Episode 43 -Arik Tendler CSO at Cambria, shares the History and Growth of the Quartz Countertop Industry
Episode #43 | Arik Tendler | The King of Quartz
Arik Tendler, chief sales officer of Cambria shares his journey from Israel to California, and how he came to work in the quartz industry. Arik discusses Cambria's focus on quality, innovative designs, and commitment to customers. He also shares how he utilizes his experience in sales to give insight into specific sales strategies and how Cambria continues to lead the industry in quartz countertops.
Listen to the full episode:
About Arik Tendler
Arik Tendler is the Chief Sales Officer for Cambria. Arik spent 20-plus years in the United States quartz and stone industry. Today, he oversees Cambria’s worldwide sales activity and brings deep knowledge of the market and product to drive distribution, sales, and fabrication.
Arik grew up in Israel and got an early jump in the stone industry when he started working in his father’s fabrication shop at 5 years old. It began with helping to clean the floors. By the age of 10, he was assisting the stone fabricators with drilling, and by 15, he was cutting and installing stone. In 1999, Arik moved to Los Angeles, California, with his family to start his own business, a stone business of course. And in 2019, he joined the Cambria team as its CSO.
Cambria is the leading producer of natural quartz surfaces. Natural quartz surfaces like countertops, waterfall islands, backsplashes, shower surrounds, and custom applications in residential and commercial spaces.
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Mark D. Williams<br> 0:00
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Speaker 1 1:01
only course I can use is the top top top notch. If I would play was the quality. I can reduce my cost of goods in 10 20%. Like many other competitors, we call it acid wash it you wish it was acid it looks really really white for a while and is getting very yellow and lose depth very quickly. We don't even know how to play this game
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:33
Welcome to curious build a podcast. I'm Mark Williams, your host today I'm joined with Eric Tendler, the chief sales officer with Cambria welcome, Eric. Thank you for having me. Absolutely. Well. We have some ties here to Minnesota. Peter Martin is a big fan of of the show as well as a sponsor through Pella and you guys used to work together. Yep.
Speaker 1 1:50
I came after him. You came after him? Yeah. But we met we used to meet him in the trenches. Okay. Okay.
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:57
And how long have you been with Cambria? Now? over four years? Okay. Okay, so pretty recent. I was reading a little bit of your bio. So you came over from Israel, in California in like 99. And I was with Caesarstone. I
Speaker 1 2:12
Kim, just me, my wife and three daughters. Okay. But the plan was yes, the plan was to start a quartz company in America. Okay.
Mark D. Williams<br> 2:22
Interesting. And you have a family background in that a little bit. Why don't you tell us a little bit about that. And then we'll kind of dive into kind of your time in California and then kind of coming into Cambria. Yeah,
Speaker 1 2:33
okay. So, I grew up I grew up in Israel 6000 miles away. My father was a stone fabricator. So I know it's not the right though. I think I mean, I'm I like to say I'm 55 years in the business because I'm pretty much all my life in stone install shops. This is the generation that you know, they all from school, that day office, you come to work. And so starting is swiping to shop to help drilling holes to a measurement to everything, summer on stone, literally all my life. But really started around age 2122. And I like to say that one claim to fame, I'm the first fabricator in the world cutting courts relied 87 Yeah, I don't think anybody can sit. There was one company first company was back in Israel named Caesarstone. And I saw how courts taking over and that was my main reason of doing the jump on a boat and do this and move to the US.
Mark D. Williams<br> 3:39
Because there was a bigger market here. Why leave Israel? Um,
Speaker 1 3:43
I saw the market share or the process of courts taking over anything and everything else. And I remember checking about courts in America, it was like, There's nothing there. And I remember turning to my wife and said that this is you know, people will find it hard to believe this era before Google. Yeah. And I heard about a company of DuPont American become big American company bought into a quartz company and I remember telling my wife Oh, my God, I mean, they're going to really help create demand. We should try it and we move straight
Mark D. Williams<br> 4:20
to La so you're in your mid 20s I was 3535 Okay, so
Speaker 1 4:25
speaking about you know, with younger generation younger employees oil or friends or anything coming through his cell Oh, it's hard or it's a risk I'm like, let me show you. So you know why three my three daughters my twins were eight. My youngest were two. I raised I got lucky you know sometimes you need lucky life. I got very lucky was amazing partners. And that said jumped in Yeah. And moved to LA in No, yeah, the rights rights I Yeah. Caesarstone LA, that's already started.
Mark D. Williams<br> 5:05
Okay. Interesting. What was going even back I even in my notes, it's like funny thinking about building as a whole, right? So you've got like, to me if I was just if someone to say what are the most primal things to building a home from the beginning of time? I'm thinking stone number one, I'm thinking wood, you know, in terms of like things that are foundational, but stone? I mean, there's still obviously structures that are stained today that are made of stone. Why is it? I mean, just this kind of a interesting question, or I think it is, but why do you think humans have such a? I don't know, we have such a propensity to go towards stone like it feels very solid, very tangible. And I'm just curious, your take on it, you have worked with a lot of different stone products, at one of my questions later will be a little bit about the world market. But why, in your opinion, why do you think stone even today, you know, 1000s, of years later to continues to be in a lot of our modern homes.
Speaker 1 5:55
I think it's all sorted by Yeah, maybe back in the day sorted by how long it's going to hold on, I'm not sure. And it's evolved to aesthetics and stuff. But people are attracted to the cold and heavy, for some reason, feel of earth and in the real stuff. And whatever the success of quartz is, quartz is like natural, it's 93% natural. It's got the same feel the same look the same everything. But but you're right for I don't know how many, how many 1000s or hundreds of 1000s of years. This is the leading foredeck for homes in general. And, you know, thank God keep it this way.
Mark D. Williams<br> 6:32
Right. What can you explain, especially to the audience that maybe listening aren't builders or I mean, at this point, especially in the United States, most people are familiar with courts, we'll talk a little bit about the evolution of courts. But I think a lot of times you just mentioned that 93% of it is natural. I think there's a lot of you know, people in at least in Minnesota, where I currently am, and we're doing this interview, you know, Grant has been had his heyday for a long period of time, obviously, natural surfaces, or I guess they're all natural, but like marble, I should say, is what was often referred to as natural products. It seems like in our market, whether that's true or not, is a little bit of labeling. And then you have courts, most of my clients who would maybe be uninformed, will say, Oh, you know, quartz is a manmade product. And there is obviously evolution, we'll talk about Cambridge's design principles, but 95% of it, you know, 93% of it is actually natural. Why is it that quartz is so often mislabeled as manmade? I mean, you don't say I'm saying like, can you explain it? Yeah.
Speaker 1 7:26
So if you look at a different option of countertop, you know, in America for a fee, for good few years, it was solid surface, it's plastic, right? But if you're looking for stuff for the, for the real, for the real field, you have either marble, granite, quartzite and quartz. Now, yes, in theory, quartz is manmade, because it's but it's 93% quartz, which is one of the most amazing mineral in nature. Now, I know, we might go to talk later, but especially in Cambria, we use very specific quartz and the plant is here in Minnesota, as you know, the final product that the end user is getting is pretty much same thing as granite even it's a better version of stone, if you will, yeah. And that's in by the way that's part of the or one of the secrets to court success is just a win win win throw it out to everybody
Mark D. Williams<br> 8:24
now so I think size I mean, would you say that size has a lot to do it I mean most slabs let's say you can get to eight feet nine feet 10 feet but courts how big of a slab can Cambria produce?
