French limestone direct to projects around the world

Over the last year we have seen an increase in English speaking customers looking for natural stone for their properties across Europe and even farther afield. 

Our position on Google for the search term of “French Limestone” means that we handle a growing number of enquiries from the architects, interior designers and landscape designers on behalf of UK expats in France but also from English speakers around other parts of the world.

In the last year, we have received enquiries from renovators of private chateaux in France and we have a growing number of specifiers whose clients have holiday homes all over France and who chose to buy their French limestone from us rather than go to their local French supplier. Our French limestone can now be seen in holiday homes in the south, central and northern France. These customers were generally native English speakers and they came to us for a variety of different reasons.

For most people, going to buy natural stone direct from the quarry’s factory can be an intimidating experience. They may have to make sense of technical terms that would be difficult enough in English, let alone in a foreign language. 

The quarries are quite used to dealing with stone trade customers but they don’t always have the resources to welcome private or “non-stone-trade” customers. It can be a time consuming process to conclude a deal with a customer who is not familiar with the multitude of options and the technical considerations when buying natural stone. It is far simpler to receive an order from a trade customer who places the order for a particular stone that is to be cut and finished to a specification that the quarries understand. For native English speakers, it is easier to have a detailed conversation in English with someone who has the time to fully explain the choices.

Another aspect is that it is more convenient to view a range of samples from several quarries all in one place in order to choose which stone to use. Many of the quarries have small showrooms for their trade customers but they will normally only have a limited range of stone on show. Naturally, they will feature their own stone but are unlikely to promote stone from neighbouring or competing quarries. UK based customers will find it easier to visit our samples showroom near Reading so they can see samples from dozens of different quarries.

One of the key benefits that our customers appreciate is that we can deliver worldwide directly from the quarrys’ factories. It means that the stone does not have to be transported to the UK before being shipped out to the customer’s location. Our haulage agent can take the stone from the factory yard directly to the customer premises. It minimises the cost of shipping, particularly for the customer choosing to buy stone from the same country as their project address.

The decision process for choosing the right stone is flexible but roughly follows the route of:

– a discussion by phone or email to work out the look and feel that the customer wants
– photos of completed projects and detailed scans of the stone to show high resolution images 
– a guide to the costs of the stone and the cost of shipping.
– followed up with small samples of the stone sent out by courier or post or
– a customer visit to our showroom to see larger samples and
– where appropriate, an accompanied visit to the quarry and factory in question.

We keep samples of most French limestones, marbles and granites at our samples showroom in Arborfield, near Reading, Berkshire in the UK. Please call, email or leave a message on the form on this page if you’d like to visit the showroom or receive samples.

Thanks for reading and we look forward to hearing from you.

Steve Turner
Pierre Heritage GB
Tel: 0345 260 8070
steve@pierreheritage.co.uk

Showroom address:
Pudding Lane Nursery
Reading Road
Arborfield
RG2 9HP