Stone People: Expanding With Quality

The same holds true in the shop. Many employees have been with Stone Creations for years, and Kieckhafer calls them, ‘the jewel of our company.”

Click photo to enlarge“This is a profession for them,” she says. “If we need to work Saturday or Sunday to meet the customer’s desired time line, that’s what we do. And, we live by the fact that anybody can hold up a red card on a project and say, ‘Stop; this isn’t right.’”

Employees are also encouraged to bring ideas for improvements to the management staff – Kieckhafer mentions pneumatic drop tables as an example – and if they make sense they’re given a budget and developed.

“If it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, but we’ve approved it because we thought it would be a good idea,” she says. “Probably 90 percent of those projects do work, and they’re saving us money.”

The bottom line, Kieckhafer says, is that even with the weaker economy, Stone Creations of Wisconsin has done better, and offered a more-satisfying career than she anticipated when it launched 13 years ago.

“I never expected it to grow as much as it did, and for it to be as fun as it is, and to just really enjoy it,” she concludes. “There’s a lot of hard work that goes into each job, but it’s very self-fulfilling. I can say I’m proud of that medallion or that a sports figure has my stone in his yacht.”

Get the news of the industry with The EDGE, the twice-monthly e-newsletter from Stone Update. Free subscriptions are available here.

For the latest industry info, check the daily Stone Update Today and our Facebook page.