I’ll tell you a short story.
A week or so after Sept 11, 2001 I boarded a mostly empty Airbus and flew to Milan Italy to attend the Verona Fair Stone show. I was one of a small handful of Americans at the show that year. It was weird...nobody was flying out of the states....alot of Americans canceled their travel plans after the world trade center towers were attacked.
I landed in Milan and took a train to Verona, checked into my hotel, and got ready to go to the show. I can not describe how nice people were to me, people thanked me for coming and got tears in their eyes as they mentioned the tragedy that had terrorized our nation a week earlier.
This was very early in my fabrication career. My shop was a metal shed attached to a pig barn in rural Oregon. We had 2 or 3 workers and fabricated one or two kitchens per week. We were cutting slabs with an Imer combi 3000. I had been making kitchens for a year or two at this point.
I went to the stone show in Verona and was floored. So much to see! At some point on that first day I wandered into the most incredible booth I had ever seen. There were super models, amazing displays, slabs with colors I had never seen, incredible finishes (this was around the time when resined slabs were starting to appear). The booth sign said: Antolini
Hmmm....never heard of ‘em. But what a booth!
This incredible looking super model offers me a drink and I said; “Thanks” I was with this guy from Iran that spoke English and Farsi. I Speak English and German. This other man from Iran, he owned a quarry and spoke only Farsi. There was a woman that asked if my buddy and I could assist with some translating (she spoke german). I was then introduced to this guy name Alberto. The three-way translation thing got underway.
Once that business was wrapped up, Alberto thanks me and declares how happy he was that I came to the show from America after the attacks. I can not emphasize how strange it was to be in Europe right after 9/11. People were incredible. I am blessed to have experienced that. I could not buy a drink! I could not pay for food!
This is where it gets interesting. What followed impacted how I looked at stone, this industry and most importantly how I grew my company from a metal shed next to a pig barn to a real full blown shop. That afternoon had a profound and lasting impact on how I marketed stone for the decade that followed...You can experience that impact first hand at our Denali Slab Studio in Seattle.
Alberto Antolini had one of his assistants take me and my friend to a helicopter. We were given an aerial tour of Verona and then flown to his factory on the outskirts of town. I was given a tour of the factory, I saw the gang saws in action, the line machines going, it was incredible. The passion of the Man and his operation was evident everywhere. The place was immaculate. The attention to detail, good taste and intent to amaze abounded. I was given a tour of what he called the “Slab Boutique” the stones were incredible. I simply had never seen these colors...it was unbelievable. Awe inspiring!
We were then flown back to the show. Alberto invited me to dinner that evening. I could write an essay about that amazing evening....but that is not the point of this missive. Although, I will tell you what he said that stuck in my mind....and then came true last year.
I was sitting in this 500 year old dining room with a table that was 20 feet long and had a bevy of waiters running around, the wine was flowing, a lady in the corner was strumming the harp etc etc.... I felt kinda awkward. I was in a room filled with the movers and shakers of the international stone trade. I remember at one point in the evening Alberto and this lovely woman named Tatiana came down to the end of the table where I was sitting and shared a glass or three of wine with me and my friend.
I said to Alberto; “Until today I did not know who you were, I am certain I have never cut one of your slabs, you understand, I only cut 4-5 slabs per week....but I do appreciate the incredible hospitality you have shown me. I feel a little out of place”
Alberto Said: “One day you will cut lots of slabs. When the time comes, I hope that you will be a customer of mine....”
Recently (over a decade later) we purchased several containers of material from one of Alberto’s affiliates.
What does this have to do with the MEGA WORKSHOP?
I want to give a huge shout out to Ron Hannah and the board of directors for somehow getting Antolini to participate in our workshop. As some of you know....and for those that don’t....I have been so very busy working at Denali, working on our FOCUS 3C software, and sorting out my sixteen year old that I had to ignore my other passion; the SFA.
I was chatting with Matt L. on the phone last week and he was telling me about how Ron had gotten Antolini to participate in our workshop and teach our organization about marketing stone. All I could think was “WOW!” This was a topic that I could get passionate about! I know first hand how my exposure to Antolini early in my stone career had made such a profound impact on my bottom line in the years that followed.
Now our ENTIRE organization has a chance to not only experience the magic that is Antolini but actually be taught by the company that invented modern stone marketing! Guys, this is a big big opportunity for you!
You can not afford to miss this workshop. Think of it in terms of opportunity cost. I promise you that whatever money you might lose leaving your shop for 3 days and getting to Nashville, you will get back TENFOLD over your career from what you will learn from Antolini's team. We are going to learn from the very best of the best. Alberto is the Steve Jobs of the stone industry.....he is sending his team to teach us. They are not going to a MIA workshop, they are not teaching at Coverings or Surfaces. They are coming to the STONE FABRICATORS ALLIANCE MEGA WORKSHOP!
I truly hope to see you and yours there. Prepare to be blown away, prepare to rethink how you sell stone, prepare to be astonished! Take advantage of this opportunity! The Ultimate Stone Romance! Brought to you by the SFA and Antolini
