Carpet coating compositions

In a carpet product comprising a coating composition which secures carpet fibers to a carpet backing or substrate, the improvement comprising a carpet coating composition which comprises:

• (a) an interpolymer present in an amount effective to function as a binder in the carpet coating composition, said interpolymer prepared by emulsion polymerization of
• (i) about 60 pphm to about 90 pphm of a high Tg vinyl ester monomer selected from the group consisting of esters of alkanoic acids wherein the alkenyl group has 1 to 13 carbon atoms, and the Tg of a polymer prepared from the high Tg vinyl ester monomer has a Tg of about 20.degree. C. to about 45.degree. C.;
• (ii) about 10 pphm to about 30 pphm of ethylene;
• and
• (iii) about 1 to about 10 pphm of a low Tg vinyl ester monomer which is free of reactive moieties except for the vinyl group, said low Tg vinyl ester monomer is selected from the group consisting of C.sub.1 -C.sub.10 alkyl esters of acrylic acid, C.sub.2 -C.sub.10 alkyl esters of .alpha.,.beta.-ethylenically unsaturated C.sub.4 -C.sub.6 monocarboxylic acids, and C.sub.4 -C.sub.10 dialkyl esters of .alpha.,.beta.-ethylenically unsaturated C.sub.4 -C.sub.8 dicarboxylic acids, wherein a polymer prepared from the low Tg vinyl ester monomer has a Tg of less than 10.degree. C.;
• (b) water;
• and
• (c) an emulsifier present in amounts effective to disperse the interpolymer in the water, wherein the vinyl ester monomers.