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Here is the proposed letter to Consumer Reports. Only two people have added comments so far, many more are needed. If you have suggestions or comments or additions post them, or send me an email and I’ll add you to the collaborators list so you can post directly. Anyone can view the page, with the comments that were used in modifying the original letter by going to http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dftkrj3r_1dbnzbg
Thanks, AL.
October 15th, 2006
To Whom it May Concern at Consumer Reports,
While not a current subscriber, I have followed the good work of your organization for many years and have always believed in your objectivity. However with your latest report on kitchen countertops there were some glaring problems that I would like to be addressed. As a long time cabinetmaker and countertop builder who sells granite, engineered stone/quartz, solid surface, and laminate, I can tell you that the report in question is in no way accurate to the reality of our experience in selling and fabrication of same.
#1. Quartz resistance to heat, no way. Even the warrantee cards we provide customers don’t agree with that. It warns of hot pots, scratching, etc. Heat applied to quartz will leave a white ring, sometimes it is seen under the cook top flange, if you remove the cook top. Heat will and has cracked quartz countertops if the hot pot is put in the wrong place. It’s resistance to scratching is demonstrated by their warning not to use a common scotchbrite pad for cleaning. It will and does stain, especially oil in foods or cleaners, as well as bleach and high ph cleaners. All this is info is given to consumers after the sale as part of the warrantee program, we insist on giving it during the sale process.
#2 Granite is in no way resistant to stains. If your tester would have checked any good granite forum like findstone.com or stoneadvice.com, he would know better. Granite must be sealed on a regular basis, something that home owners can and will skimp on, or even forget to do. Scratch resistant, same warning not to use a scotchbrite dish pad or powder cleaner like comet or Ajax. Once scratched, only a professional can remove the scratch with hours of effort. One of the most common items that causes scratches is sand, in vegetables or washed off someones hands. Resistant to impact, what a joke, again check the granite forums staffed by granite professionals. The stuff will crack with normal use, even by itself for no reason. It is a natural stone product that can be very beautiful but full of fissures and very weak unless completely supported. Home depot in our area posts placards on all stone and quartz tops warning of impact, staining and heat cracking. We insist on customers visiting several stone forums before we will install granite tops, just to make sure they know what they are getting into.
#3 Tile, good at impact. No way, I have owned tile countertops and replaced dozens of them. They are good at heat resistance, but little else, but the grout gets nasty quickly, even with sealer. It is common for all tile counters and floors to have back up tiles available since you will be replacing more than one over the life of the top. Edge failures are common in tile s well.
#4 Stainless steel, when we go down to a stainless fabricator and order a top, the first thing they do is go get a piece and twist a coffee cup on it for a few seconds, then ask if the customer understands how easy it will scratch.
#5 Laminate, resistant to heat? No way, I have replaced hundreds of laminate countertops with cigarette burns and hot pot damage. Not to mention scratching. Laminate is rated to withstand only 275 degrees, and will char and burn at 323 degrees,less than the temprature at which solid surface is bent. About ten years ago, the color and clear layer was reduced from about ten thousands of a inch thick to two thousands of an inch thick, brought about by better motor control in the machines that make the paper. Plus, EPA has taken out much of the solvents in the glue, as a result, some manufactures no longer will make the no drip edge. We tell customers that their old countertop lasted twenty years, expect four to five years out of the new ones.
#6 Solid surface Good at staining? The stuff is impervious to almost any household product. I have personally never seen solid surface stain unless you count a pot rusting in the sink, which a scotchbrite pad will remove in seconds. I have seen aluminum pots leave metal streaks, but it is the pot wearing off on the sink, like a skid mark on pavement. Again easily removed. Solid surface can be heat formed, we do it from time to time, up to 350 degrees. On occasion, solid surface will, like granite and engineered stone, suffer heat damage. It can be repaired to like new condition regardless of the damage, one of the best qualities of solid surface.
Concerning sink choices, if you check fabricator forums, you will find that quartz, granite and concrete are not waterproof. Matching quartz sinks are extremely rare at this time.
The part about seams left out the biggest difference between all the products, solid surface has near invisible seams compared to huge seams in all others. The standards in stone tops are getting better as well, top polishing is slowly becoming common giving less lipage to a seam.
The lack of maintance info on the products was a major problem. Granite has huge maintance issues, as well as concrete and tile.
You also left out the repair ability of solid surface, the number one reason to by it. It can be patched, parts cut out and replaced with almost invisible seams , sometimes with invisible seams. I have taken old tops and cut them and seamed them into new tops with no visible seams, this is common. I have taken tops with corners broken off by being dropped, then repaired them back to perfection.
One of the biggest problems with this report is that the testing doesn’t follow manufactures use recomendations. Would you test ladders by standing on the tops step? Are televison sets tested by immersion in water? No fabricator or manufacturer would recomend using an expensive counter top as a cutting board, nor would General Motors recomend using a car hood as a cutting board.
You need to consider revising this report. All choices of counter tops have their place in the mrket, but when people are oversold or given wrong info on the tops, customers are left dissatisfied.
This is an open letter, other fabricators selling all the products tested will back up the need to change this report.
Respectfully, Al Gerhart, The Carpenter Shop
Al, sorry, I did not see this from your letter’s site:
Tom, on longevity of laminate, I was refering to the thickness of the
color coat, which is were the scratching and damage is becomeing more
common. Curious, how do you do your laminate tops? AL.We fabricate using a rigid-set adhesive to laminate the deck and face of the splash. We still contact the self-edges, but the better glue under the deck ensures that at the front, for example, the laminate will not pull away from the applied edge. We also sell mostly custom rolled cove backsplashes. This can be anywhere from 2″ above deck to the upper cabinets. That fact alone can double the life of a countertop. I don’t necessarily agree with your statement about the expected life of new laminate tops, even though I agree that the laminate has been cheapened considerably. The big problem I see with laminate tops today are the ridiculous finishes that the manufacturers embed into the melamine. The etchings finish by Formica, as well as the #7 finish, etc. by WilsonArt is a classic example of the design dept. trumping the tech dept. in promoting new product.
