Does Home Depot actually sell countertop slabs? Has anyone ever bought slabs from them? All I see on line is samples - but I'm assuming they sell the slabs if they have samples.

I'm asking because we're building a home a long way away and the home is located in a pretty remote area - though there is a Home Depot relatively nearby. There are a couple of independent stone shops nearby - but their inventory is very limited. Home Depot appears to carry a good number of the better known Quartz brands such as Silestone, Caesarstone, etc.

Since it's hard to pick out individual slabs remotely and the local slab places have limited inventory...I thought it might be easier to pick out something like Caesarstone that we can look at here in Houston. But curious if that's even doable via Home Depot (or anyone else for that matter, if it can be shipped). Obviously, shipping costs may also be cost prohibitive.

Does anyone have any experience with Home Depot slabs? Or any other similar experience or advice that may help?

Pretty sure HD only sells installed for quartz. I believe you can get the Formica stuff cash & carry. When we last did countertops, HD and LOW we're still 15-20% more expensive during one of their "sales" than the local countertop places were. Just because they don't have it in inventory doesn't mean they can't get it, pretty sure they all use the same few wholesalers.

Yeah I guess maybe the local joints can get the same stuff. I just want to be able to see what I'm getting and have a larger selection - which is why I was thinking about Caesarstone, etc.

Most installers will use a slab warehouse to purchase from, if not having their own slabs on hand at their location. Really depends on where you're looking.

When we did some remodel last, the installer said "go to this warehouse, take a picture and tell the person you want this slab, then relay that information to me".

We're in DFW and there are MASSIVE stone show floors here. Like a kid in a candy store.

There are insanely big warehouses (like Choppin said). Much of our real stone comes from India and China and some from South America. So these warehouses are importers and distributors to the local fabricators. They usually don't do the cutting. And the quartz/quartzite comes from a variety of countries (careful of the chinese made ones).

Go to the importers' warehouse, you may need an appt. Pick what you like, bring a tape measure, know how much you need (local fabricator can help with that). And for a few hundred bucks they will deliver the stone to a local fabricator when they have other deliveries to do in that area. And they will keep it in their racks until the time is right. Happens all the time.

Yeah that's been my experience in Houston as well. We've done numerous construction projects here and I've been to lots of stone shops.

But I'm talking about a town of 1200 people with a larger town of 20k about 30 minutes away that has a Home Depot and 2 smaller slab/stone/tile shops. No other bigger city (not even 100k population) within 5 hours.

MAS444 said:

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Yeah that's been my experience in Houston as well. We've done numerous construction projects here and I've been to lots of stone shops.

But I'm talking about a town of 1200 people with a larger town of 20k about 30 minutes away that has a Home Depot and 2 smaller slab/stone/tile shops. No other bigger city (not even 100k population) within 5 hours.

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Yeah, I figured you were talking about your mountain home. Honestly, I've no idea but your best bet is likely finding an installer / fabricator and going from there.

I bet Montrose has a stone yard or two, unless that's the 20k you're talking about. Options can be limited, especially if you're trying to adhere to a budget (vs just letting a designer or custom home builder pull some rare stone from wherever).

Circling back though, big box is just using a local sub anyways. Hard to say where their actual product is coming from but it'll be cut by the installer, likely.