Speaker 1 8:34
We're most of our stuff is the jumbo and the super jumbo. So we talked about 65 square foot slob. That's a normal, it's Yeah, yeah. And size matter. But it's so the only reason. As I said before, it's a win win win win. Because it's end user, which is maybe the most important thing, you can know they have something better than quartz surface in your countertop. Now, the word quartz now is getting trickier because it's silt, what used to be. So I can tell you that for many, many years, the majority of the larger players in the business, the old use the same machinery, the same percentage of quartz, and quite frankly, almost the same quality of quartz, but things change dramatically. So I would say that in the last 10 to 15 years. It's not the same thing. People using now there. I call it fake. It's not the same machinery. It's and again, nothing gets made. The majority of the fake is made in China. So it's still the same machinery in and there's no you can cheat on the level of courts. So I always like to say I can save a lot of money. I can change my cost of goods, if I'll be willing to, you know, to run quarters. So I can tell you at least on the Howard Cambria we use the really the best of the best of the best of the quality. It's A it's very unique words mine that we own in North America. And even then we use, you know, just just the top of the top. So if you do the courts, right, it's the best product that end user can have a builder can hit Get can use designers architect, can anyone in this chain that specify or using?
Mark D. Williams<br> 10:24
Yeah, we could talk, we had talked for three hours about Cambria specifically. And I do want to do some of it. Part of it. What I'm interested with you specifically is even your role of sales. And so my questions will be it's more business related. Regarding the maybe going back a little bit to the history, I'd heard somewhere and I was curious, you would know. But like, Israel and Spain, I had read somewhere had basically a lot of the courts stuff that we see now or some of the innovation had started in those two countries specifically, is that am I accurate on that? Or is that not true? Um,
Speaker 1 10:52
first of all, Israel is a small country, you know, it's the size of Jersey and Israel as was almost 100% market share for stone, everything was stolen. I don't I have no idea why. Many other countries, the same thing I can do the first quarter line was sold to a company in Israel and playing was the formalised so this is where I started. And Israel as a country is a very early adopters. And in everything in, in cell phones, in cars, and anything. So market share wise, I think Israel is maybe number one in the world, really, in courts in
Mark D. Williams<br> 11:30
general, I think it's overnight, I'm sorry, in user sales.
Speaker 1 11:33
In you know, obviously, it's in penetration, I would say, okay, the amount of users Okay, so I would say about 90 Over 90% of the whole of the residential homes. Wow. Is squirts started before anyone anywhere else spin was sick. And I think in I don't know, what's the percentage over there? In Australia, same thing. It's literally an island, obviously. And the same thing, early adopters in more would say even contemporary taste.
Mark D. Williams<br> 12:04
Yeah. Agreed. I went to school in Australia for a year, and I definitely saw a lot of the architecture was definitely more modern or contemporary. That's funny. Now, you know, going back, you know, to 99, or, you know, when you first came to the California, I can see the opportunity, because if Israel has a 5% market share is hard to grow. Because, of course, is also it's going to last for so long. It's like where's my replay? You know, where's my replacement here? Where the US at that time was probably what under 10%? Under 5%? Oh, 00 Plus, you have the United States which we? We do a lot of things very bad. But what are the things we're doing very good as consumers and as a consumer market, if you're in sales, there's a lot of upside here if you get in with the product, right? So America is big. Yeah. And it's huge. Do you have 300? What's the population of Israel? 7 million? Yeah,
Speaker 1 12:46
that's yours. Yeah. All right. Yeah. So if you bring somebody really, really great to America, he just sees to a long, long time for people to see it even to try it. Now, keep in mind, we're talking about a product that you you need it once every seven, eight years. Before and after you don't care. So I need to catch you once every seven years, and you have a two month you into it. Right now. America is pretty smart. Are the really smart people hear you show them something good something? Well, they'll jump on it. But again, it's big. How do we get to every corner takes time. So when I heard the early 99, I remember asking, what's the market share? Or how much sales are in America? And I heard the number I was like, You must be kidding me. But you know, it's the old joke, you know, the tune, you know, selling shoes in Africa,
Mark D. Williams<br> 13:40
you know, but I know where this is going. Yeah, it's uh, how do you look at it?
Speaker 1 13:44
Is it opportunity, or it's, you know, so it says, there's no sales is a good thing, or it's a bad thing. So I'm the kind of guys that says, Oh, I think it's a good opportunity. We jumping in?
Mark D. Williams<br> 13:55
Was it hard to convince your wife to come?
Speaker 1 14:01
Thank you still laughing about it? Yeah. Because I remember, I was planning to go six weeks ahead to prepare stuff. And she see me picking stuff. And she's like, Why do you think the winter stuff? I'm like, Debbie, because we're certainly moving. Right? It's Oh, yeah, you're right. So while you're picking your narrow tennis thing, I mean, cuz we not coming back? Maybe. So, you know, again, I can tell you one thing that now I'm pitching, you know, and whenever I coach people say, learn your numbers, prepare stuff, which is kind of weird, because I didn't prepare nothing. Because if I would do it, I have Affinia with a sit here today. You know, I had no real business plan. Now.
Mark D. Williams<br> 14:47
That's a little bit like we before we came on the show, Eric was asking me a little bit about the history of the podcast and I was just sharing with you that you know, I didn't really have a plan. I loved it. I just jumped in with both feet. And here we are a year later and I have it's kind of The business plan has quickly evolved quite quickly once I knew who my consumer was, and, and also just a passion for what it's become. And so I think sometimes as we have mostly everyone that's been on the show has been an entrepreneur or bonus, you know, business owners. Some have started, you know, I started when I was 23, I had nothing to lose. And I laughed because my roommate in college was in financial services, and he tried to sell me disability insurance one time when I was 23. Emily's name is Ryan, I'm like Ryan, as like, I can only hope to get disabled out move home, my mom will make me Huckleberry pancakes. And he's like, I have no argument in my book on how to combat that logic. But now fast forward, I'm 35 years old. Oh, man, if I had, you know, I have three kids. And I'm like, life looks a lot differently with that responsibility takes I think it takes a lot more courage to especially not only to leave a country, choose a whole new career plus, tell your wife be like, you know, pack the tennis bags, you know, we might not be coming back for these tennis rackets.
Speaker 1 15:50
You know, my favorite thing is, you know, how do you make sure in the military taking over an island? You know, you drop the troops and you burn the boats.
Mark D. Williams<br> 15:57
Now that wasn't that. That was when they came over to South America. Right. That was the conquistadores?
