Spokane, WA, April 8--Mario & Son employee Andy Cady uses a vacuum lifter to lower a slab of Silestone, probably weighing about 800 pounds, onto a table at Mario & Son's Spokane Valley plant, according to the Spokane Journal of Business.
The company says it expects strong sales growth this year.
Mario & Son Inc., a Spokane Valley stone fabricator, wants to carve out a larger share of the market here for granite, marble, glass, and quartz surfaces used to class up homes and commercial buildings.
To achieve that end, the 14-year-old company is considering developing a nearly 40,000-square-foot facility that would enable it to boost production and market itself more aggressively, says Joey Marcella, its president. Such a facility, with new equipment, would cost $3 million to $4 million, he estimates.
Mario & Son has been looking at potential development sites from Airway Heights to Liberty Lake and hopes to begin construction of the envisioned new facility—or, if possible, be moved into it—within a year, he says. That’s assuming it decides not to expand the 13,000-square-foot building at 6523 E. Main that it currently leases, which remains a slight possibility, he says.
"Our facility here is bursting at the seams," so the company expects to decide on one of the two options by this summer, Marcella says.
Mario & Son had revenue of about $2.5 million last year and hopes to increase that to about $3.5 million this year, he says. Its work force fluctuates in size seasonally, but averages around 20 employees, and that number likely will increase after it expands, he says.
Mario & Son fabricates countertops, wall coverings, and other surfacing pieces for customers throughout Eastern Washington and North Idaho, and Marcella says, "We feel we have about a third of the market. We want to get to at least half."
The company caters to a mix of contractors, interior designers, and homeowners. Residential work probably accounts for about 70 percent of its revenues. It also, though, has worked on some noteworthy commercial and institutional projects, such as the Davenport Hotel restoration and upgrades to a number of churches here.
Countertops and other surfaces for kitchens and bathrooms are Mario & Son’s bread and butter, but Marcella says, "We do a lot of crazy things as well," such as unusual table tops and furniture that meld different materials.
Through the use of computerized, high-precision cutting equipment and 3-D digital processing technology, the company can do intricate bas-relief—sculptures of customers’ choosing that are carved into flat surfaces so they project from a recessed background. Marcella says it now even has the capability "to scan your face and produce it in stone."
For its creations, it uses marble, granite, glass, and Silestone, a strong composite material consisting of natural quartz chips and resins. Mario & Son has been fabricating and installing products from those materials for the dozen or so Inland Northwest Home Depot stores for about three years, and last summer became a distributor for Silestone, Marcella says.
That was a key development because quartz surfacings are the fastest growing segment of the overall countertop market, and Silestone has the largest share of that segment by a wide margin, he says.
"It’s really on the rise, Marcella says. Silestone, he asserts, is "on par with granite. It behaves and acts a lot like granite. It fabricates similar. It has all of the same qualities," but is available in more vivid colors, he says.
It’s touted by Cosentino, the manufacturer, as being virtually maintenance-free and highly scratch-, scorch-, and stain-resistant. Also, beginning this summer, it will be available with a built-in antimicrobial protection, called Microban.