Tom
Tom, sounds like laminate works well for your company. I’ll try that adhesive one of these days when the work is slow. The custom backsplash sound pretty cool too.
On the expected life, I saw some go in our local library on the front desk. I noticed about two months later it was wearing quick, six months after that, it was showing white and brown underlayers. Local walmart check writing counters didn’t make it more than that either. I got curious and sanded down a old peice till white or brown showed and measured it, then did the same with a new formica sheet. Ten thousandths for the old, two thousandths for the new before color showed.
The first time I did formica was in the mid seventies, union apprentice school. Just glue it down and router it off. Now, you have to be so carefull and you don’t dare use a bit with a bearing unless you tape or soak it with wd40. I got so tired a few years ago with ruining parts that I just quit using the stuff.
I also understand that the old thick stuff isn’t made anymore, or stocked anyway. So only the post form grade and verticle grade is left.
Are the new finishes harder to work with? Do they hold up okay?
I feel the new finishes have given a whole new look to a product trying to compete in a tough market. I personally like the look of the etchings finish and especially like the new WilsonArt High Definition colors. The new colors and finishes have helped keep an old product from dying out altogether in the upper end residential market. We do a lot of full rolled edges and coved full splashes and people love the way it has taken on a look very different from the traditional laminate top. We also do quite a bit of the laminate bevel in the new WilsonArt colors. Personally I would not do laminate in my own kitchen, however I may feel differently if I had to pay retail to do it in one of the other products. I don’t do much hands on work with laminate anymore and it drives me nuts to need to put my glasses on to file an edge but I can say for the last several years it seems like the color layer has gotten thinner and thinner which makes it very easy to mar. WilsonArt claims the High Definition series is much tougher than standard laminate but it has not been out long enough for me to tell just yet. Don’t take this post the wrong way, I am not a huge laminate fan but I do sell a lot of it.
Shane
Al,
Where are we at with this letter? I want to wrap it up and send it to the editor. Maybe we won’t get much from it now, but it is the right thing to do.
Send me the final draft and I will put the Fabricator Network logo on the top and send it back to you. We can post the final draft and if that is satisfactory to all then I will send a certified mail to Consumer Reports.
Could someone do me a favor and find out who to send it to so all I have to do is write in the name. Maybe the editor, address, issue number and the article title would be good.
Let’s finish what we started.
Thanks for all your help.
Below is the letter I am going to send to the editor of Consumer Reports. I would like to get this sent to them tomorrow. Let me know if there is anything that is incorrect with the letter. I am trying to open their eyes to the problems in the report. I have kept it very short and readable so it would actually get read. Thanks to all for helping right the letter.
Dear Consumer Reports,
I have a few questions about the CR countertop review. I would like to question the validity of the ratings. There seems to be three critical errors in the comparison ratings of all the products. http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/home-garden/home-improvement/countertops-8-06/overview/0608_countertops_ov_1.htm
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Solid surface will not permanently stain. In over 20 years selling and fabricating countertops, I have never experienced a stain that could not be removed with common house hold cleaners. Your report rates it at good. This rating seems very low.
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Granite impact rating is over-rated. Diffrent granite have different impact resistance. Some are excellent while most are just good – very good.
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Granite is not “good” at stain resistance. While a sealer will help resist staining, the granite itself is very porous allowing liquids to easily penetrate the material. In some cases liquids will go straight through to the bottom of the countertop. When the sealer deteriorates, the granite will need to be resealed, creating a maintenance issue
One note you may want to include in your next countertop comparison is the resistance to bacterial growth. A non-porous product such as quartz, solid surface, laminate and stainless steel, are becoming much more important to families because of their resistance to bacteria. Solid surface goes one step further by offering a seamless sink so there is no chance for bacteria to grow around the sink flange.
I’m sure CR is judging all the products fairly and as accurately as possible. However, I feel that these errors would drastically change the outcome of the overall ratings.
Thank you for your time. If you have any questions about countertops surfaces for future reports, please contact me at andy@thefabricatornetwork.com .
Andy Graves
714-393-5282
Pull the trigger on this one, Andy. You are right in that it is time to do something.
Very readable and diplomatic, good writing skills!
Initial Automated Response sent 11/18/06 at 11:41PM
Thank you for sending your comment(s) and/or questions(s) to Consumer Reports®.
We appreciate hearing from our readers and subscribers, and pay careful attention to every e-mail we receive. They provide suggestions, experiences, and criticisms that help shape the work we do.
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Well, kinda Shane. But an automated response. Andy, you might want to click on the mothership of Consumer Reports. You need to go to the top 1st and see who you get after a trickle down of corporate do gooders.
They probably get a gizzillion emails each day.
I would address it to The Editor and mail it certified mail. That way, you know they got it, someone will read it, and chances are they respond to letters in a more formal way than an automated email.
+.02 kc
We are so late sending this letter that my main goal is to open up line of communication so that the next time it will be an accurate test.
They get thousands of emails and letters, so let’s just give it a week or so and see what happens.
Just the fact that we are being proactive at the Fabricator Network means something. Everybody got together to get the letter done and supported sending it. I guess we will see what happens.
Andy, I allways thought we needed hundreds of individual letters. Is it possible to send out a mass email with a suggestion to send a short email to them endorsing the letter we sent as a group?
I am begining to understand to get large numbers of fabricators to participate, it needs to be real easy to do. Perhaps most of us are so busy working and trying to keep a family life alive.
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