Speaker 1 16:04
I guess Yeah, I can tell you one thing. I bring my bullet by myself. Yeah. So you know, we did it was you know, was no money was passion, and maybe even leave a little bit? Yeah, definitely. I had no idea what is a p&l and balance sheet or cash flow plan. And we just had the big dream, and we went
Mark D. Williams<br> 16:23
for it. So let's fast forward because like I said, We'll ride time before we write a question. So you get to California. Walk me through those a couple early years here, and then we'll kind of fast forward to Cambria
Speaker 1 16:32
Oh, no, I can I can, I can literally write a book about my first few years in America. Because again, you know, you're talking about a guy that landed in California, and I can tell you I signed a deal with Lowe's not understanding was Lowe's. How was that? Yeah, I mean, no idea. I knew the name from the
Mark D. Williams<br> 16:49
NUS court because you had the rights to sell on the court. Okay. Ali Ali only Yep. But what do you
Speaker 1 16:55
mean the rights of silhouettes? Well, it gave you the rights to civil Rolison the moon, nobody knows. Right? It means nothing. Sure. So nobody's buying courts and beg then America had laminate countertops, which you could not find almost anywhere in the world. I'm sorry.
Mark D. Williams<br> 17:09
What kind of countertops? Laminate. Oh, laminate. Sorry. Gottschalk. Yes. Solid surface.
Speaker 1 17:13
tile, tile countertop. You can find it anywhere in the world. I remember walking through expensive homes, like, what is that? I can give away an apartment in Israel without having stone. How do you bridge the gap? 99, I would say is the end of the era that kitchen were very small. Nobody really care. Very functional. That's it. It was not like today you see double islands, right? Big islands.
Mark D. Williams<br> 17:44
Collars pantry, the serving areas. Yeah,
Speaker 1 17:47
big kitchen connected to this part of the living room is become the number one room in the house. It was not there, like back then. And I remember seeing that my biggest problem is to convince somebody that grew up was tile or solid surface or laminate as a countertop. And the day comes and he was dreaming about the granite countertop, and the day calm. And here we are. And I forget about your dream. And we're going to upgrade your dream to quartz. And they look at you like Oh, my goodness, better. DREW.
Mark D. Williams<br> 18:20
They're like, they're like, what's core? It's like, do you wait, do you also sell Rolexes on the moon?
Speaker 1 18:25
So so that was a challenge. So the first few years were the challenges? I mean, could you show people like what was how did you get through the Audi round with folder with samples. I was either one employee or two employees in in his little space or rented from his soul, stone fabricator in LA. And either wife calling me because you know, my favorite story is, you know, I'm trying to sell peach somebody in courts and my wife is calling me and telling me that she's trying to fill Yes. And the ATM doesn't work. You know what it means? Right? Yeah. So how you mitigate that? So you need a lot of support, I wouldn't do as well as support on my wife and kids be honest with you. Yeah. And but again, the first two, three years was hard, hard, which means is nobody want to buy your stuff. But so thank God, I remember. And I can tell you, I show you one story, one of my first opportunity to to I had to convince a fabricator to help me build a countertop for display that they give away for free in the first showroom opportunity in Beverly Hills. And I went to the fabricator and he basically I'll share with you the bed words that he told me but he told me that I'm a F criminal, because for this piece of s, I'm going to bring my wife and daughters to America 100% your story. And I guess they smiled. And he looked at me as Eric I just by the way, funny way he said it in a nice way said pretty much I just kick you're out of here and you still smile smiling. Why is that? Are you stupid or just naive? Right? By the way, the fabricator is still there. So I said that oh, it's called the shuffle. Because in 87, I did the exact same thing to the, to somebody that came to pitch me this. Keep my business cards, you're going to need it, trust me, and I left. So I guess if there's one thing that saved me these days, in the first few years, is that knowing the capability and the potential of this thing? You
Mark D. Williams<br> 20:33
knew you had a superior product before anyone else even knew what it was? It's exactly what it is. Yeah. And we're at that time were you it let's say on the sales that you were making? Were you getting the product made back in Israel and shipping it over? Are
Speaker 1 20:45
you Yeah, everything was made in Israel back then. And shipped over here. Okay, that makes sense. So again, I could write a book about the first few years and maybe it should it sounds like a good one. Yeah. It gets jokes like this I can tell you a lot because it's true stories. I think it took us about five years to see that okay, okay. This is the two lights are coming or it's good it's good stuff Yeah, it's it's coming for companies three four companies only fighting for their market share which is very healthy. And you know, you're going to trade shows you want to go to the stone show your your the unwanted child and then in an arena you can even be here so we used to go to solid surface shows just to show I want to meet builders, I want to go the other way. Speaking about builders, I can tell you the big builders when one of the early adopters to quartz I'm talking with KB homes than an hour of the of the world early early adopters you know the customer the waiting for the designer to specify but they're the bigger one that truck home was pretty early adopters
Mark D. Williams<br> 21:52
because they could pick and spec it for all their homes well out of curiosity What was the reason that they what did they see? What did they like about it? I'll tell
Speaker 1 22:00
you it's easy to specify because was very consistent and doesn't break switch was speaking of a builder's warranty and they got the back to back warranty. Now we Cambria we give you a lifetime warranty which is unheard of in the business. And it's transferable put it aside for a second for a builder quartz is a lack of headache basically you pick a design you know the price is consistent. The client know exactly what he's going to get. You're getting almost
Mark D. Williams<br> 22:29
zero headache, you're just eliminating all the future issues. Yeah, that's so
Speaker 1 22:34
it used to be funny we used to standing in a trade show for companies one of them is DuPont the company pretty much moved to America because because it's kind of I thought about they're going to really help create the man in there they didn't do nothing It was like funny me from Israel bigger than them after two years in America oh my god there's a Spanish company that was kind of Home Depot big a Home Depot only that almost no capacity to do anything else. It was me small guy from Israel running mostly after the kitchen and bath in the builders and there's another company from the Midwest who is you know funny colors funny people it's called camera
Mark D. Williams<br> 23:13
so camera what year did camera actually start
Speaker 1 23:16
camera really started at 2002 Okay we the ground running as competitors it was a very friendly competitors because very nice people and we really went to different direction so it was so far it was not even a competition quite honestly it's go convince creating demand for Category let alone and Brent so it was it was great fun with
Mark D. Williams<br> 23:42
so whiskey I actually should know this but I don't was so was I know Cambria obvious ism was sort of Minnesota and obviously the Davis is on it now but they didn't start the company. Oh yes, they did start the company he
Unknown Speaker 23:51
bought the machinery from a bankruptcy.
Mark D. Williams<br> 23:53
This episode is brought to you by Alpine hardwood flooring. They've been our partner now for over a decade installing all our wood floors on all our new homes as well as our remodels. And on a personal level Adam and Anthony Jenko the owners are just absolutely amazing people they've been so supportive of my career, as well as doing anything we need to make sure that our clients are happy, and they work so well with our other vendors and trade partners at not only protecting their product, but also ensuring everyone else's looks great. So if you're looking for a wood floor or for refinish, I highly recommend Alpine hardwood flooring find them at Alpine hardwood mn.com or Alpine hardwood mn on Instagram. This episode is brought to you by peloton Northland for 19 half years I've been building homes and 95% of all my homes have used Pella windows. I couldn't be happier to call them a partner in our builds and our remodels. Whether you're an architect, a designer or a remodeler, I'd highly recommend Pella windows that can fit old homes, new homes, reclaimed commercial and really everything in between. Pella is a company that we trust and that we recommend to our clients. Additionally in management, Peter and I have just been absolutely fantastic people to work with as well as mentors to me personally. So when it comes time to look for a window, I'd highly recommend Pella windows. Find more at Pella northland.com Also if you're interested you can hear episode one where I interview Peter and Ed together for a great lesson on business and Pella windows
Unknown Speaker 25:19
and Morty
Mark D. Williams<br> 25:21
courts manufacture words overseas are here
Speaker 1 25:24
no no over here there was a another company that tried to put it together here in Minnesota raise money from from pension funds and stuff went bankrupt quicker than anything I don't know what made these even think about it consider that but they they bought it from bankruptcy and started from scratch pretty much
Mark D. Williams<br> 25:46
amazing. Were they at that point so then they were creating they were no longer were they ever importing courts and then fabricating and here going over there always interested in like because we'll talk a minute about the tour that I took the summer there because it's very impressive. Anyone that is local or even not local fly into and check it out. Because it's very impressive, especially as line seven the new line and just watching your whole facility is just incredible watching that kind of production. But back to the original question where are they importing stuff like you were no they were they trade a
Speaker 1 26:16
one manufacturer may Cambria I guess some historical thing about the original plan was a bit different not to create the brand to be an OEM type of deal. Pretty quickly change and the just went for it.
