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It’s not too often one gets the opportunity to be completely immersed in a world of tile-- to be surrounded by its history, its beauty, its unique craft. For those of you who know the Historic Howden Building in Oakland, California, you may have an idea of the beauty to which I speak of. For those of you who don’t, let me just quote from Mosaic Art Now and say it’s “a glittering, shimmering, jewelry box of a tile showroom.” Unique in many ways, this building, which was built in 1925, houses a showcase of tile-- and it is in this very place that the Tile Heritage Foundation presents “Clay Expectations: A Festival of Tiles and Mosaics” this Sunday, September 12th, 10-5 pm.
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This fundraising event will bring together the work of tile artisans and artists alike all to be showcased and exhibited in “support of the Tile Heritage Foundation’s ongoing archival and cataloging programs.” Accompanying the presentation of tile and mosaic art, tours and lectures will be given, along with children’s workshops on clay and mosaics. Amongst the tile artisans and artists attending, Fireclay Tile is thrilled to be a participant in this Sunday’s event and share our unique 24-year-old tile history. We will be showcasing our sustainable, handmade, local tile, specifically our hand-painted Cuerda Seca tiles, which we have been making here at Fireclay Tile for over 15 years. Please join us and witness the true beauty and uniqueness of tile from all around and learn about its fascinating history. It will truly be an event not to be missed-- so bring your family along to this spectacular showcase and have some fun!
For more information, please visit http://www.tileheritage.org/
Details:
Sunday, September 12th, 10-5 pm
Historic Howden Building
17th & Webster Sts., Oakland, California
Admission: $5 ($4 with this notice)
Lectures:
Tiles Out of the Blue: Creating Beauty from the Earth
California Decorative Tiles, 1900-1930
By Joseph A. Taylor 11-noon Sunday, Sept. 12th
Berkeley, California
1913-1959
By Kirby William Brown 1-2pm Sunday, Sept. 12th
Towers, Totems and Tiles
By Lillian Sizemore 3-4 p.m., Sunday, Sept. 12th
Tiles and Terra Cotta in Uptown Oakland
A Walking Tour with Riley Doty
Presented by Oakland Heritage Alliance
12:30 – 3 p.m., Sunday, Sept. 12th
Separate charge: $10
Elizabeth Raybee will orchestrate a “drop-in for
kids” (of all ages) to make mini-mosaics. Among
the choices will be mosaic pins or fridge magnets
made in jar lids or anchovy/sardine cans. Lots of
fun and glitter! Everyone can take away a
finished piece. Elizabeth Raybee is an
internationally recognized mosaic artist and
teacher.
Tile Heritage is also providing a supervised Kids’
Clay Table all day with well known ceramists &
teachers: Irene de Watteville, Dale Wiley, Lisa
Cox, Chere Mah and Colette Crutcher. This will
be an informal setting with lots of clay tools,
stamps and molds as well as guidance and
demonstration by the teachers. Everyone can take
home what they make!
The Tiles of California Faience
Southern California Mosaic Fantasy Worlds:
Tour:
Workshop for Kids -Mosaic
Workshop for Kids - Clay
Join us at our Annual Boneyard Blowout running from August 23 - Septemember 4. The Fireclay Tile Boneyard consists of our seconds and overstock, and for the first time ever all items are 50% off. Our Factory Showroom also has a wide selection of Pavers and Saltillos, each 20% off.
Tile starting at $2.50 per square foot for field tile and $.50 per piece for decorative - there is NO better deal for handmade, sustainable, high quality ceramic tile! Wide paver selection including Fireclay own material as well as Mexican Saltillo and other fine paving options!
We hope to see you there! For directions click here.
In 2009 Fireclay Tile realized that while we make sustainable ceramic tile, as a company we could do things to be more sustainable ourselves. We quickly identified our lighting as being very out of date and ready for an upgrade. We’d owned our San Jose location since 1986, and our Aromas factory since the mid-90’s, and neither had seen an up-grade in lighting since.
Unfortunately we had no money. Remember the recession? Yeah, well, 2009 was tough for Fireclay financially, and while we invested every dollar we had in our product and our customers, internal upgrades were put on hold.
After doing some research and exchanging some emails with members of the Bay Area Green Business Program, they pointed us to PG&E, our utility provider, as being able to help. Since we paid PG&E over $7k per month, we thought, “about time!” PG&E responded immediately, and after surveying our locations informed us that we were eligible for significant “lighting retrofit credits.” See, from PG&E’s point of view, if they can invest in other companies decreasing their energy use, then PG&E won’t need to invest as much in fulfilling peak demand. PG&E then put us in touch with RightLights.
