Hello, I’m Steven Nenzel, President of Rock-It Surfaces. After more than 20 years working closely with homeowners, I know how exciting—and sometimes overwhelming—shopping for countertops can be. I’ve also seen some not-so-great installations, and I want to help you steer clear of the common mistakes I’ve seen over the years.
That’s why I put together a straightforward guide just for you. It’s full of insider tips you can use before buying countertops—so you can spot quality work, better understand pricing and installation, and avoid surprises along the way. My goal is to make your experience smooth, rewarding, and help you feel fully confident as you bring your project to life.
Quartz countertops are engineered stone surfaces made primarily from ground quartz crystals mixed with resins and pigments, resulting in a highly durable, nonporous, and visually appealing product suitable for kitchens and bathrooms. Quartz countertops consist of about 90–95% natural quartz combined with 5–10% polymer resins and color pigments. This engineered mixture allows for a wide variety of colors, patterns, and finishes that mimic natural stone like granite and marble, while also offering options for solid colors and unique textures. The finished surface is extremely durable and resistant to stains and scratches because it is nonporous and dense.
Quartz countertops blend the strength of natural stone with the versatility of engineered materials, resulting in a surface that combines beauty, durability, and practicality for modern homes.
Quartz should not be used outdoors where it is in contact with direct sunlight. Although most quartz today has some UV resistance within the resins, it will not stand up to the relentless direct exposure to sun.
Granite countertops are made of natural granite rock, primarily composed of quartz, feldspar, and mica, and they are considered an excellent choice for kitchen surfaces due to their strength, durability, and unique natural appearance.
In summary, granite countertops are a strong, heat-resistant, and hygienic choice for kitchens, offering both functional and aesthetic advantages with only minor ongoing maintenance needed.
Quartzite countertops are a natural stone surface made from quartz-rich sandstone that has been transformed by heat and pressure into an exceptionally hard, durable, and dense material, making them a strong choice for kitchen use.
Quartzite is a metamorphic rock formed when sandstone is subjected to extreme heat and pressure deep within the Earth’s crust, resulting in a surface that is primarily quartz and typically features a glassy sheen and dramatic veining which often resembles marble. Quartzite slabs are cut directly from this natural stone and require sealing to reduce porosity and help prevent staining.
Most, although not all, quartzite colors are highly regarded for kitchens due to several key attributes:
Pros:
Cons:
In summary, quartzite countertops are an excellent, luxurious choice for kitchens if durability, heat resistance, and a natural, upscale look are top priorities, provided that regular sealing and professional installation are factored in. There are some colors of quartzite that we would not recommend as they are softer with much greater porosity which makes them very susceptible to staining.
Porcelain countertops are a man-made ceramic surface created from natural clay and minerals, fired at high temperatures to create a dense, glass-like material.
Porcelain countertops are attractive but we do not currently recommend them for high use kitchens due to the susceptibility of chipping.
15 years ago there were virtually no resined slabs. Now nearly all slabs I purchase are resined as they often have a superior finish and are difficult to stain.
Natural stone comes in many different colors, shapes and textures and is made of varying minerals. Many of these stones have natural occurring fissures, micro-fissures, fractures and superficial holes and pits. After the granite slab is cut an epoxy resin coat is applied that fills the naturally occurring fissures, pits and voids. After the resin is cured the slab is ready to be polished. The polishing process removes most of the resin leaving the micro fissures and pores filled. The polished granite surface is an all natural shiny easy to maintain surface.
A few granites are not resined. Giallo Ornamental is one of those stones. Often slabs that are not resined have very small pores that you can feel. The best advice I can give is to carefully look at the stone from an angle where you can see the micro fissures and pores. If the finish looks too pitted or spotty for your tastes, then consider another color. I will be happy to help you choose the right color for your project.
MARBLE
Marble is a metamorphic rock that forms when limestone is subjected to the heat and pressure. It is composed primarily of calcite and usually contains other minerals, such as clay minerals, micas, quartz, pyrite, iron oxides, and graphite. Under the conditions of metamorphism, the calcite in the limestone recrystallizes to form a rock that is a mass of interlocking calcite crystals.
On the mohs hardness scale a marble will range from 2 to 3. It will scratch easily. Marbles are also porous and can stain easily if not properly sealed and spills wiped up. In addition, the calcite in marbles makes them susceptible to acids which will etch (rough dull spot) the finish.
Much like a leather handbag, Marble will show wear. The bumps and scrapes, scuffs and scratches all tell a story that become part of the Marble’s “patina”. The Italians consider a well-worn kitchen to be a sign of great hospitality and many friends. This is the beauty of Marble. If these characteristics unnerve you then perhaps Marble is not the appropriate stone selection for your home. On the other hand, if you are a purest and view these traits as a lovely patina worth embracing then, by all means go with Marble.