Mark D. Williams<br> 26:29
So how quickly today were they on your radar? So you're here 99 They were an old two would pretty quickly you knew who they were, oh,
Speaker 1 26:35
it's a small it used to be a small industry. So you knew right away again what he was very from day one. In the first tradeshow came to introduce himself shake hands, invited me to see the plant. And we got to be a very friendly competitors. Yep. And the market was so small back then just to create demand. It was a huge mountain to move. So there's no competition, quite
Mark D. Williams<br> 26:58
honestly. Right. So you just yeah, whatever you can do to work together to to move the sled that makes sense. So let's go towards your time. And Cambridge has a lot of sales questions for you. And it just, it just so interesting. How long was that period? Or before you said, hey, well, I guess what were some of the driving factors for you to leave what you had created in California, and to go to Cambria, walk me through that transition period. 2011,
Speaker 1 27:20
I sold the company. Again, the name was not mine, either distribution rights to the US. I'll try to avoid but they wanted to go public. And they had to buy the distributor, mostly in Australia in the US, they bought me out. And I'll call it the American dream. It took me four days to realize this is this is a nightmare. And way too young to retire I was up 4748 47 ish. And it was really, really boring. I had noncompete which for years noncompete which is I was a really good boy until the last second. And I tried to consult and I tried to invest in I tried to go to real estate and I tried many many things. Nothing gives me any joy whatsoever.
Mark D. Williams<br> 28:07
Did you have a non compete globally did the United States in
Speaker 1 28:10
the US at that point, I was like I don't care. I'm, again, I'm I'm always playing by the rules. And I said, You know what, I'll wait for the last second. It took me a really relatively quickly I realized that there's nothing I can find my I can't find my place. I can fall in love with anything else. And again, I did a lot of real estate, a lot of consulting investment. You know, I'm an entrepreneur and I move very quickly in a fast paced, fast paced guy. It was so boring for me. And I knew I gotta go back. Yeah. So again, Fast forward four years. I started a private label from China. So and I did it for about four years. So I did spend a lot of enough on the nun. Original quartz manufacturing line was it's, I get I'm trying to be polite. So I can I have a good reference point to compare. Especially Cambria to anyone else.
Mark D. Williams<br> 29:17
I mean, that's gotta be hugely, I mean, four years is no joke. I mean, to your point that you just made more succinctly than we're about to expand upon. But like if you've kind of seen what the opposition has to offer and you sold it, or you owned it, I mean, you can speak to an incredible depth of like, no Cambria is this much better than these things? Is that really kind of the depth walk me through a little bit of some of the knowledge that you gained more specifically that's
Speaker 1 29:41
that's that's really easy because compare Cambria to what we call non Brett online that's not It's not almost not fair. Okay. I can compare a camera to anyone else. You know, it's funny because think about was only years in America, pretty much pretty much to every meeting I go people know I was there already. And in many cases, people look Give me like, What are you doing here? Seriously. It's a I made a decision and I'm a car salesman. If I'm a car salesman, I'm going to sell them or citizen, nothing else, right? That's my usually my answer is, if I'm staying in the industry, I'm going to join the best of the best. This is not me as a salesman prick with a quote, slogan. Anyone in the industry will tell you that. So
Mark D. Williams<br> 30:25
yeah, no, I think that's a good comparison. I've often likened it to like, you know, I'm also in sales. I love sales. I love to sell, frankly, almost anything. One of the things oddly enough that I enjoy most about the podcast is even having, let's say, our sponsors, I love selling other people's stuff, frankly, frankly, that's actually the easiest to sell someone else's stuff. I don't have to fulfill it. I don't have to warranty it. If I if I, I mean, honestly, I'm getting out easy to sell it. I mean, if I love it, and I can speak about it firsthand, like I'm all in, I love to sell things. And so I can just see you doing this journey, like, Well, hey, I'm gonna go to Cambria. This stuff's amazing. You know, if you could sell before, imagine what you can do now.
Speaker 1 31:01
That's exactly the way I feel about it. And, um, you know, I remember, you know, again, I was always we were always friendly. And, and what babies don't want to have Cambria. And we always used to laugh about it, we got to join forces. And because, you know, it's, obviously when you sell good quality, it's so much easier. Now, Kimbra is, is more than just great quality. And I know I'm biased, obviously. But but you know, what, in a way, proof is in the pudding. I mean, I could have gotten in the kind of go either way I want. When you have the perfect storm, if you will have an amazing product was within in your toolbox is everything else, which is, you know, people, it's for me, it's right away. For me, it's number one in every company in any size, shape or direction people is the number one, if you have the right people with the right culture with the right attitudes.
Mark D. Williams<br> 31:59
It's that's what really comes. I had heard recently it was that, you know, culture, Trump's strategy. And I think a little bit what you're referring to is that sounds like there was a good there's a there is a good culture at Canberra, I was listening to actually, summer casts interview with Brad Levitt from, I don't know, six months ago, or eight months ago, and she just mentioned how much he enjoys working within Cambria. She's been there for I think she said she was employee number 13. Or she'd been there for a long time. But I guess the point of it is if you have if everyone feels a sense of ownership, and is inspired to work for the company, when you own several companies at this point, you know, you're a multiple serial entrepreneur, and you're like, hey, I want to go there has to be something within Cambria that is still fulfilling that itch, because otherwise, to your earlier statement, you'd be getting bored. Right?
Speaker 1 32:41
I wouldn't stay I wouldn't show and if I would join, I would never stay right. So think about how do you take and it's a fairly large company. Now. How do we take this large group and create this caring intrapreneurship aggressiveness? At the same time, you're gonna get to play by the rules, because again, it's not a five people company anymore. You're at 1900. Now, something like something like that was 2000. But so how do you keep this in a thing? That's what's unique about us, we are group of passionate people are aggressive in a good way, carrying the Treaty of the passion for it to be the best, sell the best, and keep with fixing issues and get better and better and better. Was all it was an all the evolvement that business takes. And so it's fine. It's fine in in. So going back to what you said. So you create the culture to help on the strategy and is it's kind of it's a system Agreed.
