Sharon Koehler

Stone Industry Consultant

When I became a kitchen designer, the first thing my boss ever said to me was, “If you ever order the wrong cabinets, you’re fired.”        

He turned and walked away and gave me no clue as to how I was supposed to be right 100% of time. No one is right 100% of the time. Oh, the pressure! I took his warning to heart and figured out ways to cover myself, reassure the customer and always order the correct thing. In all those years I never ordered the wrong color or style and I never got fired. 

When I made the segue over to the granite world, the premise was the same: “Don’t install the wrong color.” It’s costly. It’s time consuming. And, you look like an idiot. Plus, since the customer is angry, even if the second install goes perfectly, they will always find something wrong because they are angry. Not to mention, in these days and times your gaffe will probably end up being plastered all over social media.

But, three granite companies later, I do see the wrong stone being installed from time to time. The colors and people may change but the scenarios are basically the same. And the funny thing is one simple step would prevent all this from happening. See if you can figure out what it is…

#1 – Y’all know Steve the contractor, right? Fine, upstanding contractor, does good work and uses you on all his jobs. He pays on time, very organized. His jobs always go off like clockwork and you love to work with him. 

So Steve calls one day and says, “Hey, I need a 96˝ vanity. Mrs. Lucy and her decorator have selected Durham quartz.” 

So, you get all the pertinent information, price it up and he gets the job. Yay, Steve! You template it and order the slab from your Cambria distributor. It comes in, you fabricate it in record time because Steve is a good guy and you like to help him out whenever you can. 

Your installers show up at Mrs. Lucy’s front door, all cheerful and happy but when she opens the door and sees the vanity top she shrieks, bursts into tears and says that is not the color she selected. Oops!

Steve calls and asks if you ordered the right material. You double check all the paperwork. You look at the slab remnant against the Durham sample. It’s all good. Steve stops by, looks at everything you’ve got and leaves confused because everything looks right. 

Steve goes by the customer’s house to see what the problem is and Mrs. Lucy pulls out a sample of Botticino marble. It has been labeled on the back by a no-name, price-slashing, out-of-business fabricator as Durham quartz. Oh boy!

OR

#2 – I’m sure you all know Mrs. Suzie Homeowner. She’s a nice, perky, middle-aged woman. She and her husband are empty-nesters that are fixing up their home a little at a time so they can spend their golden years in the comfort of their own home. She has new floors and new vanities in two of her bathrooms and she picks Black Galaxy for the master bath vanity top and Blue Pearl for the guest bath vanity top. 

You give them an estimate. They accept it. You fabricate it and go to install it. Mr. Suzie Homeowner is at home to let you in. You install the tops. The Mr. says everything looks fine so off you go to the next job.  Their plumber stops by and hooks up the sinks and the faucets. It’s all good. 

AND THEN the phone rings and Mrs. Suzie Homeowner is yelling in your ear about the tops are on the wrong vanities! Somehow, someway, the Blue Pearl ended up in the Master Bath and the Black Galaxy ended up in the Guest Bath. Before you open the file, you say a silent prayer that both the vanities are the same size and this is just a mix up. 

No such luck. The master bath is a 60˝ double bowl vanity and the guest bath is a 36˝ single bowl vanity. What the heck? You go through the file and find that somewhere in the paperwork, at some point in time, the colors somehow accidentally got reversed. 

You realize that to re-fabricate, tear out, reinstall the correct tops and pay a plumber to go back, you are losing money. You offer her the job for half off if she will keep it. She says no. You offer her the job at no charge if she will keep it. She says no. NOW you are losing money!

OR (this is the last one, I promise)

#3 – Please meet Ms. Diane Homeowner. She got the house in the divorce plus half his 401k so she could fix it up (he was a lousy handyman and a very bad husband). She wanders around your slab yard and picks Ubatuba. You write down all her selections and estimate the job. She accepts your quote and it’s all good to go. 

The cabinets are being installed in approximately 2 weeks. She will call with an exact date so a template can be scheduled. The cabinets come in and 2 of them are broken. It’s a 4 week delay to get new cabinets. Four weeks go by and the new cabinets come in but since they weren’t in the same run as the original cabinets, the color variation is too much to deal with, so they must go back. It’s another 4 week delay until the 2 cabinets come in and are installed.

So, 10 weeks after she made her selection, you template the job and 11 weeks after she made her selection you fabricate it and install it. You go in with a lockbox because she is out of town. But a funny thing happened out in your slab yard during those 11 weeks. 

You sold all the Ubatuba you had except for her slab and you ordered more. The truck showed up to deliver it and instead of moving her slab out of the way, a bundle of Ubatuba was off loaded in front of her one lone slab. 

So, when fabrication sees Ubatuba on her cut sheet, they go get Ubatuba in the location the cut sheet says it is in. EXCEPT, what they don’t realize is that it’s a DIFFERENT lot than what she saw.  It has almost no gold in it and it is several shades darker. 

She comes home from out of town and she knows it’s different. Her sample is lighter and has gold in it as well. You’re in trouble now. You can try the old “colors are different from slab to slab and lot to lot” line but she isn’t buying it. She saw you put HER name on HER slab. What’s a fabricator to do?

The one thing all these scenarios have in common is that the colors are very stable. They have little to no movement. Because the colors are as close to uniform as possible in the granite world, no one ever encouraged or asked these customers to come in and do a slab layout. Who lays out a vanity on Black Galaxy? Who lays out Ubatuba? Durham quartz is man-made. What you see is what you get. Who would lay that out? 

We as an industry always lay out the Golden Thunder jobs or the Fusion jobs or anything else that has a lot of movement or color or both. But we sort of ignore the more stable uniform colors. Who lays out Blue Pearl? No fabricators that I know.  

But in each case and probably most cases, the slab layout is your last line of defense against installing the wrong anything. While the customer is there, it’s the last chance you have to verify each and every decision they ever made: sinks, faucets, edges, backsplashes and anything else they might have chosen. It is much better to discover a problem before it’s installed then afterward.

Is it a hassle? Yes, a little bit. But compared to the time, trouble, man hours and money that will be spent fixing the mistake, it’s a small price to pay. Take your pick: a little hassle up front or a lot of hassle in the end. The slab layout wins every time.

Sharon Koehler is a 10-year veteran of the stone industry. Currently she is the head of marketing for Artistic Stone Design in Richmond, Virginia and has been a regular contributor to various trade magazines for several years. Any thoughts or comments may be sent to sharon@artisticstonerichmond.com.