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Posts
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Hello to all. This is my first post on this website. I am a homeowner, and a satisfied solid surface countertop customer (Corian Mont Blanc, installed by a local independent shop this past summer). I can tell already that this is going to be a long post, so I apologize in advance for that.
I also would like to extend an apology, and an olive branch, to Al. He and I have tangled on several occasions on Gardenweb’s Kitchens forum, and on several occasions I was ruder than I needed to be. I’ve come over here not with any desire at all to continue any of those rancorous exchanges, but to try to offer you all a consumer’s perspective on this whole set of issues.
Al has posted here and on g-web that he is skeptical of my real identity, and I can understand why he would be. I’m not going to post my address or phone number on the web, so I’m not exactly sure how to satisfy that important question. The best thing that comes to mind right now is to post this link to a result of a search for my username on g-web: search results. The second one on the list takes you to a thread where I show pictures of our new kitchen, and give the details on it. This link takes you to a search result for both my name and “carpentershop”: search results. There are 82 results for my name alone, and 28 for both Al’s name and mine. I don’t recall having posted about granite (since I don’t know much, if anything, about it) except in those cases where I was challenging Al. If you glance through the posts in the first list, I hope that it will become apparent that I really am just a guy who remodeled his kitchen this year. If this is still a concern, and you can think of something else I can do, let me know.
My impression was that Al came to g-web with a hidden agenda. His happened to be an anti-granite agenda, but that wasn’t key for me.
This site is all about productive dialoge and consumers as well as fabricators…heck everyone is welcome. You’ll find that many of the fabricators here are building tops out of all surfaces. While everyone has their opinions and a certain way of fabricating, you won’t find to many, if any flame wars.
Welcome aboard!
Dave
revans1,
Sure. Dialogue is good. Why not?
What questions do you have for us?
I’d say that Al is way too plain spoken to have any kind of alternate agenda. He is as passionate about solid surface as you can get, and while he is no diplomat, he does a great job of backing up his claims with fact. You need to understand that forums that are filled with folks who do not usually debate as a vocation are not going to be polished in their responses and queries.
We see so many fact-challenged articles and discussions about solid surface that it can actually be painful at times. Al is one guy willing to jump in and set the record straight. I’ve seen the way he gets treated for doing this, and all I can say is: thank gosh he’s got the ‘nads to do it in the first place.
I’ve disagreed with Al on numerous occasions, but I stand behind his efforts 100%.
Thanks for writing and welcome to this side of FabNet.
Tom Mather
Revans1,
Never let it be said that I refused an apology made with sincerity. Your’s seems to meet that threshold, yet forgive me if I say time will tell. I will keep an open mind and try to judge you by your future behaviour. If nothing else, perhaps I might learn something of my self by listening.
Here is a prime example of how I got labeled a “granite hater” for posting the truth about granite. Note that the question was addressed specifically to me, then bumped up by the Original Poster (OP) to keep it easy to find, so obviously the poster needed info and quickly.
First response was a helpful soul that took the time to copy something off the web to help out, note that it called granite fragile.
Prior to this, there apparently hadn’t been much mention of rodding granite on gardenweb, thus the questions.
I answered, late, had been at the AWF woodworking fair in Vegas, and just confirmed what the other poster said, simply answered the questions. Brought in a few issues, width of sink rails, not drilling through the back rods when faucet installed, sink setters including how cheap they were, how rodding doesn’t prevent but just helps prevent breakage, mentioned the dangers of using plain mild steel and recomended fiberglass rods, what stresses the rodding will help on and the one it won’t help on, repeated that stone was fragile as the previous poster had brought up and then, Ta Da!, sent them to the MIA for more info.
Note the next post, Paulines, supposedly a homeowner but one with a dog in the fight to go to so much trouble.
Next poster stood up for me, validated the info I had given.
So far, one interested consumer looking for advice, three people stating what rodding does, and one granite stooge crapping on the carpet.