DOLOMITIC MARBLE
A related marble rock, dolomitic marble, is thought to form when the calcite in carbonate mud or limestone is modified by magnesium-rich groundwater. The available magnesium facilitates the conversion of calcite into dolomite. This chemical change is known as “dolomitization.” Dolomitization can completely alter a limestone into a dolomite. Dolomites are harder than your average marble but are softer than granite. Dolomites will hold up better than marble to acids and etching, but they can still etch. Dolomites make a great looking countertop and can be used in the kitchen, bathrooms, etc., but don’t expect the same performance as a harder stone like granite.
A leathered (textured and honed) dolomite such as Fantasy Brown Marble can be a perfect fit for those that really want marble but are concerned about durability. Although not as hard as granite this dolomite is very durable. It is harder to scratch and does not easily etch as a regular marble. If you do etch or scratch the leather finish hides this well. This stone is not very porous and is easily sealed to prevent stains. It is our “go to” stone when people really desire a more durable marble.
There are two different thicknesses of granite sold; 3/4 inch and 1 1/4 inch. At one time most of what was sold was 2cm slabs, but over the last 15 years a transition as taken place. Most markets in the US use 3cm granite, quartz, and marble slabs.
San Diego and most of California have been slow to transition. A 2cm kitchen countertop has a glued built up edge and requires a plywood substrate for support. 3cm countertops are strong and can sit directly on the cabinets with out plywood support and no glued up edge. Your countertop will be on solid think piece of stone.
I have a bias toward 3cm. Happy customers are important to me. Once my customers have seen the difference they choose the thicker 3cm every time. Go with one of my competitors, your tops could look like the picture on the left.
First and foremost, the quality of a seam cannot be determined solely by the color and grain match. You can have a perfect color match but a horrible looking seam. A well fabricated and installed seam will be very tight at less than 1/64 thick and will be relatively chip free on the top. It is not always possible to have a completely chip free seam as some stones are very brittle and even with the best milling method will chip. A properly colored epoxy will do a good job in hiding any chips.
Great seams are not produced with a saw cut, they are milled with progressively finer grits and take time to produce. Companies that have CNC (computer numeric controlled) stone machines and know how to use them can consistently produce tight seams that are relatively chip free.
On the right you can see the results of unprofessional hand fabrication. At Rock-It Surfaces we have the machines and technical know-how to give you a great seam every time.
Color and grain matching are critical components to nearly invisible seams. However, even the best fabricator cannot always produce invisible seams as it is dependent on how closely the two or three slabs match in color and grain and if the consumer has purchased enough slabs to obtain near perfection. Know what you are getting before the installation by requiring your approval of the slab layout before the stone is cut.
We use a program called SlabSmith that allows me to digitally nest the countertops onto high resolution photographs. We can send an e-mail you with an actual picture of the countertops….seams and all.
Often fabricators put seams on sinks in order to make the seam shorter (and supposedly less visible). Within the stone fabrication industry there is much debate about this and some think it is fine and others not. I think it is a bad idea. By putting a seam in the sink cut-out you have just made a potentially fragile area more fragile. Most sinks are located at window openings. Placing the seam where it can be seen the easiest in the reflected light is a bad idea. Worse yet, you have very small areas holding very large pieces of stone together.
We have had more service calls to repair seams on sinks installed by other shops than any other type of call. We normally will not put a seam on a sink cut-out and if a customer insists, I will exclude it from our warranty.
The location of other seams is dependent on slab and countertop size, number of slabs purchased for the job and grain direction of the stone. It is impossible to give any real guidance other than common sense; try and avoid them on peninsulas and islands. Usually, but not always the grain direction should flow one way in the kitchen. There are exceptions to both these rules but they are rare. One of the nicest islands we have ever installed had a booked matched seam running through the middle.
Most people want sinks that mount under the granite (undermount sinks). I always make the cut follow the shape of the bowl but I have seen lots of track homes with cuts that follow the edge of the flange of the sink and not the bowl. It is easier to make a rectangular cut by following the flange of the sink than it is to cut to the shape of the bowl. Following the shape of the bowl looks much nicer and adds more granite area around the bowl which adds strength to the area; it is a double win. I consider following the flange of the sink a short cut. When cutting to the flange, I have seen my competitors put 4 seams on the sink cut-out; two in the back and two in the front. They did this to save time and material without much regard for the home owner. I replaced the countertops shown above.
