Complaint Review: Madewell Concrete - Greenville South Carolina

I contacted Madewell Concrete in February to give us a quote to replace the garage floor, our driveway and a concrete pad at the bottom of our front steps.  All new concrete was to be tinted “smoke” color.  We paid additional for Madewell to include a 3-inch gravel base under all concrete, plus stamp & color the new front concrete pad.  Their quote was acceptable, so the work was to be performed in March.  Because of a POD container sitting on the driveway, the work was to be done in two stages…the garage floor first and the driveway/front pad second, after the POD was removed.  We were to pay a total of $14,729 for the job.  Brian Phaup was onsite manager, and Miguel Molino and his crew would be providing the labor.

Madewell generally performed professionally through most of this process.  There are a number of positive things to say about the guys that did the work.  They were punctual and they worked incredibly hard.  For much of the process, Brian was responsive in his communications with me.  When things started going sideways, I began involving Austin McCaskill, his sales manager, who also, initially, was responsive to my communications.  Unfortunately, as I continued in my attempts to resolve issues, both Brian and Austin stopped communicating, and Madewell has now abandoned the unfinished project.



During the garage stage, after the old floor was removed and the gravel was dumped and spread, I noticed Miguel and crew were using concrete rakes to compact the gravel.  I knew this would not be enough as it was really only moving the gravel around.  I asked Brian if the gravel needed to be mechanically compacted.  (Brian admitted, during a phone conversation, that they normally use the 10,000 lb. Bobcat loader to compact the gravel but they couldn’t get the loader into the garage.)  Brian left and returned with a rented mechanical tamper.  The crew used the tamper to compact the gravel.  A vapor barrier was installed (although they sliced it in a number of places…which defeats the purpose of a “barrier”).  The concrete truck had to sit at the street for quite a while as Brian resolved the compactor issue.  The driver apparently added a lot of water to keep the mixture from setting.  When it came time to pour the concrete, the mixture was very soupy. 



I hope that doesn’t affect the structural integrity of the floor.  The concrete was then poured, leveled and eventually smoothed.  Miguel and crew were here until eleven o’clock that night finishing the floor.

My issues with the garage floor:  Concrete had been poured up and around the garage door tracks.  I had to chip away concrete to get the doors to close.  The next day, I realized the right-hand garage door was not closing evenly with the concrete.  There was a one-inch gap on the right side at the base of the garage door where the door, even with the door tracks now free and clear, no longer rested on the new concrete as it had with the old concrete.  Later, Miguel would suggest that I cut the bottom of the STEEL insulated door to mirror the angle at which the door now intersected the concrete.  I said no.  Also, the insets in the concrete (for the door bottoms to rest in) were sloppily finished.  Other than that, the garage job went fair.

The driveway stage followed a week and a half later.  The issues that arose:



I paid extra for, and was promised, a 3-inch layer of gravel under both the garage floor and driveway.  Per the Madewell estimator’s follow-up email to me: ME - “You mentioned gravel at approx. $800 additional.  Did that include the spreading and compacting?”.  ESTIMATOR - ”Correct.  That does include the actual labor aspect of it as well. The price is also confirmed at $862, which would give you a 3" gravel base as we did for (my neighbor).”  The garage floor was probably close to the correct depth.  For the driveway job, at the time the gravel was delivered and dumped in the street, I mentioned to Brian that there didn’t appear to be enough gravel.  It also was not the crush & run that was used in the garage.  He assured me there would be plenty to cover the whole driveway “in a couple of inches”.  As it turned out, the driveway gravel was nowhere near 3-inches at any point.  In reality, there was barely an inch at the upper area towards the garage, and little to NO gravel on the bottom half of the driveway.

2) The driveway was poured in two different batches (two trucks), with color being mixed into the concrete after the mixing trucks arrived.  There is an obvious physical “seam” where the first and second batches meet within the forms, and the concrete was not smoothed and brushed properly. There is also a distinct color difference between the batches.  The driveway concrete also has small white spots covering almost the entire surface.  Maybe the spotted look will eventually disappear…right now, it looks permanent.  There is also a huge color difference between the garage floor and the driveway.  The color was to be smoke throughout the entire job, although now, I’m thinking different colors could’ve been used.  Brian, the project manager, even commented that he was “concerned about the difference” between the garage and the driveway colors.  While the check-off sheet indicated there might be inconsistency in color, the difference between the garage and the driveway, plus the white spots (thousands) and the rough seam created between the two different driveway batches shows a substantial lack of quality workmanship.