So I respond, stating the only reason I could think of why anyone in their right mind would dispute what advice had been given up to that point. Mentioned the MIA again and was stupid enough to use logic to prove my point.
Pewl jumps in, a bit sarcastic, not unexpected from the behaviour of Paulines, but makes the point that they are glad they had a decent fabricator that rodded their granite countertop sink rails.
“Whatever” Pauline responds…
Then come Stonegirl apparently defending her past work, after all no one wants to get caught cutting corners out of either ignorance or desire to make more profits. Mentions how flexible granite is. Do this, find a three foot scrap and put a wood screw in the middle and push down. Then tell me now flexible granite is….
Oh, and then I post the famous link to the 400 unit condo that had almost every sink rail failing, some rodded and some unrodded. Absolute proof that sinks can fail in service both with and without rodding if improperly supported. Note that what rodding that had been done was done poorly.
So in response the fine folks at stoneadvice.com yank the thread into the dark room where consumers couldn’t read it.
By now, anyone with sense won’t post to keep from being attacked if they support me, fine I can handle them on my own.
I didn’t cherry pick this thread, just the first one that popped up when I searched for “carpentershop” on gardenweb.
Revans1, asking without animosity here, but how could that thread be taken as “an
I’ve started this post a couple of times, and dumped them both because I couldn’t get out what I wanted to say. Al, I’m going to try to resist an effort to go back and revisit our old “discussions”, at least on a point-by-point basis, because I’m afraid it would just lead to us rehashing things that have already been discussed a lot. I’m not trying to be evasive or to hide from things I’ve done and said in the past…I’ve tried to take responsibility for that already in this thread. I just don’t want us to sort of head down a dead end path, if we can help it.
I would like to ask if you can help me understand the ultimate purpose of all these activities. (When I say “all these activities”, I’m thinking of the postings on g-web and other consumer sites, the studies of health issues, etc.) Is it ultimately meant to, in some way, affect the buying decisions of a large number of customers? It sort of looks and feels like a marketing effort, albeit one that is mostly focused on the negatives of the biggest (?) competitor for the higher-priced countertop market. If that’s the case, I wonder if it is really an approach with a realistic chance of “winning”.
I hope this doesn’t come across in the wrong way, but it looks to me as though the solid surface fabricators are spending more time “selling” pitfalls and negatives of granite, than they are selling the virtues of their own products. Meanwhile, Dupont and the company that makes Silestone (which I realize is quartz) are now selling branded granite of their own. I can appreciate being loyal to the one who brought you to the dance, but it strikes me from the outside looking in that the best approach is to become a multi-surface shop (like yours, Al), and take on a more balanced and realistic approach to all the products. I wouldn’t suggest that you soft-peddle real issues like the need for sealing, etc., but it seems to me that a lot of the issues like radiation, radon, bacteria, etc., are almost certain to fail as messages in the marketplace, and they have a greater potential to make the solid surface fabricator look desperate and unrealistic than anything else.
I’m not sure I like this post much better than the first two, but I’m tired of writing and rewriting the same stuff over again. I genuinely haven’t intended to offend, and I hope I haven’t. It’s late, I’m tired, and my team lost the ball game tonight, so I think I’m going to let this one go and I’ll come back and fix it later if I misspoke.
I do want to thank those who welcomed me, and to thank Al for at least provisionally accepting my initial thoughts on this thread.
revans1,
I didn’t have a problem understanding your post. It was maybe even too delicate.
A lot of us feel that the radon issue is a non-starter, and I think that should be clear by the posts here. You might be sweeping with a broad brush on that one. I alos think you may be a bit off on solid surface fabricators selling the pitfalls of stone. By that logic, you could say the same thing about stone only guys selling against solid surface by pushing the softness (scratch resistance – lack thereof), and the more “artificial” look of solid surface as compared to stone. If you look around at these posts, you will find many more details about the ups (and downs!) of solid surface than you will trash-talking the competition. We are pretty hard here on solid surface.
