Eble Family: All's well that ends well

Last Friday (3/16) I stopped by the house in the AM on my way to work to drop off some hose reels that I had assembled the night before. The flooring for the hallway, kitchen and eating area had been installed and it did not look good.

Back when we were choosing flooring, Holly had expressed interest in a slate look and the flooring company (ICC Floors) had suggested the real thing. There was a 3' x 3' area in the show room of "Indian Mulitcolor" that looked great. We went with it and got two sample pieces for color matching. Let me say this, the showroom floor and our samples had some texture which we liked. Some.

Below are the photos that I took of the flooring as installed. Unknown to me, Mike had emailed me the night before suggesting I stop by and look at the flooring. After seeing the slate, I called Mike who was only 3 or so minutes away. We looked at it together and he agreed that it didn't look good. He had had his wife look at it the night before and she assumed that it was an outdoor tile (indoor per ICC). I told Mike that it was unacceptable and he immediately called ICC Floors.

Two of their salesmen came down that day along with the Rep for the tile company (DalTile). The story as I understand it is that the Daltile guy said that since it was natural stone it was expected to have some variations and that the tiles were to their standards. Low standards in my opinion. See below and judge for yourself.

Here's where having a good builder comes in handy. Mike fully agreed with us as to the quality of the tile. Though the Daltile Rep washed his hands of any wrong, ICC Floors stepped up to the plate. They offered to open the store off-hours to allow us to come look for an alternative; they brought samples to our home for us to look at; they allowed us to pick out what we liked as a replacement -- with no consideration for whether it fit into our original budget. Holly and I picked a new tile (slate looking ceramic) last Saturday. By today (3/24) ICC has removed all of the slate flooring and subfloor and has replaced it with the new. I truly believe that this was made possible due to Mike's sterling reputation and relationship with his subcontractors.

Good for ICC Floors. Good for Mike. Daltile Co, not so much.