A few weeks ago, I attended a session of the Marble Institute of America/Stone World education series in Boston, MA, where I also moderated a Fabricator Forum. We have been doing these educational sessions in various formats since 2005, which means we have seen them take place in a broad spectrum of climates — from the glory days of 2006 to the depths of 2009 — and, it seems, everything in between.

In the weeks leading up to this particular event, I had been hearing some very positive feedback from fabricators in the New England region as well as other parts of North America. Notably, two fabricators actually postponed my visits to their shops because they were “slammed” with work at the moment. Realistically, I know that many shops are still seeing plenty of ups and downs at the moment, but I definitely wasn’t hearing this sort of thing two years ago.