As far as on the other sites, I believe the concentration on stone is a result of the nature of the queery by the consumer asking the question. It most certainly is a marketing effort, on both sides, but what is the problem with that? It seems to me that most of your concern is with one or two guys pushing points that you (and many of us) don’t feel is all that germain towards the decision of whether to buy. That’s going to happen. Also, what if it turns out that Al, Lenny, and others may be right about the issue? Be an awful shame to miss important data like that, even if it came from a small amount of overall contributors.
If I may, and please forgive me if this is not true from your perspective, I need to point out that many of the criticisms seem to come from a stone vantage point. In other words, you are expecting us to talk positive about solid surface on posts that are primarily concerned with stone. The question needs an answerr before one can tout the benefits of the other product.
Lastly, many, many of us here sell a wide variety of materials. That we are honest with the downs as well as the ups of our product offering (all of them) should speak better for us, than someone who only wants to herald the plusswes of one, and the negatives of another.
Stick around, ask questions, ignore the comments you feel come from too biased a perspective. That should include the stone folks as well.
Tom
Thanks for the reply, Tom. I understand your point about the broad brush…I’m just responding to what I’ve seen, and not implying that I even have any way to know what happens in the average shop with personal interactions with customers.
And I don’t mean to say that there is anything at all wrong with having a marketing effort per se…..in fact, you’d be making a huge mistake to ignore marketing. My questions are more about whether or not this stuff will “work”, in the sense of changing enough consumer behavior.
My points about this effort being mostly “negative” are just based on my experience and observation. And let me be clear that I’m not opposed to all negative marketing. I’m just saying that what I’ve seen seems to be too heavy on the negative side. As an illustrative example, I’ll point to the Solid Surface Alliance site. There is one page of information about solid surface (with a main heading of “Why choose solid surface over granite or quartz?”, and a big chunk of which is a wikipedia entry. There’s nothing wrong with wikipedia, but there is a fairly limited amount of original material here on solid surface. There are two pages on “granite problems and issues”, and one page on “studies” that are also focused on granite. Those proportions seem to me to be consistent with the impression that I have formed about the information generally available to a consumer who uses Google to research countertop options. If that’s true, then I wonder if there shouldn’t be more emphasis on pushing the pluses of solid surface, and less (not none, but less) on pushing the minuses of granite. In the end, it is my belief that you’d sell more solid surface that way.
My questions are more about whether or not this stuff will “work”, in the sense of changing enough consumer behavior.
Yeah, I agree. That’s been the thrust of my (and most other’s) argument all along.
The SSA site, you need to understand, is developing and growing as wee speak. Al is not getting as much help as I think he expected, and some of that is my fault. The other day, we started fisking an article on Estone that he had started, so that will grow, and the bash fest for solid surface, I will assume, is to follow closely after. You should see how Al can go after solid surface. Almost as fierce as stone sometimes.
I also agree that Wikipedia is not the best, and certainly should not be the main site to derive arguments. That place is a sieve of questionable info, but it’s so gosh darn easy to look up that we lazy types usually start there. I mean for just about everything, not just countertops.
Let me ask you to check out these pages, and let me know if you think this reader’s digest kind of listing is easier for the average Joe to discern at the bottom of the page, there are quick (probably too quick) lists about plusses and minusses of each material):
I would be interested if you think this approach is better geared for the average curious consumer.
The site home page is here.
You bring up many good points, that should be considered, but I still need to point out that addressing issues with stone honestly and completely is near impossible. If you listen to the more passionate voices on stone, particularly Stonegirl, kdnoel, and some others who have nicely joined us here at FabNet, you will see how complicated getting total info out about stone can be. These guys really know the particulars. One lesson I have learned in particular, is that a consumer should never buy stone at a home center. I have always felt that way about solid surface, but it seems more so with stone.
Revans1,
I started reading gardenweb and hgtv.com more for the insight into my customers buying habits, what makes them tick so to speak. Watching the massive ignorance of the stone, quartz and solid surface issues is what lead me to start responding.