Mark D. Williams<br> 33:47
Agreed? What would you say? I mean, what if you could give some examples or what are things that motivate you now, what are some things you're really excited about that kind of gets you like, hey, this really exciting, I'm excited about this spiritual,
Speaker 1 33:59
we're competitors. We're very competitive people that are here to compete. We go off to market share in our business, again, so we I mentioned Rolex before but if you want to buy a good good watch, you want to spend money, you have a good 10 different brands. You want a good car, you have 10 different brands, you want to phone your company, you have sunglasses, you pick a product in our business, there's no other brands, we're just kind of good in bed. I sit in the opportunity. Some people can see there's not I see it as opportunity. All my team and by the way, we're proving we're growing at a time that everybody's crashing. It's kind of crazy. We are the only brand you have once every seven, eight years you go to redo your countertop, because you bought a new condo or a new house or you remodel your own. You look at appliances, you have multiple options, good appliances, you want to look at cabinets, you have multiple options. You go to a countertop, you want something The brand, the real brand, the real quality, there's only one showing that was Kimbra. Now, not everybody's aware of it, that's my problem. But that's my job to fix. But, again, we don't, as I said before, it's almost the only show in town is it sounds arrogant, but we are by far different.
Mark D. Williams<br> 35:19
Well, especially when you're talking about, you know, the percentages of what you're using. And what's real, like advocate, you know, obviously you want because you're respectful young man. What some other competitors, you know, I've heard that this ratio, you know, 93% courts, what are some because obviously, Cambria if it can, compared to some other courses is going to be more expensive. Now, if the average consumer doesn't know about the lifetime transferable guarantee, you know, all these other the design will get a little bit why I feel like I feel like you guys have a huge leg up in design. And I know that's intentional. But walk me through what some of your competitors are doing in terms of, you know, the baking mixtures, why is some of the other quartz products out there? I mean, they're less because they're, I assume they're using more resin and less quartz, what would those ratios fall to? And how far out if you could I mean, I have known nothing about this, could you go to 100%? Resonance, 0% quartz or what? You know, like, how far can you go before the thing just does not represent anything? Yeah, think
Speaker 1 36:15
has changed a little bit. But in theory, okay, cost of goods, right of the product, the original product was 93% quartz. So if we stay was the 93% quartz. Now, the place, the place to play is the quality of the courts, and the type of the fillers. So I can tell you, I can tell you about Canberra, because everything else they said is going it means. Obviously, I know a little bit about our competitors. We use the most expensive courts by far. And I'll explain in a second what it means some other designs, by the way, because there's a consequence over there. So I'll answer it differently in order to do the quality of the cord surface that we manufacture. In order for us to do the designs that we're doing now, you know, the Inverness, they've got depth into it. So if I can, in order for me to use alloy, real alloy that we're using now is become a big hit, I got to be able to control and play was the courts basic in different words, the only courts I can use is the top top top notch, if I would play was the quality, I can reduce my cost of goods in 10 20%. Like many other competitors, I'm not saying with a sea from overseas that you can buy a really low grade quartz, we call it acid wash it you wish it was acid, it looks really really white. For a while it is getting very yellow and lose depth very quickly. We don't even know how to play this game. We just love playing this game.
Mark D. Williams<br> 37:51
Understood. That's actually that's a great quote right there. I love that. We don't know how to play that game. So we don't even play it and you're speaking to quality. I mean, you're saying like, hey, we we know quality, because it affects all these design things. But you won't even know how to take something that doesn't really work and make it look like something that it does. Because the fallout of it is you just not practicing. It's like practicing bad ethics. Some of the other day said like, Oh, I'm gonna look at your books, I want to make sure you know, you're not cooking your books. And like, go ahead. I honestly don't even know how to cook my books. So like golf for it. Like there's nothing to hide here.
Speaker 1 38:20
You know, it's the typical business discussion, which is you know, we can say hey, cambia you control your the merciless, why don't you want to add the line also to be the super, the Volvo whatever it whatever brand middle door. We don't know how to do that. We didn't know how to cut corners, we didn't know what we didn't know how not to do it not perfectly. Instead behind it. So when I go solid, my product costs way more. And then a that's why I can support this was lifetime warranty, by the way, no fine print. And by the way, I'll give you a secret 92 or 93 thing they need 2.7 I'm pretty sure of a warranty cost is goodwill is a client call me and say Oh, I'm so sorry. My AC guy came and put the leather on the island. I'm like, Ah, like, seriously, you let somebody we sending people at no charge to fix it. I'm talking about
Mark D. Williams<br> 39:14
because your reputation is so powerful. I also believe there's economics behind that as well. The fact that you're transferable though, is a game changer. I know companies and there's nothing I think is still valid. The United States has a different culture than other parts of the world. We talked I've talked about this before. And I'll just use Switzerland and since we're talking about watches, you know, a lot of their homes is multi generational, because it's so expensive to even be there. Right? So if you're gonna do a window because what you're gonna do triple glazed trip, you know everything you can because you're thinking about your grandkids living in this home in the United States, I assume because it's for a younger country for one thing, but you know, I think the average person lives in a home for like seven years now. I'm a builder. So I'm super biased. You know, as grown up as a kid, I lived maybe two years in a house. You know, I just thought that was normal. Until you realize like, yeah, that's not that normal. But I guess my point is, is that People don't often think in the home space, at least in the United States, that they're not thinking about multi decades and generational type housing. So the idea that Cambria because if you said lifetime, we're as long as you owned the house. I mean, honestly, is that not not that big of a deal? The average is seven years, like, I'm pretty sure we can last seven years, but that did that you're transferring, it means that a split that might be 10. owners. That's pretty amazing. It's pretty
Speaker 1 40:24
amazing. And we don't play games, and there's no fine print. And we still behind it. 120%. And I'm telling you now, almost 93% of us that is owner is a user error. And we still doing this, by the way we can. And we are because we know the quality of the product. It doesn't it so that that's what behind it. And again, you've been at our with our with our plan. Yeah.
Mark D. Williams<br> 40:49
went to summer. So
Speaker 1 40:50
I've been in I wouldn't tell you, every every courts when he first entered the world, but I think I've been in the majority besides besides the, you know, the China and India and stuff, which I've been in bunch over there. It's a second to none. You can find anything. And
Mark D. Williams<br> 41:08
I mean, first of all, I'm a small little operation, right? I have, you know, five people. And yes, I employ hundreds of people through subcontractors. And we work on a jobsite outside. So I'm not in the manufacturing space. But I have a great admiration for a companies that can scale because to me, being a little entrepreneur, I'm just like mind blown that you could have even 20 3050 employees, it just becomes a lot. It just I know it's possible. And I'm sure I'd hire good people, but it's just not what I do. So I don't so I'm always kind of like amazed by it. So knowing that au of 1900 2000 people, but when I went to the Cambria tour, and I know that the Davis family had a food background, right, and you're hearing this, of course, from the person who's given me the tour, I told her, actually, you'll get a kick out of this, the tour took almost three hours, and I was the only person there. And she said you've asked more questions than any other person we've ever had on tour. And some of them they couldn't add like our course wanted to take video and all that stuff like don't know, like, why I'll promote it like no, you're like, I'm just I don't think like that. I'm very open person. But I was so impressed at, you know, the cleanliness is crazy. And I know I'm a bit of a fanboy here. But it's crazy. You walk through it. And I'm like, I could drop my salad, not a sandwich, I could drop my salad on the floor here and eat it and be fine. And like the idea that you're stockyard for those that haven't been there. You Eric can maybe speak better to it. But essentially, because Cambria specs are. So spot on down to the whatever mill, you guys are the only company that can stack all your slabs horizontally, and then vertical where everyone else has to stack them vertically. I'm doing a bad job of explaining this off camera. But essentially, you guys can, you can store way more material in a smaller space than any of your competitors. Because you know that this 300 foot stack is not going to fall over and crush Little Timmy on his way to work. Anyway, that's just one of the many things like the catwalks. And so maybe I'll turn it over to you let you speak I was just still kind of gushing over. Like, just how well organized everything is how clean it is. I mean, it looks like the operation center for I don't know, NASA.