I have seen many jobs where the quartz or granite edge is duller than the countertop. Some fabricators have been known to use wax or rouge to brighten the edge but the shine will quickly wear off. That is unacceptable!
A polished edge takes more time and skill to produce, so it is easy for me to spot a “hack.” I’ve hired experienced fabricators who have, on their second day of employment, used their trick of the trade. After spending the first day trying to polish a black granite (usually the hardest to polish) and not finding any wax or rouge in our shop, they bring their bag of tricks the second day. That next day was their last day in our shop. I can teach them how to properly polish, but it is too late to teach them character.
Quality is important to me. You have to look at your granite countertops for as long as you own your home.
It matters.
A large percent of the service calls I receive involve improperly installed sinks.
A properly professionally installed sink will have a bead of 100% silicone between the granite and the flange of the sink and will be mechanically fastened to the underside of the granite. There are various ways to accomplish this and different sinks and the available room inside the cabinet will require different methods.
For stainless steel and composite sinks I usually drill holes 5/8″ deep in the underside of the granite. I insert grommets into these holes
to provide screw holes in which we can use clips to fasten the sinks directly to the granite. Before we install the sink we run a bead of 100% silicone around the flange. When the sink is pushed to the granite the bead of silicone flattens out and provides a solid seal.
Make sure 100% silicone is used to seal your sink. I have seen many sinks where the installer used regular caulking and the result is not pretty. Caulking does not resist mold as well as silicone and does not adhere to the sink and granite as well. The reason less reputable companies use caulking is it is less expensive and easier to clean up.
When using 3/4″ thick stone many companies will sandwich the sink flange between the granite and the plywood deck. I personally don’t like this because if moisture gets to the plywood it can swell up and rot. If this happens the sink will eventually drop away from the granite. The moisture can come from the sink not being properly sealed or from a faucet, soap dispense, water spigot or dishwasher vent. If you are using 3/4″ thick granite do not allow them to sandwich the sink. There are better methods of fastening the sink to the granite.
Five years ago I purchased a Computer Numeric Control (cnc) stone milling machine. We produced top notch hand fabricated countertops but I must say not as good as our cnc is able to produce. A cnc will use an autocad drawing of the countertop and will mill the edge to exact size. When it mills a 6 inch radius, it is an exact 6 inch radius. A kidney shaped island is a cake walk. Undermount sink cut-outs are produced exactly to the drawing and consistently follow the shape of the bowl.
Hand fabrication is not as precise and is prone to more error. Hand fabrication depends solely on the individual doing the work. If the individual takes pride in his work and is very detailed he can produce nice results. However, I found that even my best guys had their off days and they are only human. When we switched to cnc machining we found that not only did our quality go up but we dramatically reduced errors. Now only one or two at the most make any substantive decisions about work to be performed on the kitchen countertops. This insures that few errors are made and our turnaround time faster. On a scale of 1 to 10, my stress level went down to a 2 from an 8 after we deployed this technology. Day in and day out the machine produces the same high quality and never calls in sick. Our countertops fit in kitchens with absolute precision. That is the Rock-It difference.
When choosing a granite fabricator you should consider the technology they are using to create your granite or quartz countertops. Although some hand fabricators can produce decent results you are taking a greater chance finding one that will. As we all have come to know as a sad reality, there are fewer people today that take pride in their work than in days past. Trying to keep a shop full of those fewer people is a challenge I won’t take up again.
Part of the process of using cnc machines is the required deployment of a digital measuring process. When hand fabricating we would create templates of the kitchen cabinets using strips of wood and hot glue. Although this worked for the time it is nothing like a laser measure that can scribe to the bows in the walls.
We never have to adjust countertops out in the field to make them fit… they fit perfectly and with tighter tolerances. That is precision.
As a standard I use 1.5″ off the face frame of the cabinets which shows approximately 0.75″ overhang off the door fronts. It is common to use 1.5″ and you can use more or less just make sure it is agreed upon at the time of templating. The overhang can vary slightly and some tolerances should be expected. A large tolerance would be 0.25″ variance, however, keep in mind that your cabinets may not follow a straight line. If the two cabinets on the end of a run were set out 0.25″ or more from the cabinets in the center, you would not want granite to take a dip in the center; it would look horrible.
When extending out from cabinets and pony walls for bar tops and seating areas, the Marble Institute of America states the maximum unsupported overhang for 3cm granite/quartzite off a 24″ cabinet is 10″. For 2cm stone with a plywood deck it is 6″.
Quartz can cantilever off cabinets a greater amount than natural stone. On an island we can provide an overhang on one side as much as 14” without additional support. Quartz is stronger across the slab than any natural stone.