A one man marketing effort? Read some of the stoner sites, they are blaming me for just about any negative info that comes out these days. These guys are nervous…
The Radon and radioactivity are just icing on the cake. Far more imeadiate issues should by all rights limit the choice of granite materials sold for countertop use. I am working on page three of the reasons not to buy granite, for the SSA site. Here is the basic outline:
Unhappy consumers Video of unhappy customer beat down customers dire warning of removal of bad work
Stains
scratches
etches
mineral deposits
discolorations UV rust
cleaning damage
breakage
Heat damage
flaking
pitting
bad spots
Smelly granite
Bad resin on slabs
Kerosene processing
poor quality work
poor quality seams lippage color grain and movement not matching.
sinks failure Sink rail failure Rodd splits
Wasteage, edging, cutout costs extra
Blacklist
Worthless warranties, stone and sealer, dupont
checklist for homeowners
Donnyfication
minimizing problems, blame the cabinets
Driveway fabricators
Doctored stones
Chemicals used in sealing and staining
Radon
Radiation
Social aspects of granite
Osha deaths Rise in Silconosis cases amputations
Illegal alien labor, lack of insurance
Indian child labor Chinese child labor
Customer deaths
Radon
Enviromental issues strip mining pollution
Now, how many of these same issues could be laid at the door of solid surface?
scratching (easily rectified)
Heat damage (admitted and warned about)
UV (with one type or one brand with some colors)
Poor quality work (rare but it is out there despite certification)
See the difference from my viewpoint?
Negative advertising, how can you avoid it? On occasion, I run into a homeowner with concerns, usually you get stopped as they ask to be told about the good points of solid surface instead of the negative points of the competing products.
That is an impossible task if you are truly attemting to give the consumer an accurate overview of materials available. Take scratching, it takes maybe one or two minutes to show a consumer that it isn’t an issue with solid surface, using showroom tops, an old top taken out of homes for warranty reasons, some quartz samples if they are considering that. Talking about one material isn’t possible, you need to compare all at the same time. Start by taking the quartz samples from the boxes and show the handling scratches, sow the ads and warranty info admiting scratching issues, have the consumers look over worn showroom tops and end up at the old top, 9 1/2 years of use but still looks great.
Same thing, say that solid surface is nearly impossible if not impossible, to stain. You have to mention Jetta and a few other small players that aren’t true solid surface, then back to the quartz warranty sheets, then over to the granite sample section complete with sections of granite material stained with common food items. Finish the issue with the MIA cleaning guide to point out how careful you have to be to avoid staining granite.
So to give an accurate account of the difference in materials, you have to discuss all of them at once.
With solid surface, it is possible to give general statements accurately on most issues like preventing heat damage, taking care of sinks and so on. There is very little bad info out there to refute, so the positive attributes of solid surface are quickly summerized. That is why you don’t see much on solid surface, it doesn’t need much.
Granite and quartz, by comparision are so oversold. First question I ask customers when they look at the quartz samples is what do they know about it. At least 90% of the time, they say it is scratch proof, stain proof and you can set hot pots on it. By watching their expression when you drag out the manufacturer warranty pages and ads in kitchen journals saying otherwise, I can predict whether they buy from us or not. Some have their mind made up, and by showing them that their choice has been based upon lies, they get defensive right off the bat. The eyebrows say it all, and if they show suprise at the info, chances are you will land the job. Personally, I would tend to believe Zodiac’s warranty sheet over what a clerk at a big box store told me, or what a homeowner said online.
Do this, google “granite anti bacterial” and see what pops up. You would be suprised at the shyster stone shops claiming this.
In the end, just by looking through garden web’s granite horror stories, one should understand how oversold granite is and how much consumers need accurate info. Then go over to stoneadvice.com and watch homeowners getting convinced that their shoddy granite work is just fine for what they paid for it, then watch the admonishments to use SFA and MIA members in the future.
