Stone People: Not Quite an Exit Strategy
“The new construction market is pretty sad,” Jones says. “They’re either building affordable housing or they’re in the upper-six figures where they’re not pinching pennies.”
Although the company does have a commercial project – a restaurant – in the works, Romell Jones says he doesn’t focus on those too much because it’s a market that’s still fixated on getting the lowest price possible, and often relies on personal relationships to award contracts.
Click photo to enlarge“I’ve bid on some jobs, but you really can’t get in there unless you know somebody,” he says. “If I don’t know somebody in the company who’s making the decision or know somebody who knows, I’m just throwing a quote out there.”
For now, Jones is happy to focus on his residential work, and in seeing Stoneware Kitchen & Bath turn out a quality of work that has seen the company win awards in competitions and – even better – brings customers to the door.
“Customer satisfaction is our main thing,” Jones says. “We clean up after we’re done, we make sure the customer is happy, and I’m there to handle any problems if they’re not.”
Romell Jones adds that he believes the economy is improving, although still slowly. In the meantime, he’s looking at some other options to help put Stoneware Kitchen & Bath on still more people’s radar. That includes adding concrete (“They’re really big on the West Coast and around here nobody’s really doing them”) and other countertop materials to the business’ mix, as well as expanding into cabinets.
“I’m looking into some alternative branding,” Jones says. “I’m just trying to get to people who are buying affordable housing and are looking to get granite or something like it, but don’t have the money to pay the granite price.”
In the meantime, he says final decisions will continue to rest with Brad Jones, who hasn’t made any moves to end his second, non-corporate career.
“He says he just wants to go fishing, but he’s also a man who’s been working for almost 40 years and he hasn’t taken steps to back out of this job,” says his son. “Right now I’m just trying to keep jobs coming in and hopefully one day he’ll say, ‘Romell, here are the keys.’”
Regardless of who’s calling the shots, though Romell Jones says his greatest goal is to build Stoneware Kitchen & Bath into a market leader.
“When they see our name, I want them to know what we do, and it’s not a guessing game,” he concludes. “I want them to know when they come to us they’re getting high-quality granite.”