Speaker 1 43:08
So that's what happened when, when food people getting into the store business. And I remember myself as a guest as a competitor. Oh, walking through the was it like that from the very beginning? We'll get through the plant and turning around to tomorrow. Oh my god. I mean, I never seen a plane that clean and, and you know, being clean it just one aspect of it. Because you know, it's so just the clean part of it is how much respect we give ourselves to the product itself. And I'm saying you you mentioned the way we storage it yes, you're right in most places is storage, vertical Stegen. Without camera, it's hard vertical keeping the slab which is a whole different stress on the slab and this and that. So Cambria is and by the way, the tour that you took, I think on average. I mean, we take hundreds of people through the plant a month, I mean designers, architect builders, hundreds of people a month. It's a pretty unique animal in this business. And again, as I said, I've seen plenty of plans in Europe. It's a different world. So that's where we are. As I said before, we didn't know how to cut corners.
Mark D. Williams<br> 44:22
Let me go to we could talk about this for a while but I'm just curious to give some perspective. What is a couple like what would it be the global market share or dollar amount for like countertops in general? All countertops any idea roughly? Or is us better for that?
Speaker 1 44:40
This? It's a moving target. Okay, I can give you a very
Mark D. Williams<br> 44:46
creative so let's do it this way. Let's do percentages, then what in the United States anyway, since I don't build overseas at this point. What go go there we are. What percent of the United States market would be courts versus let's say everything else. If
Speaker 1 45:03
and again, these numbers, these ballpark, these numbers are based on different things. But if I have to remember this commercial or residential, so it said the average the total mix is over 50%, though courts.
Mark D. Williams<br> 45:16
Wow. Okay, that's way higher than I was thinking.
Speaker 1 45:20
If I have to guess quartz is 4550. Maybe even what we're,
Mark D. Williams<br> 45:24
and I'm trying to get trend here. Where was it 10 years ago? And where was it? 20 years ago,
Speaker 1 45:29
20 years ago, of course, was zero 1%, half a percent. So years ago,
Mark D. Williams<br> 45:34
half a percent made. So in 20 years has taken 50% of the market. Yeah. And
Speaker 1 45:39
I remember, as they said, they moved here at two partners. One One was born and raised over here. And the other one is a real estate guy from Israel, which I mentioned before we get into something we need luck in life. That was my part of my luck. Yeah, I'm in I remember the growth at the beginning was pretty. For me, it wasn't it didn't move. In our thinking the third year or fourth year, I remember my, my American partner, unfortunately, recent piece. It turned out to be so we had to wow, this last quarter saw the growth and I was like Lance, I'm disappointed. It's moving slow. It really turning out there was Eric What what are you really, like? There's I saw this thing flying from zero to 88%. Market share in five years. Now, again, compare apples to bananas, because you know, Israel is different is a way smaller way easier, early adopters versus America the size and these and that. I'm not surprised at all. Because 20, white 20 since 1990. Quartz is and still the best countertop you can have in your countertop. You as a consumer, and obviously anyone and everyone behind you. It's a win win. So it's not just oh, it's a great product for you. But the process to do it. No, it's great for the builder. Warranty, we talked about a designer, architect, maybe the most important to fabricator, the stone fabricator, the stone, the hands on link, if you will, in this chain, that's really do the hard work. Quartz is the best work for them to work with. So there's a reason why quartz is so popular, and he's not going anywhere. So like won't be able to do that.
Mark D. Williams<br> 47:26
Yeah, I want to talk to you a little bit about design, I feel like now obviously, a built in building for 20 years. And I wouldn't say I'm a great courts expert. Oddly enough, I leave a lot of my decisions to our designers, and at least the homes in the style that we're picking, it seems like a lot of marbles. For whatever reason, that's the more earthy tones. And over the last five years, I've seen a huge dramatic quality shift at being a professional, I can spot the difference just by looking at it to know whether it's quartz, or you know, let's say marble or something like that. But the the amount, I should say, it takes me a lot longer to figure it out now than it did five years ago. I believe it's getting to a point now where it's becoming so amazing that you does it at this point doesn't even matter, frankly, right? And it's like you know, you're looking at the glare you're looking at all this other stuff where I'm going with this I feel like Cambridge in particular has done such an amazing job with design and leading with design. So you being that you're chief of sales that this is something I'm sure sales and design definitely play together. Am I right in assuming that somewhere along the line you Cambridge got together and said, Hey, we want to be innovators, not only in the technology side, which you already were and have been for decades now at this point, but designed forward because I feel like a lot of your marketing, you know, I get your weekly newsletter in my in my inbox and email just showing the latest designs are what they are. And, you know, now we see so many backsplashes, and I feel like it's been like that for about three to five years. You know, just from my perspective, seeing full backsplashes, which is more Cambria and it's just but it's a design thing. You guys brought it, you've done a tremendous job with marketing it. Talk a little bit about sales in general, like how you what a your job specifically is to sell into a market to take over market share versus like, how does it play with design? And how do you see them working together? I
Speaker 1 49:16
have the easiest job. I have to fly around enjoy the country, the scenery and meet people for lunch. I mean, that sounds like really, but on a serious note, and I do I'm flying 100 flights here. So I could be Yeah.
Mark D. Williams<br> 49:29
Get your pipeline up. I believe you have your pilot's license,
Speaker 1 49:32
and I stopped flying since then with carrier I have no time for this. I'm flying helicopters but and you gotta you gotta be in the right mindset for that. And I'm like, again, I'm I'm laughing and PTSD from from not working in the area where I love. So anyhow, yeah, design in sales, you know, with other good designers. We can be very talented but we're no sale. So Cambria made a decision back then that we wanted to be wouldn't be the best we want to be different. We want to be different in anything and in everything. So it started by how can you manufacture even these designs with the existing machinery, if you will. So Cambria change basic he from scratch almost everything. So Cambray is very different from everyone else. No, just by the result, it started by the infrastructure, the machinery. So we completely tweaked everything we have. Everything is patent. I mean, we spent a lot of time energy and money on this. And that's why the things that you see so different are so different, right? It's study was Brittanica. And all the way No, we have I don't think he even saw yet our New Windsor. And there's such amazing stuff, special finishes
Mark D. Williams<br> 50:47
that alloy that I saw, they all think so when I did the tour. So oddly enough, I used to coach cross country running here locally at Chanhassen. Drake Kilburn is one of your chemists, down at Cambridge, I ran into him, and I when I was on tour, like, hey, Drake, so he showed me around a little bit, he's like, yeah, now he can't take videos of that. Now, we can't take photos of that. But you know, they're in product development. And so I don't remember the name, you would know what it is, of course, but they were just showing all these really cool alloys. And I remember going over and feeling it, it was like the etching. And I was, I was just like, wow, this is incredible.