So first the playing feild needs leveled by confronting bad info when it shows up, including gathering as much info on the negative aspects of granite and storing it in one spot, the SSA site so that interested shops and consumers can find it quickly, backed up with links to the proof so that the consumer can make up their own mind.
Call that an agenda if you like, but the fact is I am the consumers best friend even if they are going to buy granite, they will have the chance to be exposed to the downsides.
Negativity breeds Negativity and = A big turn off thus No Solution for the customer.
All materials have their place and I will continue to recommend them where they best solve the customers problem.
Tom, that strikes me as a balanced and informative approach that I would appreciate if I were just starting out to consider countertop options. The preference for solid surface is apparent, but not overpowering. I can appreciate also, I think, the challenge of “getting total info out” about stone. My point is, you shouldn’t have that as your goal. The interest and attention span, even for the shopper who is committed to buying a countertop, is not going to sustain an attempt to get out all that you want them to know. If you want to accumulate that information somewhere and direct them to it if they’re interested, then that’s fine. But I think your initial and overriding goal should be to motivate them to get to a shop that sells a variety of tops, and to have a certain set of ideas and questions in their minds when they arrive. Then you can explain in a way that is consistent with their needs. (I’m in the insurance business, and can recall seeing ads that pushed the consumer to an “Independent Agent”, because they were best equipped to meet the needs of policyholders. That is the kind of philosophy that I think could win. Of course, that assumes that you’re ready to do multiple kinds of tops…).
Al, I’m going to share my thoughts with you in a straightforward way. This will have to be taken as criticism, because it is. I’m just trying to be honest, and tell you how this comes across to me. I sincerely hope that you take it in the spirit with which it is intended.
I think that you enjoy the debating too much, so that it has become an end in itself. (I do have enough self-awareness to recognize that I often share this characteristic, which goes a long way in explaining the history of our interactions.) You want to smother your opponent in data and score enough hits that you can “win”. It’s an exceedingly rare thing, though, that one side of a debate says “uncle”. It’s not consistent with human nature. Observers of a debate, in this case lurkers on a forum, are rarely going to follow the technical details of your long posts all that closely. (I’m self-aware enough to know that my posts are too long, too.) They’ll skip down and see 5 or 6 other posters who criticize you, and make up their minds based on that. In the end, you mostly just make people mad, and mad people aren’t motivated to buy what you’re selling.∓nbsp; As a fairly long-term and consistent participant at GardenWeb, I am firmly convinced that the net effect of your participation there was to create a negative impression of yourself and by extension, the cause that you pursued.
On a related note, I think that you have become so absorbed in this anti-granite thing that you’ve lost a sense of perspective about what it’s like to be a customer who is surfing the net for basic info on counters. I’m 46 years old, and I’ve owned 4 houses. Until this past spring, I probably hadn’t spent 15 minutes of my life thinking about countertops. I just took them for granted, you know? When we decided to remodel the kitchen, I started from zero. Now, by the time you and I “met”, so to speak, my remodel was done, but it’s all still fresh in my mind. Your approach on the SSA site, and on Gweb, would not have worked on me. It’s not that you don’t have enough data…it’s that you have too much. Your list of granite concerns stretches across structural issues, safety issues, health issues, environmental issues, social justice issues, etc., etc. It’s a whole paradigm that only a true believer can accept. It all just turns me off as a consumer, and as a result I just reject it all.
Man, I hope that this doesn’t just aggravate you. I’m absolutely not trying to start up another nasty personal exchange with you. I’m trying to suggest that you step back, take a deep breath, and try to get a little separation from all of this. What, exactly, are you attempting to achieve? Does it really appear to you that your current course of action will actually achieve it? If you’re genuinely about the advancement of solid surface as a countertop option (which I believe that you are, and which I find to be a perfectly reasonable and respectable goal), I think that you have a ton of energy and passion for it, but I honestly believe that you’re going about it in the wrong way. I don’t doubt your motives, but it seems to me that even with the best intentions, your current course of action may ultimately even be counter-productive (pun is unintentional).