From its website, “The RightLights Program provides subsidized energy efficiency upgrades of lighting and refrigeration systems, with free professional assistance to help you lower your energy bills and boost your cash flow.” Just three weeks after first contacting the Bay Area Green Business Program, RightLights was on site, surveying our lighting and taking notes. By November 30, 2009, we had a quote for our San Jose location and RightLights specialist Ryan Mack. His proposal identified the “total installed cost”, the “total rebate” and my “final cost” all with an estimated annual savings in energy use and a payback period.
RightLights contracts out the work to certified installers, in this case Lumenature. Lumenature was a first-class operator, and their team communicated well and did a great job installing the retrofitted lighting. Once they were done, Ryan came back out for a final inspection to sign off on the project.
The success of San Jose convinced us to do a similar program in Aromas, and in March RightLights’ Jeremy Jackson provided a similar quote and returns analysis. This time the result was staggering! The “total installed cost” was $5,530, but our “rebate” would be $4,125, meaning our “total cost” was only $1,405. Our estimate annual savings were $3,876, meaning we would see a payback in only 3 months!
A quick summary of thwat they did was as follows:
- Replaced incandescent lighting with Energy Star® compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs).
- Replaced “T12” lamps with “T8,” which are smaller and more energy-efficient.
- Many of our older magnetic fluorescent ballasts contained polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), a toxic chemical. Fireclay's facility had quite a few PCB ballasts removed and recycled, which were replaced with energy-saving electronic ballasts (which contain no PCBs). Electronic ballasts also eliminate the “flickering” and “buzz” that may cause headaches and eyestrain.
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| T8 Energy Efficient Lights | Energy Star CFLs |
If it sounds too good to be true, well, it is. Beyond the simple environmental and financial savings, our lighting got a significant overhaul and each employee is far happier with better lighting. Even our Quality Control improved!
The other day I looked at my online PG&E billing statement to really see just how substantiall Fireclay’s energy use has been impacted. In San Jose, over the last several our electricity usage was on average down over 40% compared to similar periods last year! Given we used to have a $500+ bill in San Jose, that’s awesome!
If you haven’t yet checked out the RightLights program or PG&E’s rebates do it now. The savings are real and the environmental impact is obvious! Any questions, drop me a line at (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).
So thrilled with out two newest and most recent Fireclay Tile videos. These are each about 2 minutes long and provide a great oversight of everything we do at Fireclay Tile!
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Ok, so it's probably a stretch to compare Fireclay Tile to Apple. I mean, Apple did just report about $16 billion in sales over the last 3 months, which is about, well, A LOT more than Fireclay, but when it comes to lead times we're not so different.
Eric, our business guy, just snagged one of those hot new iPhone 4s and has been playing with it, making movies, and snapping photos left and right. When he ordered it, though, the lead time was 3 weeks! Ok, so the iPhone is hot, so demand is greater than supply. But then again today, after Apple launched their new "Bumper Program" for iPhone cases, the lead time was 3-5 weeks!
At Fireclay we make each and every order from scratch, start to finish, and we do it in about four weeks. Don't believe us? Just watch our manufacturing video to see how it's done. Not only that, but we make it right here in the U.S. and we do it using recycled materials which we up-cycle into beautiful new ceramic tile products that will last forever.
The iPhone, on the other hand, is made overseas, is made in bulk, and will be obsolete in about 2 years, and when you discard it the electronic pieces will be extremely difficult to recycle or dispose of properly.
So beyond just the mere fact that our lead times are pretty much the same, by our take we'll give you an even higher quality product made for you, by us, in only four weeks.
Want to experience it for yourself? Grab a sample here! (Note: this blog post was written on an Apple and the writer is a lover of all Apple related things!)
We love emailing our customers about new tile products and other exciting ceramic news from our company, and we use Vertical Response for that effort. This week we were featured as the Customer of the Week by Vertical Response for our July Newsletter.
If you are interested in receiving our newsletter just sign up for our newsletter!
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Enough with all the iPhone 4 hype! The real news is Fireclay Tile has launched its NEW Express Line of recycled ceramic tile featuring some truly amazing new features such as:
- 6 New Contemporary Colors suitable for all residential and commercial applications
- 1 Week turnaround...and it's still handmade like all of our other tile lines!
- Most popular shapes and sizes, including 4x4, 6x6, and 3x6, as well as trim and decorative accessories to match
- Over 62% recycled materials, just like our Debris Series Recycled Ceramic Tile
- 25% less expensive ($18/SF) than our Debris Series, meaning you can get it faster for less money!
