Marble specialist Fox Marble’s (LON:FOX) decision to add more quarries to broaden its product range means significant sales are now expected to come through in 2014.
The company said it has acquired more quarries than originally planned as it wants to offer a wider range of distinctive marbles.
As a result, overall quarry development is taking longer than expected, though it added that developing in this way will give it better market positioning. In total, Fox has licences for six quarries with operating agreements for two more. All are either in Kosovo or Macedonia.
Fox Marble confirmed two quarries are now in production with a further two expected to come onstream by the end of October. It now expects initial sales later this year and volumes to increase “significantly” through 2014.
Land has been also acquired for a processing plant near Lipjan in Kosovo, with construction due to be completed in the first quarter of next year. Until then, processing of its produced marble blocks will be carried out a contract basis in Italy.
Fox Marble has already signed an offtake agreement with Pisani, one of the leading wholesale suppliers of marble in the UK. A range of marble will be launched in the UK on at the Pisani headquarters on 6 November.
Results for the first six months of 2013 showed a loss of €1.07mln (€489,000). Net cash at the end of the period was €5.4mln since when the company has raised a further €2mln.
The company added it was confident of progress and expects to announce commercial sales of marble in the near future.