Speaker 1 51:16
And this would, this would make us so different. And so unique, we have, first of all the amount of designs were over 200 designs. My next my next competitor, we got 60, just to give you the flavor into three finishes, a thicknesses, and we have our special finishes. And every one of them is different from everyone else, because of the the way we do it. That's where we can pick it up with warranty, matte finish or matte finishes. Nobody gets anything similar like that. cut the story short, we are very different from every aspect in machinery, and results. Now, how do you take our over 30 locations in the country, and we have sales team everywhere. So you mentioned before culture, but culture people, so you hire the right people, you train the right people, you make sure that we all align and work together shoulder to shoulder because again, we're not corporate America. We would like to be in the from the bedside, obviously. We prefer we wouldn't be we want to work together and how do we win together and we aligned together? So in how do we carry the message? As I mentioned before, once a decision maker, either a builder remodeler, large or small, whatever company, end user with their hands, if you will, literally on the Cambria it's a game over might our challenge on the sales side is how quickly time is time to market, how quickly I can get myself in front of the right people that making the decision. Because again, once they see it, they see the
Mark D. Williams<br> 52:50
difference. Now that's true. So what have you found across now you flying all over the country? And I, as a custom home builder will often rely on my interior designers, especially when it comes to you know, selections? So do you and you talked about getting in front of the right person to make these decisions? Do you feel that in general, that the interior design groups are the ones that have the most power? Is it the client so then they ask their? You know, I know you're going after all of them, but I'm just curious, like percentage wise of Who do you think has the most way builders, and I get like if you went if you gotta let NAR now you're talking about scale? That's a whole nother ball of wax versus small little custom guy like me, or as an architect, I guess how would you how would you look at those categories?
Speaker 1 53:38
The bad news is for me that I have to win them all. Yeah, the good news is when I put my hands on them, it's easy. It's relatively easy. The builder, the builder is important. And the designer is very polite, obviously, the end user need to like it, and obviously the fabricator so it's a it's a four legged table that I have to be keep it very stable. As I said before, good news wouldn't cheat. It's the real deal. Obviously, we can argue you can come and say Eric is apartment building. I'm not going to be my no $2,000 or I'm not going to pay $90 a square foot installed 100 120 I'm gonna rent it for 1000 bucks. So I got it i i get it. But I'll give you a quote from one of my biggest customer big builder. And when I joined Cambria, I'm looking at the numbers and I'm looking at the sales and the geography. I'm like, wow, who's this client is buying hundreds of subs a year I call the guy I know from previous life advantage. I reminded him reverb is so nice. I can ask you a question. I just joined Canberra. Why are you buying so many kittens so much? What's what's behind it? Just design your clients asking for it. So everybody was laughing yourself? It's a really weird question to ask a client I think I knew from before, he said Eric obtenga secrets, you are the cheapest upgrade to a property. Now this point I'm getting offended on chip, what do you mean? You say if I want to upgrade my house, my property, which makes me eat, always easy to sell, always get the top dollars. If I'm going to replace all the flooring, it's expensive. If I'm going from my local cabinet guy to Germany, that's expensive. with you guys, my average top is a slob and a half. So I be all into my fabricator. 2000 bucks more, in my wheelhouse look different. You know, I was like, oh my god, this is one of the best lines ever heard it is the good. And I heard his only client, oh my god, this guy, you should hire him as a as a as a copywriter. Seriously. So that's in a nutshell, the old guard the influence designers, builders, end user in the fabric era. So we really get stuck just uncovering the four. It's really important.
Mark D. Williams<br> 56:06
I love that that's a great story. My dad built homes back in the 70s and 80s. And I remember and he didn't build to the level that we build now and this not knock against that. But it's just you know, by his own words, but he used to always spend a couple $100 more on the front handle. And his logic was it was the first thing somebody touches on your house. And he wanted it to mean something so that it wasn't something cheap. They grab it like whoa, this is instantly they went everything else in the house must be at the same quality. I think a little bit visually, that's what you just described you walk in and because of the way kitchens are, you know, you've mentioned that the last 25 years really kitchens, the way they've opened up have been the focal feature of the house. Well, if you have Cambria if you have some latest designs, like boom, it makes it makes you now think that everything in this house is like that.
Speaker 1 56:55
You know, I was looking at I was looking to buy a house over here in Minnesota. So I you know, I went to a couple of agents and they show me I saw here over a dozen houses, and they had no idea who I am and what I'm looking for it was COVID Everybody flew out of California. And here we go. Here's now it's here in the lake. In most cases, I was kind of run here. And here's Dallas and here's the appliances are this. And this is Italian cabinetry. And by the way, it's Cambria Euro Canberra, like let me know can you explicit Oh, so when you get to this point, you're in a good spot.
Mark D. Williams<br> 57:32
So that's hilarious. I would love to get to a point that where they you have people to sell you on your own product. Oh, I
Speaker 1 57:38
was. I thought somebody's joking with me. Like, I found this broker nobody else and she could know that. I'm ready. All right.
Mark D. Williams<br> 57:46
I love that man. Did you? Do you still stay in touch with that guy that you sold? That gave me that line when he first is he still buy slabs? salutely Yeah. Oh,
Speaker 1 57:53
it doesn't. And by the way, he's buying just are really all the unique products are luxury line. That which is it's crazy. I agreed with it. That's crazy. I can see why we know why. The answer is yes. Yeah. Yeah. And by the way, when the economy gets slower, we see growth from the builders. Yeah,
Mark D. Williams<br> 58:15
well remodeling usually, I mean, it's interesting to be in this market, right? Because you know, as interest rates have gotten really high, you know, maybe you can't afford to build a new home or even do a large remodel but what can you do? You can update your countertops, right? Oh, well
Speaker 1 58:28
we definitely when when market get weird I would say we usually see a growth in remotely now. Because of our where we are in a category you know, new construction was never been our biggest biggest thing. We always been strong was remodeling but definitely when rates going up you see more remodeling and even even you know the typical flippers if you will building a house now removing it and try to flip it. kitchens that is the number one of the road in Canberra is maybe the only courts that look different. You mentioned before natural stone. The problem is the usage. So if you buy yourself in this great natural Calacatta as the builder Good luck you on the hook was warranty. Right? This is going to stain from lots of white. Yep, forget about lemon. Oh my god. Yeah. So scratch,
Mark D. Williams<br> 59:23
I think it's a different person. And I'm not the best person to ask that question too. Because obviously a you would have volume is it like furs and smile. We have a 9019 house that we remodeled, beautiful remodel. And we did Claire marble, and we knew and we're fine with it as the owner like the order. Yes. But to your point. I can't tell you how hard it is when people come in. Most people especially younger, I'd be an anomaly. I mean, I'm 43 Most people my age would have no time for Claire marbles. They're like no, and I have three kids and I'm fine with being stained. I sort of liked vintage and I'm okay with that. But to your point. Now I am I am the minority here. So it's like you are the
Speaker 1 59:57
minority. The mature All righty. We'll call you back. Yeah. So you come here with the builder and change my code Ditto. Well,
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:00:05
here's how I got into Cambria. You're like, this is a good plug for Cambria, unintentional intentionally. So we had a quartz countertop, not Cambria, and it stained. And they could not explain why. And they fought us so hard to get it replaced. It was a brand new house, it was a tour house, we finally because of my relationship with my fabricator of over 20 years, he was able to lean on them enough because he did enough business to get it replaced. And they did replace it. So good for them to do the right thing. But they couldn't explain why we're at Cambria. Oddly enough. We the next house that we had there, I don't even remember the issue. It doesn't really matter. But we call came by they said no problem. We'll take care of it. And you know, away we went. And so it was night and day of how they handled the two claims. It was a new house. I mean, imagine 10 years or 20 years down the road, how different that would be.