3) While the concrete was wet, Miguel installed control joints in the driveway and also in the walkway.  The walkway is really more of a small, irregularly-shaped rectangle than a walkway.  I thought it was odd that he put in “tool” joints in such a small area.  There was no indication of joints mentioned in the quote drawing, while the type of joint to be used was explicitly mentioned for the driveway and garage floor.  We were having the concrete stamped, so I didn’t say anything as I hoped the stamped pattern would obscure the very visible tool joints.  I was wrong.  Once the pattern was stamped into the concrete (messily, I might add), the joints were still very obvious, seemed even more out of place, and were at a diverging angle to the horizontal and vertical lines created with the stamped pattern pads.  In reviewing Madewell’s website “projects” photo gallery, I saw few, if any, joints on their stamped concrete projects…in even larger expanses of concrete than ours.  The very same pattern used on a patio was clearly a much better job than ours.

Two days after the driveway job was finished, I began trying to contact Brian about the pad, but he did not return my calls or texts (I didn’t know he was out of town).  I then sent an email to Austin McCaskill regarding the stamped concrete.  I included photos of our walkway plus the photos from Madewell’s website.  In his reply email, he stated: “I do agree with you, the joints do not look the best.”.  He had Brian contact me the first of the following week.  After Brian visited and I explained the issue, Brian eventually texted me with the following: “Good morning Chester. I discussed your concern with the aesthetics of your walkway with my supervisor and although we understand why the line joints aren’t necessarily pleasing to the eye, they were installed correctly for warranty purposes. We would have to charge you $1600 to replace the walkway.  This price involves us absorbing a large amount of the actual cost. Also, if we replace the walkway without joints it will void the warranty. Take some time to consider the offer and let me know. I really hope we can take of this for you Chester. Have a good day.”  

When Brian was here to review my issue, I told him that saw-cut lines would be acceptable (the same used in the new garage floor).  An email to Austin brought his reply confirming the $1600 charge.  In a later email to Austin McCaskill, I indicated that I relied on the information at Madewell’s website to make our decision as to which company I would use for our concrete project.  The pictures of the stamped patio at the website were key in our making the decision to do business with Madewell, and I wanted my walkway to look as good as the ones in their photos.  Austin never responded.

It’s funny, but Madewell’s website even has the following comment – “Let’s make that patio, walkway, corridor, or outdoor kitchen a beautiful reality – together, from our family to yours.”.  It’s not too much to ask for Madewell to live up to that philosophy.

4) Plastic underlayment was to be put under all concrete.  They did a fair job in the garage, but only made half an effort for the walkway/driveway.  The walkway plastic was not laid out properly when the concrete was poured there.  The plastic had actually folded back on itself by the wind, and concrete was poured right over the top of the doubled-up portion just as it was.  No effort was made to straighten it out.  Miguel actually started pouring concrete over an area of the driveway where there was no plastic because it had blown aside.  I pointed it out to him…he did an “Oh no!” kind of look and said he could scoop up the concrete with the Bobcat and put the plastic back down and repour.  At that point, I felt like that would lead to “muddy” concrete.  I told him to just remove the plastic altogether (which had pretty much blown out of the graded area).  It was obvious, at least to me, that they had no desire to do the plastic correctly.

5) Miguel’s finishing skills were lacking.  There are many rough edges and markings in the concrete that were not smoothed properly.  Concrete was “slopped” up against the garage wall/trim and our front steps.   This will need cutting, grinding or chipping to remove the excess concrete.  Because the concrete was poured too high between the old walkway and the new walkway, there is a height difference between the two.  There was not a smooth “melding” of the two walkways.  The excess concrete could easily have been troweled away from these areas while wet…but Miguel didn’t make the effort.  I also note in a number of project pictures at the Madewell site, protective plastic had been taped up on walls and posts to prevent splashing on these surfaces.  None of that was done at my job.  I had to touch up my newly painted garage walls because of splashed concrete after they finished in the garage pour and finish.

Once Madewell stopped communicating with us, I tried to visit the local Charlotte Madewell office.  I wanted to talk to the sales manager personally, but I was never able to locate an office.  The address, as listed at most online sources, leads to an apartment complex.  Other sources show their address to be a general “business center” that handles mail and telephone calls for multiple businesses.

What do I expect from Madewell?  I would like the driveway gravel to be the full 3 inches I was promised and I paid for.  I want our driveway and garage floor to be moderately the same color.  The disparity in colors is just not right.  The spots are a defect I want corrected. I want my walkway to be of equal quality as the Madewell’s previous project pictures at their website...at no additional cost to me.  Any concrete up against the walls should be removed.

Madewell might complain that I “should have said something”, as Brian said to me at one point…as if it was my fault.  My feeling is that I should have been able to leave town for the two days it took to do the work, and return knowing the job had been done exactly right.

I have photos to illustrate all issues.