Why Cambria Counter tops.

Question: What are Cambria Counter tops?

Cambria counter tops are a brand of quartz-based kitchen and bathroom counter material.

Answer: Interestingly enough, Cambria counters are made by a company that also makes cheese. The Davis family, based in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, supplies about a third of a billion pounds of cheese each year to Kraft Foods. I can confidently say that Cambria is the first kitchen materials manufacturer I have encountered that also makes food . Very appropriate, I say.

Quartz Counter tops Basics

It's probably a moot point to say that Cambria is a high-end maker of quartz counter tops. Quartz counters are, by definition, high-end. You install quartz counters in your kitchen for their attractiveness and performance, not as any kind of cost-saving gesture. Most quartz counter makers come right out and admit that quartz compares cost-wise with slab granite.

Quartz counters are well over 90% quartz, with the remainder composed of various resins and pigments needed to bind and color the materials.

How Cambria Quartz Compares to Other Countertop Surfaces

Quartz counters excel because they are both harder than natural stone and they provide more design options. Granite is only about 40-50% quartz, and it may have irregularities and soft minerals that weaken it.

But quartz counters have toughness built in. From a design perspective, quartz and pigments can be combined to produce an almost infinite range of styles. You are not limited by whatever slab happens to come out of the quarry.

How Cambria Quartz Compares to Other Quartz Counter tops

DuPont Zodiaq would be one competitor of Cambria's. DuPont is famous for making stuff out of polymers (i.e., Corian, introduced in 1971). Its Zodiaq quartz material is considerably newer, having been brought onto the market in 2000.

One chief difference is that Cambria counters are 100% made in the United States (at Cambria's LeSueur, Minnesota plant). So, if you're concerned about such things as "Made in the U.S.A.," then Cambria is just the ticket.

Not only that, but as noted already Cambria is a privately-held family company, whereas Zodiaq is made by giant international conglomerate DuPont. In fairness, I should note that DuPont is based in Wilmington, Delaware.