September 6-7, 2006
Mahwah, NJ Increase Your Share of the Residential Countertop Market for Natural Stone
(classroom instruction)
If you are looking for quality education for your sales associates and shop employees, this seminar is your best starting point. This seminar covers every facet of stone sales, fabrication, installation, and effectively managing a stone business. Existing and start-up companies will want to make this seminar part of their continuing education program.
Endorsed by: 
Eligible for NKBA Educational Hours or Continuing Education Units
Day 1 is a sales and showroom overview where you will receive the knowledge and skills needed in the showroom to boost your natural stone sales to residential customers. Anyone who interacts with the customer should attend this seminar. A networking reception caps off the first day.
Day 2 is a fabrication and installation overview designed to enhance your skills and perspective needed to produce superior products while exceeding customer expectations. This seminar addresses key fabrication and installation issues that must be addressed in the sales documents (ranging from proposal documents to installation checklists) used in a successful stone company.
Who Should Attend….
All Sales Associates (NKBA & Stone Industry) who want to boost their knowledge and skills needed to increase natural stone residential countertop sales. All Stone Fabricators & Installers looking for the perspective to produce superior products. Companies new to natural stone sales, fabrication, and/or installation. Others hungry for education about natural stone.
What You Will Learn….
How to market and sell natural stone to consumers: stone basics, selling basics, showroom basics and market basics. How to enhance your skills and perspective needed to produce superior products.
Seminar Agenda... Wednesday, September 6, 2006
(Sales & Showroom Overview)
7:30am Registration/Coffee8:00am Welcome / About the MIA / Class Objectives / Attendee Introductions8:45am The Story of Natural Stone Video9:00am Stone Basics - standardize the industry's basics
- Vocabulary / Finishes / Geology Simplified
- Classics vs. Exotics / Grades
- Where stone comes from / How it is transformed & processed / How many people handle it
10:00am Break10:15am Selling Basics:
- Profitable sales for your company
- Safety for employees and customers
- Spending the appropriate time with customers
- Inspecting the slab/tile with the customer
- Avoiding mistakes that lead to supervisory intervention, litigation, jobsite claims
- Say the right things, including "I don't know"
- Selection is a subjective topic
- Questions that come up: backsplashes, cracks, fissures, pits, holes, and other "defects", sealers (their role and function), stone durability
- Competing materials - plastics, ceramics, concrete, metal, resinous quartz.
- Consumer resources from MIA
12 Noon Lunch1:30pm Showroom Basics:
- Preparing your premises to make a good first impression
- Physical display issues
- Vignettes
- Samples and sampling, labels, dates, edges
- Finish and edge examples
- Kid friendly spaces
3:00pm Break3:15pm Market Basics
- Recruiting and hiring sales staff for your company
- Architects and Design Professionals vs. Home owners
- Selling to Industry professionals: Big Box Sales Associates, Fabricators, Importers, Design Centers and their Sales Staff
- Retail vs. wholesale selling. What's the issue in various markets?
- Cooperative marketing, strategic alliances
- Coordinate all of your sales elements to emphasize your business identity, make more sales
4:45pm Closing Remarks / Q&A 5:00pm Networking Reception
MIA Bookstore Open
Thursday, September 7, 2006
(Fabrication & Installation Overview)
7:30am Registration/Coffee8:00am Welcome / About the MIA / Class Objectives / Attendee Introductions8:30am Basics of Stone Shop Safety Video
Basics of OSHA Compliance for the Natural Stone Industry Video10:00am Break10:15am Measuring10:30am Basics of Natural Stone Fabrication Video11:00am Fabrication / Shop Set-up
- What type of customer base?
- Objectives of the shop?
- Natural stone countertop fabrication overview
- Equipment/Tools/Supplies (cutting equipment, edging equipment, hand tools, fabrication supplies)
- Shop Photos (equipment logistics, material flow systems, material storage)
- Question and Answer
12 Noon Lunch *1:30pm Fabrication: Techniques
- Slab Handling and Cutting
- Edge Treatments
- Bowl Hole Cutouts
- Creating for Installation
- Question and Answer
2:45 Break2:30 Installation
- Install Video
- Face-to-face with customer - Meeting customer expectations
- Determining logistics of job (transportation, handling, man-power, location)
- Equipment and Supplies (transportation equipment, seam levers and pullers, small tools necessary)
- Installation Techniques (proper support for countertops, seam fillers)
4:30 Closing
- Meeting end-user expectations
- Is your structure profitable?
- What can I bring back to my company?
5:00 MIA Bookstore Open
*Lunch and Facility Tour Provided by Alpha Professional Tools About the Speakers...
Fred Jackson, CTC, CSI - Jackson Estudio, Anaheim, CA
Duane Naquin - Stone Interiors East, Gaston, SC
Registration...
MIA Member:
1st Person - $229 (1 Day only)
Additional People - $179 (1 Day only)
1st Person - $329 (Both Days)
Additional People - $279 (Both Days)
NKBA Member: Go online to
nkba.com for pricing.
Non-Member:
1st Person - $279 (1 Day only)
Additional People - $229 (1 Day only)
1st Person - $379 (Both Days)
Additional People - $329 (Both Days)
A $50 early registration discount (1 discount per company) is available for registrations received prior to August 18, 2006.
Registration includes:
- Morning coffee/refreshments
- Lunch
- Reception following September 6th seminar
- Speaker handouts/resources (a $100 value)
- $25 Coupon for the MIA Bookstore
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