This project is owned by BlackRock Investments, USA ($6.5 trillion of AUM), and directed by Macquarie Global Property Advisors, an investment firm with ($54b AUM). The director was aggressively involved in every detail of the project. The requirement was for 17,000m2 of a beige marble for the hotel guest bathrooms. They required reliable, consistent, and fast delivery. The approved spec finally settled on a stone from Oman.
A large delegation including the director of MGPA came to Oman. We had preceded them a couple of days earlier to prepare the mock-up. The tour first started at the factory to demonstrate the production capabilities of the facility from which we will cut and supply the product. We then went to the quarry to show them the capacity and selections available. Finally, we concluded at the factory once again where we had the mock-ups set up, which included a range of slabs and dry-laid tiles that represented the available range.
The approval process was challenging as the client decided to go with a different selection than the initially agreed one. However, the final range approved was still within the same budget and availability as the initial approved spec so the day concluded positively with a nice dinner!
The rest was standard procedure for us (production, QC, reporting, logistics management).