, but for the general public and the designers who aren't diving into that whole area, go with third-party certifications, they make a huge difference. Another great website that I will use as a resource, especially if I'm jumping into, let's say products, I don't often spec like installation, you know, I'll, I'll go to oh, of course it's gonna escape me now. Parkinson. Well, Perkinson wheel has a fabulous list. That's called the precautionary list. If you haven't used it, definitely check it out because they've already done the due diligence and they even go through, okay, PVC pipes. Here's what they cost. And here are some alternatives. So great, great website that has kept up to date constantly. It is such a gift to the world of design and architecture.

Erica Reiner (29:06):

This episode is going to have so many great little resources in the, in the notes. Thank you so much. You're welcome. Say that list for us one more time per cautionary lesson, right. It's called

Annette Stelmack (29:18):

The precautionary list and it's from Perkins and well, great. And if you go to their website, just put in precautionary list, Perkin and well, and you'll get right to it.

Erica Reiner (29:26):

Okay. So I like to ask, what are your favorite three ways or top three ways that you like to go green and an interior design project. And let's say this is you can choose residential commercial, but let's say for finishes and furniture. Okay.

Annette Stelmack (29:44):

So for finishes, I always think of what are my biggest Plains of finishes surfaces, surfaces, the floors, the walls you know, any of the windows and indoors even, and the millwork, because those are the areas that cover the most surface. So definitely taking those three or four components into consideration is really important. If you can get to the place where I have a client right now, she and her daughter have chemical sensitivities. They wanted to put carpet in. I tried to talk her out of carpet that didn't work, but we're going to do what on the main floor. And then they're going to do carpet in the bedrooms and she was going to do the recycled polyester. And I went, please do well, if you do nothing else, let's find you a wool carpet. I know you're going to pay a little bit more first of all, last longer, and it will perform better. And she did. I'm thrilled that she really heard me and went that way because that doesn't always happen. Yeah.

Erica Reiner (30:37):

I mean, yeah. And that's the, that's the thing that comes up a lot for me and for clients. And I'm sure other designers and green designers is for every project and every single product, you have a range of criteria. You have to meet, you have to meet their aesthetic and style. You have to meet their perhaps color palette could be separate from that. You have to meet budget budget, and then you have, and then we're kind of adding in another layer here is the green element. And so you know, with however many criteria you have, you can try to get something that meets all of them and that's always the goal, but sometimes you have to talk to the client about a particular product, not just the project as a whole and say like, okay these were the options. I found that like are going to meet these criteria as closely as possible, but we might have to reorganize the priority on this particular thing. Just like you see on those, like those like reality shows where they're supposedly like buying a new home and, and the, and the client goes, I want this, this, this, and this for this price. And the realtor goes, aha, let

Speaker 3 (31:42):

Me show you what you can get. Well,

Annette Stelmack (31:45):

And I'm so glad you brought that up because one of the things that I think is extremely important, no matter when we come onto the project, you know, as designers, sometimes we might be the first person they hire. We might be the third or fourth person that they hire, no matter at what point to ask what the goals and objectives are to really help your, your client and the team stepped back a little bit, because then when you get to those products where you're just not sure what you're going to do, you can pull those out and say, okay, what was the number one objective on this project health, then let's make sure this is a healthy product. And every, and you may have to pay a little bit more for it, but it really helps to have those goals and objectives and write them down and share them with the team.

Annette Stelmack (32:24):

I found that that's always been the most effective for furniture, you know, it's kind of the same thing. It's again, what is the biggest surface area? So upholstery, pollster and mattresses are two of the most important and can either be support health and sustainability or can be highly toxic. Oh, the other way. Yeah. Yeah. So it's really important that you take those two in consideration. And then I think right behind that is if you are, for example, doing RL hard surface flooring is area rugs. And because again there, the larger piece of that puzzle and then a case pieces, so kind of the same festive fee.

Erica Reiner (33:04):

Absolutely. And I don't know if in this recording it'll show up as having just gotten a little bit staticky, but in case you didn't hear her, she said the last thing was case goods. And so that, or is like kind of the hard furniture, the non upholstered pieces in your home. Okay, great. That was that was awesome. Thank you so much for sharing all of that. Absolutely.

Speaker 4 (33:29):

Tell us

Erica Reiner (33:30):

One place where we can find you and reach out to you.

Annette Stelmack (33:34):

Yeah, I go to my website, I've got my email on there and I also have excerpts of the book. So you can at least get a taste of what that looks like and that's and www dash dot in spirit dash, llc.com.

Erica Reiner (33:49):

Awesome. Thank you so much. This was wonderful. And it was so fun to have you and share your story and your knowledge and all that good stuff. So we so appreciate it.

Speaker 4 (34:02):

Thanks for having me. Absolutely. And we'll touch base soon. All right. Bye. Everybody. Have a great day.