When extending overhangs beyond 16 inches on islands and peninsulas, the support issue needs attention as there is a point at which a leg of some kind will be required to properly support the countertop. No one is going to pay the huge expense of hiring an engineer to construct the load factors, etc. to determine at what point and where legs need to be added. The homeowner, the fabricator and the contractor (if one is present) need to discuss this issue and act conservatively. There is no way I could begin to cover the complexity of this issue considering all the different scenarios there could be.
Quartz prices can vary a lot between manufacturers. Most of the manufacturers have tiered pricing for their different colors and the price difference between colors can amount to thousands of dollars for the average kitchen. The name brand suppliers such as Cambria, Silestone, Caesarstone, etc. are more expensive than the non-branded lines such as Della Terra and Q Quartz. The difference can be substantial. Do not confuse cost with quality. Much of the time there is no difference in quality between price levels.
The cost of natural stone slabs (granite, marble & quartzite) vary dramatically and are primarily supply and demand driven. The quarry where the stone is mined determines what they are willing to sell the blocks of granite to the polishing factories. If they have a hot color that everyone wants and they control the supply, they can demand a higher price. If there are many quarries producing a similar color and the color is not as desired, the price will be much lower. Right now quartzite prices are very high (making them the most expensive countertop option) due to demand and supply.
Some slab yards will not sell directly to the consumer. They sell it to the fabricator who sells it as fabricated countertops to the consumer. Many slab yards categorize their stone into groupings from A to F (A being the least expensive). They do this to give consumers an idea of price range without telling them the exact price.
If you are purchasing slabs from a slab yard keep in mind you have to purchase the right number of slabs to ensure your seams look good. If your kitchen is small, say 45 sf, you may think you can get away with one large slab and you may be right if you choose a stone that has no grain direction or color variation. Your cabinet configuration will also play a role. As a general rule I use a 15% to 20% waste factor on granite that has no color variation or grain direction. I use up to 50% waste factor when using exotics that have movement and color variation. I’ve found many consumers make the mistake of believing there is no color variation or movement in a slab. If they did not see it before the slab was cut they certainly will see it when the seam is put together; color variation and grain direction will present itself like a sore thumb.
Within our slab yard we sell quartz and natural stone by the per square foot not by the slab which can make more sense. Overall there is less wasted stone because I buy bundles of quartz and natural stone and can yield more kitchens per bundle. That is a win for me and a win for the customer.
Before you decide whether a quote is “good” or “bad,” take a close look at the fabricator behind the number. The right company will save you time, stress, and money in the long run. Here are the key questions you should ask:
Do they stand behind their work?
A warranty is only as good as the company offering it. Sadly, fewer than half of new businesses make it to their fifth year, which means many won’t be around to service a future problem. A long-term written warranty is a strong indicator of quality and reliability. I offer a 10-year warranty because I believe in the craftsmanship and expect it to last.
Are they licensed and insured?
In California, hiring an unlicensed contractor leaves you with little protection if something goes wrong. Even worse, if a worker without proper insurance is injured in your home, you could be held legally and financially responsible. Choosing a licensed, insured fabricator isn’t optional—it’s peace of mind.
Do they own a real fabrication shop?
True countertop fabrication requires precision machinery, special tools, and plenty of water to polish edges and create a flawless surface. If someone is “fabricating” in a garage or on-site in your driveway, walk away. Quality results only come from proper shops with the right setup.
Is their shop clean and organized?
The state of a shop says everything about the people who run it. A clean, well-organized shop reflects pride, professionalism, and respect for the craft. On the other hand, a sloppy shop usually means a sloppy job. Saving a couple hundred dollars is never worth cutting corners here—you’ll get what you pay for, and usually less.
Can you see recent examples of their work?
Ask for the last three jobs they completed, not just staged portfolio photos. Call those homeowners. Happy and unhappy customers will both be very clear with you. Outdated or vague references are red flags—if a fabricator avoids sharing recent work, move on.
How do they quote projects?
Countertops are typically quoted by the square foot with additional costs for features like detailed edges, sink cutouts, or other custom touches. Rates vary depending on local business costs, so it’s smart to get at least three quotes. But don’t fall into the trap of assuming all fabricators are equal—experience, equipment, and craftsmanship make a world of difference. The real question is: What value am I getting for this price?
For example:
Invest in people, not just stone
At the end of the day, buying countertops isn’t just about granite, quartz, or marble—it’s about the people behind the installation. Do their values match yours? Do you trust them to treat your home with the care it deserves?
A few hundred dollars’ difference on paper often translates to a huge difference in quality, service, and peace of mind. Choose wisely, and you’ll enjoy the results for years to come.