Speaker 1 1:00:55
So yeah, this this is almost easy for us. Yeah. It doesn't happen a lot. We don't play games, we have a lifetime. So there's nothing I can argue about. We do see here and there people really abused or somebody abused the countertop. But there's on the majority side, right?
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:01:11
Interesting. Now, what do you see Cambria your technology that you're inventing? Because you seem to keep inventing new technologies to meet your curiosity and where the markets going? What's next? Or what are other products that the quartz products could expand to?
Speaker 1 1:01:28
You mentioned changing in trends. First of all, now we see lots and lots of shower walls, full showers and in some areas in the country. It's not even us is nothing new about it. Right? Muster showers, which is changed the whole look of now speaking by the way you can put your money and upgrade a house, obviously, to see him to
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:01:48
see if that's because what are these so yeah, we tried
Speaker 1 1:01:50
the theater installer hates it. And we really tuned and really connected to our installers. fabricators. They were like it, it's too it's moving too much.
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:02:00
Is it? And so it's completely non porous. I've you know, you'd have your waterproofing behind it. So in some ways, it doesn't even matter if it is or it isn't from I'm thinking from a full walk in shower, right? Like I've done full porcelain sets. How thick would the porcelain wall be if
Speaker 1 1:02:12
it was eight feet tall, different porcelain got other problems? Okay, it's crack easily. Yeah,
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:02:17
they'd buy usually they buy two they told me because I asked him why is the price so expensive in my fabric and my fabricator said, he goes, I buy two, because half the time the brain
Speaker 1 1:02:25
is great by two cores. So one of the ends are going to go very quickly is pretty much so it's crazy. So
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:02:30
but yeah, that's I'm not the first person that told you that. Oh, yeah,
Speaker 1 1:02:33
we know we know the business right. But as I said before, courts market share is so great. And the growth is so amazing, because it's a win win win for everyone in the chain in the food chain. You mentioned Porcelain is scratchy Z chip, the biggest problem encountered we see them now trying to get into countertop, it is getting chipped very easy. And by the way, you cannot fix it. You cannot fix it. So between the scratches and the figs, and then he's still the full body which mean your edge detail or where you cut for the sink. You see that this is not the same thing as basically it's a print. Right And and I think we both agreed before our people are not stupid people are smart, and they like to get really good quality. So showers you're getting from quartz, you see the site is a full body. Obviously the look is it's it's a little bit it's not better, it's a little bit more expensive than tile. surprising enough. It's quicker. So it's in and out. You don't have to do stairs, steps and steps and steps. And it's become very popular. You mentioned backsplash, fireplaces, flooring, I mean they use it walk me through
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:03:41
flooring. So where are you seeing it in the flooring application. Flooring
Speaker 1 1:03:45
obligation is I would see if you can customize and cut full slabs to whatever size you want. So it's a larger format or unique sizes that you need for a kitchen or to any anywhere. We see a lot of powder room for flooring and walls, we see so many amazing application. And as I mentioned before, I think I would say we put most of our efforts on the designs. And what are we saying designs you mentioned that finishes. So between our new design and new finishes that we could never done before. Because we didn't have the machinery for that. That's why I see the future because I don't see courts going anywhere. And the thing that designs and the finishes will take us to the next level. All right, again.
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:04:30
On a personal note, what do you do as we kind of wrap things up? How do you I mean, it sounds like you're traveling a lot. But what are some ways to that you self educator? I mean, I like to ask this question because I think as entrepreneurs are out there looking for you know, everyone's interested in like what how other people educate and get inspired and learn. What are some ways that you like to, you know, keep feeding your brain as you essentially like a shark you're constantly swimming nonstop.
Speaker 1 1:04:57
I have to admit Give up. And I also switch now to the Netflix of the world and yeah, so no, it's easier and I love documentaries. So I mostly see document business documentaries and no just by the way, yeah, he's athletes, you know, the spirit that books have one book that I think I only read I read many, many books, but this is one rule one book that I have to think of all my late partner giving once a book, you know, check Walsh winning. Okay. Yeah. And we used to have I remember the beginning when we struggle. I remember telling him after a meeting, you know what, Lance? I don't think he's smarter than us. I don't know why this is working. This is not working. So. And he gave me this book on earth 20 years ago, I think. And he said to Eric, something like even him is much smarter than us. Keep pushing. It's I think, you know, success in general is a combination if I if I need something to motivate me. I don't know. I was born motivated. Yeah,
Unknown Speaker 1:06:06
I have, you know, three girls to motivate me and now motivation is a lot from within. I don't know I I'm laughing about PTSD from retiring. Yeah.
Speaker 1 1:06:14
I retired early age and it's not for me, I don't play golf. Fish. It's I do what I like. And I like what I do. So I'm lucky, quite honestly. But my motivation is you know, it's market share is success. Yeah, he's tomorrow. Yes. I don't stop. And my good if you ask my good good friends about if there's one word, what's my most common word is? I love
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:06:36
the next. Yeah,
Speaker 1 1:06:37
I mean, we don't stop we'd have stopped when the next because there's a new day and it's a new hill to climb and that's what we do. I
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:06:45
can relate to that. 100% I feel I feel like if anything I have to I need someone in my life to tell me no because it's like every time I see something I want to like you know make the best water bottle and they I just heard this documentary on pencils. And I'm like wow, that's amazing. I want to brand a pencil for all the different brands that companies I have it's just I can't to your point net I can't stop doesn't always mean you should do it all the time either but
Speaker 1 1:07:07
but at least a few hits the wall make sure that you move forward quickly. Yeah, so yeah,
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:07:12
yeah, well thank you very much for coming on. Where can our listeners find out they obviously they can find out more about cambria@cambria.com If they want to reach out to you I assume headed to your LinkedIn page timber
Speaker 1 1:07:22
you will see those catalogs so mostly you can show us freely on LinkedIn I'm with my cell phone all the time text me is the easiest I'll be happy to you know to communicate with your with your audience and anyone and everyone that needs anything. And you know your to to be you know, for the next one, I have the next deal.
Mark D. Williams<br> 1:07:39
I love it. Thanks for your time appreciate your burnouts. Thank you for having me here again. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for listening to the cures builder podcast. If you like what you listen to please give us a five star rating and write us a review. It really means a lot. It's a great way for us to just understand what you like about the podcast and while we can keep doing so like and review and please share with your friends and family. Find out more at curious builder podcast.com
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