What is the Specialty Concrete Market?
Specialty concrete provides a medium in which one can create a unique one of a kind piece that stands above and separates itself from typical design choices.

In addition, specialty concrete pieces can be pre-casted off site. This removes the irritation of weather elements that can stifle or completely stop decorative concrete installation.

How easy is it to develop a Specialty Concrete market?
It starts with understanding what you want to create and design. Does your market have a need for any of the following:

* Concrete Countertops
* Concrete Furniture
* Sinks / Vanities/ Vessel’s / Back Splashs
* Shower Panels or Wall Panels
* Tombstones (Yes we thought this was odd at first too)
* Artwork
* Table Tops
* and much more…

What does it take to start?
In the past you would need a large facility to setup shop and a 2-4 week turnaround time for the creation of concrete pieces. That is no longer the case, new technologies has taken a frustrating market and simplified the technique and cured the space and time involved in each design.

Where can I get started?
The team at SureCrete Design Products has put together a system that takes advancements from multiple material science companies and made a single location for all your specialty concrete needs. The Xtreme Series Product Lines have opened the doors for the creation of High PSI concrete artwork and designs. With an 10,000+ PSI strength and a flexural strength of 1,495 PSI this material can be shaped and bent, that’s right we said BENT, into any shape, size and design.

The cure time on this product allows you to pour the material and in 4 hours be able to take the piece out of the mold and begin the next stage. You can begin staining immediately. If your desire is to polish you can begin that stage in as little as 8 hours. A traditional concrete countertop that may take 10-21 days to complete can now be done and installed in less than 72 hours. With the ability to pull the piece out of the mold in 4-8 hours you can rack your pieces in order to minimize the space you need for production.

We will discuss in the next addition to this subject a forming system that matches teh speed of the Xtreme Series product line. If you would like to know more on this subject please visit www.SureCreteDesign.com or call 1-800-544-8488

1)      Cage Mixer manufactured by Smith Industries in Dade City, FL. for $84.00

Why we like it – If you’ve ever mixed a 50 lb. bag in a 5 gal. pail, you’ll love this mixer. It pulls the mud down, instead of throwing it all over your legs. The design allows you to smoothly scrape the round sides of your bucket and ride the bottom. No chunks of mud are left unmixed.

What we would change – offer a threaded head to connect to hand- held mixers, not just the flat hex head for ½” drills.

2)      Steel Squeegee (epoxy finisher) manufactured by Bon Tools in Gibsonia, PA for $37.00

Why we like it – It’s like a trowel on a stick. We hate bending over or working on our knees when we can stand up straight and save the back.

What we would change – Change the angle of the blade; make it straight, not angled on the handle. Offer rounded corners to prevent tracking.

3)      Baby Chapin (1 ½ qt. hand sprayer, model 1046) manufactured by Chapin in Batavia, NY for  $22.79

Why we like it – For detail work it beats lugging around a hefty sprayer with a clumsy hose. The Baby Chapin is even equipped with Viton seals. It will spray most anything.  The pump action saves the repetitive squeeze of other hand sprayers. The handle design allows you to hang the sprayer from a back pocket while working.

What we would change – Make it last longer, they tend to break down all too quickly.

4)      Flex Bed Spiked Shoes manufactured by Midwest Rake in Warsaw, IN for $96.00

Why we like it – Because we like our feet even more. Comfortable and flexible are what we want when walking through a wet job. Why wasn’t this thought of sooner?

What we would change – The price. Come on, $96.00 is steep!

5)      SP pump-up acid sprayer (2 gal., model 02SP20A) manufactured by SP Systems in Santa Monica, CA for $108.00 (OK it’s over a hundred bucks)

Why we like it – This sprayer not only handles acid well, it puts out the volume that a pro needs. We prefer the fan tip for volume and the cone tip for coloring. Since we’ve sworn off acid for staining, you’d think we’d find a replacement for the SP. But when you need to dampen a slab to put out a coat of any cement based overlay, you can’t beat this sprayer.

What we would change – The price. And the handle. Although the handle has a locking position after you pump it up, it will unlock and the sprayer will drop the length of the shaft that the handle attaches. This feature is rather annoying, but not a deal breaker.

These tools are, at best, only among a longer list that will make installing easier. You no doubt have your favorites. If you haven’t tried these, at least consider it. What have you got to lose? At most a hundred bucks!

Next we will tackle an issue that is problematic in decorative concrete: color matching. Live long and cementitiously prosper.

There is no way that you can put a cement-based overlay on crumbling asphalt.

But what if you could? Imagine the benefits:

* NO Asphalt tear out
* NO Asphalt disposal issues or labor
* NO Permits
* NO Concrete to pour

What competition would you face in your area? NONE!

This niche market is possible because of SureCrete’s Xtreme Overlay that was introduced at the 2008 World of Concrete in Las Vegas, Nevada. It is applied at a minimum thickness of