If you think I’ve gone too far or said too much here, I’m sorry. As I said up top, this has to be taken as criticism. I just hope that you understand that one of it was intended to be an insult.
In a way, it’s like the current political climate.
What would win the day is for the stone only types to give critical analysis of stone, solid surface guys to give a critical answer on solid surface, and the multi-guys to cover the ups and downs on estone.
Mind your own backyard, but do it honestly, and the consumer wins.
I read what Stonegirl writes very carefully. She doesn’t make too many sweeping generalizations about stone tops, but selects the right stone to address the consumers concerns. For as complicated a type as stone is, that’s what works for me. Girl seems to know her stone.
revans1 wrote
Tom, that strikes me as a balanced and informative approach that I would appreciate if I were just starting out to consider countertop options. The preference for solid surface is apparent, but not overpowering. I can appreciate also, I think, the challenge of “getting total info out” about stone. My point is, you shouldn’t have that as your goal. The interest and attention span, even for the shopper who is committed to buying a countertop, is not going to sustain an attempt to get out all that you want them to know. If you want to accumulate that information somewhere and direct them to it if they’re interested, then that’s fine. But I think your initial and overriding goal should be to motivate them to get to a shop that sells a variety of tops, and to have a certain set of ideas and questions in their minds when they arrive. Then you can explain in a way that is consistent with their needs. (I’m in the insurance business, and can recall seeing ads that pushed the consumer to an “Independent Agent”, because they were best equipped to meet the needs of policyholders. That is the kind of philosophy that I think could win. Of course, that assumes that you’re ready to do multiple kinds of tops…).
Al, I’m going to share my thoughts with you in a straightforward way. This will have to be taken as criticism, because it is. I’m just trying to be honest, and tell you how this comes across to me. I sincerely hope that you take it in the spirit with which it is intended.
I think that you enjoy the debating too much, so that it has become an end in itself. (I do have enough self-awareness to recognize that I often share this characteristic, which goes a long way in explaining the history of our interactions.) You want to smother your opponent in data and score enough hits that you can “win”. It’s an exceedingly rare thing, though, that one side of a debate says “uncle”. It’s not consistent with human nature. Observers of a debate, in this case lurkers on a forum, are rarely going to follow the technical details of your long posts all that closely. (I’m self-aware enough to know that my posts are too long, too.) They’ll skip down and see 5 or 6 other posters who criticize you, and make up their minds based on that. In the end, you mostly just make people mad, and mad people aren’t motivated to buy what you’re selling. As a fairly long-term and consistent participant at GardenWeb, I am firmly convinced that the net effect of your participation there was to create a negative impression of yourself and by extension, the cause that you pursued.
&nbs;On a related note, I think that you have become so absorbed in this anti-granite thing that you’ve lost a sense of perspective about what it’s like to be a customer who is surfing the net for basic info on counters. I’m 46 years old, and I’ve owned 4 houses. Until this past spring, I probably hadn’t spent 15 minutes of my life thinking about countertops. I just took them for granted, you know? When we decided to remodel the kitchen, I started from zero. Now, by the time you and I “met”, so to speak, my remodel was done, but it’s all still fresh in my mind. Your approach on the SSA site, and on Gweb, would not have worked on me. It’s not that you don’t have enough data…it’s that you have too much. Your list of granite concerns stretches across structural issues, safety issues, health issues, environmental issues, social justice issues, etc., etc. It’s a whole paradigm that only a true believer can accept. It all just turns me off as a consumer, and as a result I just reject it all.
