Bussard Marble & Tile

The design work, which was completed in December 2008 was reasonably helpful and creative. The installation was episodic and moved along with minor delays from "sickness", along with the remodelling , which in itself went slowly. However, before the installation was finished, one shower floor had to be regrouted when we discovered stains in the floor grouting. This required some convincing on our part for Bussard to regrout that floor and eliminate the stains. Subsequently, within 4-6 months after completion, grouting was cracking in several places.In one case, the base floor underneath the cracked grout was not sufficiently anchored or even, which resulted in uneven tile which produced a creaking sound every time a foot stepped on that site. Also, there were several areas in which the grout was insufficiently wiped clear from the tile. A few spots later required caulking where the tile did not meet the toilet or the floor vent. Mr. Bussard was contacted by phone in the late spring of 2009 describing the problems. He responded angrily that the grout manufacturer was responsible. That was the last time he communicated with us. We subsequently tried to reach him several times by leaving phone messages with no response. Eventually, his phone numbers became no longer in service. We finally gave up and regrouted and caulked the problems areas ourselves. One uneven tile location and loose subfloor still creaks, but the new grouting is not cracking. In summary, an adequate job had turned sour because of lack of detailed finishing and simple corrective service response following installation and payment.

Bruce is a good guy. Just a few snags along the way, and he fixed them all personally. The project dragged on for too long. Some of it was that my contractor could have done a better job prepping the site so that Bruce's guys could hit the ground running instead of either waiting for GC to prep right or to do it themselves. But, even after they started, sometimes no one would show up, so they could attend to other jobs. I think one of the guys wasn't feeling well for a lot of the project. Also, all cutting had to be done in the basement because GC had already installed the hard wood floors, all of which slowed things down. Speed aside, there were a couple of basic mistakes: shower floor wasn't sloped to drain correctly; shower bench sloped the wrong way. Basic DIY stuff. Bruce came the next day and fixed it all himself, saying his guys were good, but just had an off day. The slate floor over a heated floor system was perfect. Guest bath wall tiles worked out well. Maybe a few places with thin grout, but nothing major. Standard hex tiles went fairly well, but there are several rogue hexes that are slightly askew. Your eye doesn't catch them very often, though.

It was 7 foot by 4 foot with marble, chair rails, all kinds of things. They were very concerned with what the customer thought. They were on time, willing to work evenings and weekends to make sure the job got done. The owner is Bruce Bussard.