Business to business : Prostone Interiors finds a corridor of opportunity

In February, Natural Stone Specialist reported on the first Breton NC300 in the UK being delivered to Prostone Interiors in Ammonford, South Wales. As Prostone’s Directors are avid readers of this magazine, they invited us along to have a look at the new machine and see the part it will play in helping the company maintain its healthy levels of growth.

When you have driven for three hours or so from London to the end of the M4, Ammonford in South Wales, where Prostone Interiors is based, can seem fairly remote. But that’s a London-centric view. From where Bryan Gilmartin and Greg Marsh sit as Directors of Prostone, the M4 is 200 miles of opportunity stretching out in front of them with easy access to the markets of Swansea, Cardiff, Bristol, Swindon, Reading and into London itself.

Prostone is certainly not the only company to have identified the advantages of producing in Wales and selling along the M4 corridor into England. The area at the end of the M4 is a hive of industrial activity with good communications to the motorway network into the North and Midlands as well as the M4 itself.

And being in Wales has measurable advantages, as Bryan and Greg can testify. It certainly made buying their new NC300 Contourbreton from Breton UK less painful because they (eventually!) got European money to help pay for it, thanks to Wales in general being a deprived area.

The NC300 is working alongside an NC260 (which the 300 replaces in the Breton range) in the Prostone workshop. There is a Comandulli edge polisher, a Thibaut T108 face polisher, a Thibaut TC04 saw and a bigger Breton Easycut.

There is also a MitreForma, which, like the Thibauts, is sold by Waters Group Ltd. And like a lot of other worktop companies that have bought a MitreForma, Prostone finds it an invaluable addition to its workshop. It has only the one function – to produce mitres – but it is not expensive and does the job quickly and accurately, freeing up other, more expensive machinery to get on with what it does best.

The only trouble Prostone has now with the NC300 is that a bottleneck is developing at the Breton Easycut, so Prostone is anticipating having to install a second saw this year – although Greg warns suppliers that Prostone is fed up with promises that are not kept (such as dates) and that the company is going to be more rigorous in the way it purchases.

Fortunately, Prostone has room to expand, having moved to new 900m2 premises two years ago from its previous 350m2 factory a short distance away. The company needed the extra space and the Directors are glad they made the move but take the opportunity to complain about British Telecom. “Three times I have had a move and each time BT have cocked it up,” says Greg.

Again, it was fortunate Prostone owned its premises, rather than renting them, and was able to continue to use the phones in its previous offices until they were sorted out in the new premises.

But the company had to move because it had run out of space and they were working in marquees. “We would come in some mornings and find them blown down the road,” says Greg. “We have a good relationship with our bank manager and Bryan and I decided to take on these two units here.”

Prostone Interiors was incorporated in 2005. Greg Marsh had previously been involved with PVC windows and Bryan Gilmartin will be remembered by many in the stone industry from the time he was with Midlands stone wholesaler Blyth Marble. For the past 15 years he worked for masonry companies in Swansea.

Bryan felt he was not being allowed to develop to his full potential with his previous employer – and feels vindicated in that view by having sold more in his first year than his previous employer ever achieved.

Of course, that was before the credit crunch and Bryan admits that for the past four years Prostone has had to work harder for every job it has won. Nevertheless, it has kept winning them and Bryan believes his company has an advantage over the ‘supermasons’ simply because it has only 17 mouths to feed in total and does not need high volume work to keep the factory busy.

It has not done at all badly in picking up some good sized contracts – it is currently working on 13 sites for Dave Wilson Homes and has a contract to supply bars for Wetherspoons (it did the Manchester pub and has just finished one in Kirkley) – but more of its work these days is coming from private customers, mostly via studios. Prostone does give free displays because its competitors do and it cannot afford not to be seen in those outlets.

Prostone offers engineered quartz as well as stone, of course – and is the only Silestone Gold Approved Fabricator in Wales. Cosentino’s new Dekton surface will, at least initially, only be available as worktops through Gold Approved Fabricators and Bryan believes it will be another product to help him win some more business. “Some people like thin material,” he says.

Prostone is currently in the process of creating a showroom at its own premises to make customers more comfortable when they visit – because it does like customers to visit. It is understandably proud of its factory, which is new and is kept clean and tidy. It has a gantry running the length of it to minimise manual handling. Rainwater is collected from the roofs and a Turrini Claudio water recycling system is used, (supplied, again, by the Waters Group).

Prostone would like to have solar cells on the roof, although it has more urgent calls on its finances for now and intends to look at voltage optimisation before turning its attention to electricity generation.

Seeing an efficient, well-equipped, busy factory helps give customers confidence in the supplier – and also helps them understand why stone is not necessarily the cheapest option.

People have become aware of Prostone, but it has not marketed itself strongly. It has placed ads in local magazines and since the early days has run silver and black vans. It also has silver backing to its letterheads with the legend ‘Prostone, the granite and marble specialist’ on it.

“It adds to the cost but it’s about creating confidence,” says Greg. “If someone is going to spend their hard earned they want to know it’s well spent. Going through the factory gives them confidence, too.”

Prostone even has its own lorry to collect the stone it needs from wholesalers if it needs to meet a particular timescale. “It’s about never letting the customer down,” says Greg, who criticises some of his suppliers for not having the same attitude. “What we say will happen does happen,” he says. “We won’t say we can deliver in four days to get an order then turn up in six days because that’s how long it takes to make it. We will say ‘no, you can’t have it in four days’. It’s our reputation and we are very concerned about maintaining it.”

Last year the company’s marketing took on a new focus when Michelle joined Prostone. She has been raising its profile in the market in general. The company website also helps do that, but Bryan and Greg do not want to enter the price sensitive area of selling online. A company brochure is now also on the way. “We’re beginning to get things together on the marketing,” says Greg.

Prostone wants to grow, but in a controlled way and as a natural progression. Greg says the biggest threat to their ambitions is simply getting paid, although they are also reaching the conclusion that they need to manage more and get involved in the day-to-day business less.

Greg told NSS: “To be honest, you being here is the longest Bryan and I have sat down together since we started the business. I feel we have to get out of the business to be able to run the business.”