GRAN MARBELLO
Experts in Porcelain Natural and Engineered Stone Benchtops
Up until then solid surface was dominated by Granite and was very expensive.
Also the installation process was carried out the way it had always been done and in our view the installation joins were unsightly and detracted from the overall appearance.
Our main supplier of finished tops had invested heavily in a state of the art solid surface manufacturing plant. Latest equipment cut down manufacturing costs and just as importantly increased the quality of the finished product.
They also had global supply contracts with the best Granite and Engineered Stone suppliers so dealt with the stone companies at source bypassing the wholesalers and reducing raw material cost.
So with a state of the art facility coupled with global supply contracts the cost issue with Solid Surface benchtops was addressed. They now became affordable and the jump from Laminate Tops to Solid Surface became an easy decision to make instead.
Then we addressed the installation and the quality of joins and edge finishes. The latest CNC equipment helped with the accuracy and the quality of the finished slabs.The joins then became the point we had to improve. After looking overseas and in other industries we found the perfect solution. It was an electrically powered clamping system that attached to the top of the slab and straddled the join. We sourced a superior glue formulation that coated the join and the clamping system forced the join together and held it until the glue had set. The glue was colour matched to the slab.
With the clamping system came the end of unsightly joins. Before, when you looked at a solid surface top that had a join the eye was drawn to the join. It stood out due to the size of it and quite often not very well colour matched to the slab.
From that point we were away. No one could match our pricing as we had fundamentally changed the structure of the industry. No one could match our quality of finish and our joins were by far the best. The competition had to change to keep up. Margins dropped through the industry to a sustainable level and solid surface benchtops share of the benchtop category increased dramatically.
We continually try to innovate and keep ahead of the competition. Although we fixed the big issues we keep looking for ways to improve. Things like the industry standard for solid surface tops was to template the tops on site before being manufactured. Then they were manufactured based on the template and installed, sometimes up to four weeks after the measure was done. This meant four weeks with the kitchen out of action.
We started measuring some of the benchtops from plans. This meant that as soon as the new kitchen was installed we were there the next day installing the tops. Unheard of in the industry but standard operating procedure for us. It is innovations like that that keep us ahead of the pack.