Man, I hope that this doesn’t just aggravate you. I’m absolutely not trying to start up another nasty personal exchange with you. I’m trying to suggest that you step back, take a deep breath, and try to get a little separation from all of this. What, exactly, are you attempting to achieve? Does it really appear to you that your current course of action will actually achieve it? If you’re genuinely about the advancement of solid surface as a countertop option (which I believe that you are, and which I find to be a perfectly reasonable and respectable goal), I think that you have a ton of energy and passion for it, but I honestly believe that you’re going about it in the wrong way. I don’t doubt your motives, but it seems to me that even with the best intentions, your current course of action may ultimately even be counter-productive (pun is unintentional).
If you think I’ve gone too far or said too much here, I’m sorry. As I said up top, this has to be taken as criticism. I just hope that you understand that one of it was intended to be an insult.
Well Revans,
You see the point that only a multi material shop is truly independent. Having them arive with a set of ideas and questions is a good goal, but presenting only one side of a material is unethical on a discussion board like gardenweb. If you want to avoid talking about granite issues on a stone site, fine, people who expect the entire truth from some one who sells only that product will get what is coming to them.
Motivating them into checking out the indepent shops will be met with claims of experience from the single material shops, like the stone shops. There needs to be cause for a consumer to consider other shops and the fact that a multi material shop can afford to tell all will need the explanation of what else there is to tel.
Revans, smothering with info is a direct result of people calling you a liar for posting negative info. One of stone girl’s first posts had references to my common sense, calling me stupid even for posting what she knew to be based on fact. Would you sit still after being challenged like that? Or being maligned? No, of course not, you would respond as I did were the facts on your side.
True the majority of the readers will be lazy, even some very motivated postes like Mark admitted they didn’t read all the posts, just skipped down to the end and started attacking. Still, most people are smart enough to see where one side is using only personal attacks and the other side is replying with science and info from…..STONE SITES. Only a dozen or so were offended in some way, most admitted it was the way I said it not what I said. Still, for liberials, they were very, very intolerant of what they didn’t agree with (yeah, liberal and intolerant go hand in hand). Re read that thread I posted in response to your first post, you will find that many welcomed my info and supported me till the a**holes started hammering. And only after the personal attacks escalated to claiming I posted that there was a sucker waiting on gardenweb looking for a solid surface top did fellow fabnetters come to my aid. Resulting of course in me getting banned, and probally the others.
No matter that for months there would be ten to fifteen stoners and three or four homeowners like yourself hammering away with personal attacks, never using science or info from stonesites that supported their point of view. One one post, a homeowner wrote that she had been furitively reading my posts for months. If that isn’t proof of the poisonous enviroment that you helped perpetuate, nothing is. Poor lady wanted to ask a question but was afraid to. Think for awhile about what that says about your group…
The list of concerns that granite encompasses is set by the material and the industry that fabricates it. I had nothing to do with how it is mined, the lack of industry standards regarding quality work standards, the continued use of dry cutting and grinding that Dave at Federal Saw has refered to, nor am I responsible for it not being properly tested before coming to market. Slave labor or child labor used in India, China, Aftrica and Brazil along have been well documented as well as the surge in illegal workers opening up shops, usually dry shops, are not of my doing either. The only problem seems that I spoke of it, perhaps making granite owners aware of their contribution to the problem.
Did you know that over a half million new cases of siliconosis were reported recently in China alone? And that it is also recurring here in America? Did you know that most of the oversea granite quarries set up cottage industries using child labor and poor women to process scrap and broken blocks into products? Hell, these poor souls don’t have electicity or running water, much less the ability to have a wet shop. Granite will soon be responsible for vast, vast, numbers of deaths in developing countries due to siliconosis alone.
Face it, granite has huge issues that make it an unsuitable countertop. Blaming someone who brings them to the discussion is not something that I would be proud of doing.
Revans, othing you have written to this point offends me and I apprecieate the feedback, yet you are assuming that I have not already thought out my approach to this issue, which is slightly insulting. What if I questioned your actions over the last few months and asked the same questions of you? Unlike yourself, I have regretted nothing. I have even written out for all to see what my approach would be, which in itself worked like a charm, getting banned just proved my point that there were too many unwilling to allow the truth to be told about granite. .
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