- Qualifies for numerous LEED Points including recycled materials and local manufacturing. Read more here.
We've been selling this product to our exclusive dealers over the past 4 months and so far the feedback has been fantastic. We can't wait to grow this part of our business and keep bringing our customers truly innovative products that are sustainably manufactured by Fireclay Tile right here in the U.S.
CHECK OUT THE BRAND NEW EXPRESS SERIES of recycled ceramic tile AND ORDER YOUR FREE SAMPLES TODAY!
Click here for your FREE SAMPLES!
By Mayra Melchor, Fireclay's Production Coordinator
Recently when Mrs. Stonebloom's class came by the Fireclay Tile factory as part of a school field trip never did it cross our minds that we would become a great part of what they were planning to create for their school. We love to host students, but generally it is a tour for them to learn about using recycled materials or green building and LEED Credits.
Mrs. Stonebloom later advised us that the class was in the process of designing a mural which would depict the history of Aromas, CA and needed a little bit of our help to create it. Our Chief Ceramicist and founder, Paul Burns, was more than willing to donate all tiles and trim needed to initiate this historical and unique piece of mosaic art. Community contributions are important to Fireclay, and we have been involved with many that we are proud of. (See more community contributions here.)
Aromas is a quiet and small town with a population of no more than 3,000 residents, it is located in the middle of the Monterey, Santa Cruz and San Benito counties. You would think there is no history to be told of this town, but the mural these students created would suggest otherwise.
Twenty-one students sat down and researched the town they've grown up in from indegenous origins all through the rancho period and up to the 1940's. The mural was sponsored by the Aromas School English Learner Advisory Commitee. The students, five of whom have been in the U.S no longer than 3 years, were not able to communicate verbally with their peers fluently but proved that art needs no language.
The mural titled is "The History of Aromas in Twenty Voices." The Aromas School Mural Project which stands 4 feet tall and 17 feet long was put up on June 8th, 2010, just before the last day of the school year. The students proudly told the story of how this project came about and directed me towards the school library where pictures and books were put out for us to see showing the intense process of this project. The tiles used were our Debris Series Recycled Tile, and in the process the kids also learned about re-using recycled waste materials.
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All in all it a wonderful sight to see after the mural had been put up for all of us to enjoy, but more so, the fact that even though this small school has also been struck by budget cuts and lost it's art teacher, this was made possible due to all the volunteers and donations that were made.
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The project was recently highlighted in the Santa Cruz Sentinel as well as local news!
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Aromas School would like to thank it's donors and volunteers:
Paul Burns of Fireclay Tile: for donating all materials (tile, glazes, kiln)
Fireclay Tile Production Manager Ramiro Plascencia: for his time, attention and technical support
Fireclay Tile Production Office Manager Mayra Melchor: for her encouragement and teaching the students the art of tile making
Hugo Marquez: for installing the tile
Tina Baine: the historical consultant
Monterey County Free Library: for supplying all historical documents and photographs
Terry Strasser: art consultant support
Guillermo Kelly-Paez: Muralist
If other student groups or schools would like to do similar projects, please do not hesitate to contact us.
On June 24 Fireclay Tile celebrated a huge achievement and showcased our newly designed San Jose Tile Showroom. Roughly 5 months after starting this project and after investing close to $30,000 on the remodel, we are so thrilled to showcase our beautiful locally manufactured products and other favorite vendors.
Fireclay's tile and surface materials Factory Showroom features an enormous display of Fireclay products in hundreds of colors, shapes and sizes. We designed and custom built a beautiful new bathtub, shower, and kitchen backsplash installation, and designed over 100 new concept boards to provide design inspiration for any environment. We will feature LOTS of pictures in a follow-post after they have been properly photographed, but if you want to come visit for yourself to see the wonderful creations, you can find directions here.
We also celebrated the achievement by inviting some of our local customers and fans and sharing one of our most favorite Fireclay experiences - BBQ!!!
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| Martin, a Fireclay Founder, and Steve | Paul, Founder and Chief Ceramicist, with guests |
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| Carlos (far L) and Meika (far R) with friends | Paul with Laura (graphic designer) and her husband |
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| Erika, Joy (Merchandizing) and Lindsey (Intern) | Delanie (seated), our mosaic teacher |
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| Guests got to "Make their own" Cuerda Seca | Steve, Paul, and Martin - The 3 Amigos! |
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| Alex, our Customer Solutions expert! | Guests enjoying the delicious BBQ |
We are already planning our next Customer Appreciation BBQ and look forward to seeing you there!
