ComCom approves sale of 67-year-old carpet firm Bremworth to Americans

Wednesday, 1 July 2026

The world’s largest flooring producer, the state of Georgia-headquartered Mohawk Industries, looks a step closer to being allowed to purchase the iconic Kiwi company for about $77 million.

Another iconic New Zealand firm is one step closer to be delisted and owned offshore after the Commerce Commission gave US conglomerate Mohawk Industries permission to purchase local carpet play Bremworth.

Mohawk is the ultimate parent of Bremworth’s biggest local carpet rival, Godfrey Hirst New Zealand. The company is headquartered in Calhoun, in the US state of Georgia, and is the world’s largest flooring manufacturer.

The commission had initial concerns about the merger of the two local companies, given that combined, they would have a minimum of 70% of the country’s domestic carpet supply by volume.

But it ultimately decided that given synthetic carpets make up about 85% of all carpet sales in the company - a much larger percentage than wool - and that there are many other synthetic carpet importers, the supply of soft flooring products overall would not be uncompetitive.

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“The proposed acquisition would remove the existing competition between Godfrey Hirst and Bremworth, with the loss of competition being most acute in relation to the supply of wool carpets, which is where the merging parties are the largest current suppliers,” committee convenor Dr Derek Johnston said.

“However, in the context of the broader soft flooring market, the Commission recognises that the predominant share of carpet that is supplied in New Zealand is synthetic carpet, and that the merged entity would be constrained by existing competitors that supply synthetic and/or wool carpets, and also by consumers and retailers switching between different types of carpet in response to a relative price increase,” he said.

“After assessing all of the information before it, the Commission considers that the loss of competition as a result of the proposed acquisition is unlikely to constitute a substantial lessening of competition in the wider soft flooring market.”

Back story

The Bremworth Carpet Company was founded in Papatoetoe in 1959 by Doug Bremner.

Two execs left the company in 1972 to establish Cavalier Carpets, which listed on the NZX in 1984. One of the company’s directors was future Reserve Bank Governor Don Brash.

In 1988, Cavalier bought Bremworth. Three years later, the company was renamed Cavalier Bremworth.

Cavalier Bremworth had many strong early years as a blue-chip stock but declined as it battled to compete with an increasingly open market for synthetic carpet imports.

Godfrey Hirst’s arrival in New Zealand was part of that more competitive local market. The Australian company established operations in New Zealand in 2006 when it purchased the assets of the collapsing iconic Kiwi brand Feltex Carpets.

Godfrey Hirst became part of Mohawk in 2018.

In 2021, Cavalier Bremworth rebranded itself as Bremworth and undertook an ambitious plan to produce only wool carpets. Its advertising campaign at the time, called 'Going Good', criticised synthetic carpets as being full of plastic and shedding microplastics. Legal action by Godfrey Hirst followed. The case finally ended in April 2025 when both companies reached an official settlement.

Bremworth denied breaching the Fair Trading Act but formally acknowledged that parts of its 2020 campaign may have misled consumers, and it removed the disputed advertisements.

Bremworth has resumed making a small amount of synthetic carpet in the last year.

Takeover

Also in 2025, Bremworth saw its revenue plummet to $80.3m - it had surpassed $148m in 2018 - and an activist shareholder group, frustrated by what they described as a '10-year-long train smash,' mobilised a vote to sack the existing board of directors.

The shareholder group successfully rid the board of long-standing directors and installed long-time primary sector figure Rob Hewett as chairperson, and Craig Woolford was appointed chief executive to restructure the company.

It was understood a sale was always a possible outcome of the restructuring process.

In October 2025, the new board unanimously backed a $70m–$77m buyout offer from Mohawk Industries via its subsidiary Floorscape Limited, which has been steadily gaining shareholder and regulatory support ever since.

In May this year, Mohawk was named in a Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Frontline (PBS), and Associated Press investigative documentary called “Contaminated: The Carpet Industry’s Toxic Legacy”, which revealed that for decades so-called “forever chemicals” ( PFAS, or Per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances ) used to make carpets stain-resistant were flushed into rivers that provide drinking water for hundreds of thousands of people in and around Dalton, Georgia.

Residents in the area, the so-called “Carpet Capital of the World”, are suing major manufacturers like Mohawk Industries and Shaw Industries, alleging these companies knew about the health risks for decades but continued using the chemicals.