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Online purchases
I honestly think that an antique fireplace should be seen de visu before its purchase. And this is because of a "matter of skin" (an antique fireplace is like a boyfriend, you can't get engaged "via photo" like Alberto Sordi in the mythical movie A Girl in Australia). However, I also understand the customer who, living hundreds of kilometers from our location and unable to visit us, tries to make a purchase anyway, precisely online. For this customer we have arranged an "additional" service, so that his choice will still be as thoughtful as possible:
In addition to the important number of carefully taken photographs already present in the page of each fireplace, at the request of the customer who has identified a specimen of his liking but has the desire to examine it in more detail, we will make a specific video highlighting all the salient features of that fireplace.
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Shuttle Service
Our exhibition is about a 10-minute drive from the MEDIOPADANA high-speed train station.
Great, you'd say... In two and a half hours you can get to us from Roma Termini, in 50 minutes (and avoiding the mephitic chaos of the Milanese streets) from Milan, in an hour and 40 from Turin etc... You read a good book, relax a little, sounds beautiful, doesn't it?!
That's great, too bad that in order to get on the first available cab you lose at least an hour on the way there and another hour on the way back... You can't have everything in the world, Italy is the most beautiful place in the world and we are happy to live there, however...
So, for a few years now, clients who decide to visit us by train, we wait for them at the main exit and of course take them back at the end of their visit. Some get embarrassed, would not want to be influenced to buy because of this "imposed kindness" of ours, and I can understand this feeling. Therefore, I would like to clear the field of this perplexity: it is physiological that more than half of the customers do not buy on the spot.
Between husband and wife there is no agreement (perhaps, not only on the fireplace...), they have found the right piece but there may be a problem with measurements or they intend to get the placet from the architect on that particular color etc... etc... Concerning this part of customers who are not buyers on the first visit, a good number call back some time later confirming, by phone or via email with attached photographs, one of the selected fireplaces. Another portion returns a second time, which is usually the good one. Very few are the "INCONTENTABLES" (from the 1960s carousels, remember?), those who will never show up again, but very few indeed.
All this tirade to convey to those who will read these lines how we can accept without embarrassment a service that costs us practically nothing while relieving our possible client of anger and wasted time that at a time when he should be happy, just would be out of place.
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Installation advice
The world has changed.
From 1227 (the year from which the history of the fireplace is made to begin in Venice) until 1940 (the year in which the Beautiful, the Just, the Healthy, the Humane and the Reasonable ended in favor of the Consumerist, the Industrial, the Ugly and, that's all that was missing, the Chinese) the mode of making a fireplace was only one: The wood-burning hearth. The technicians who specialized in recommending and/or making a hearth, complete with a proportionate chimney and associated chimney pot, were the chimney sweeps. What a beautiful world that was, at least for fireplaces.
Then, in the postwar period, THE DILUTION.
The (obscene) industrial prefabrication, the new modes of combustion and/or "non-combustion" (after all, a kind of fire and smoke can be produced with steam and a little electric shock...);
The magical (so to speak) bioethanol is anything but "bio" but it has been very successful;
And again, a nice gas fire... Or, why not, pellet, in short, you name it....
Obviously, the ancient figure of the chimney sweep, at least as it used to be understood, no longer exists; today this man is called a "stove-repairer," and, in addition to cleaning flues, he has become handy with these modern hearth devils.
This historical gunslinger serves to understand how, since the postwar period, the world of the fireplace, which was completely immobile in the previous 700 years, has in a few decades radically changed, the systems for its operation are many, and, in short, it is not easy for anyone to find his or her way through this chaos.
For our part, we can help you (and will do so gladly as well as in our own interest) :
A) regarding the specific installation of the marble frame (which is basically what we sell) by giving fundamental instructions to your technicians or masons (in case you opt for "Do it yourself").
B) Or (advisable) we can direct you to the best fumigators operating in your area, many of whom we know personally, if only for the almost half a century of work in the same world.
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Fireplace delivery
GENERAL PREMISES
Once upon a time (in the early years of our business) THERE WAS THE TRANSPORTER, a professional man who took care of the goods as if they were his own, and you knew, when you entrusted him with the 4 or 5 packed fireplace parts, that they would arrive safe and sound to the customer in Rome, Bologna or Canicattì. He was a punctual and polite man, even willing to go to some trouble if, at the time of unloading, the help promised by the receiving customer was lacking.
Today, this human genius is long extinct, replaced altogether by an endless tide of predators (they are recognizable by the inscriptions on their chests and backs, Amazon, Zalando, Aliexpress, BRT etc...) who throw the goods entrusted to them with elegant and very rapid Pindaric flights near your homes.
SO...
IN NORTHERN AND CENTRAL ITALY ALL DELIVERIES, REGARDLESS OF THE PRICE OF THE FIREPLACE ITSELF, are made by our own means and our own personnel.
Only at certain times of labor difficulties, said delivery is made by professionals specialized in antiquarian transportation, experienced trustees well known to us.
PRICES FOR DELIVERIES TO NORTHERN AND CENTRAL ITALY (FROM TURIN TO ROME, TO BE PRECISE) ARE TO BE UNDERSTOOD AS "POLITICAL PRICES" AND RANGE FROM € 100 TO € 250 DEPENDING ON WEIGHT AND DISTANCE.
AS FOR DELIVERIES TO THE SOUTH AND ISLANDS, GIVEN THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF MANAGING DELIVERIES BY OURSELVES, we entrust our fireplaces to excellent transporters (generally, FERCAM OR SHENKER) after having them carefully packed and protected by custom-made wooden crates, fireplace by fireplace.
This indispensable care brings delivery costs, for each fireplace, from € 400 (Mainland) to € 600 (Islands).
It is in our interest to make a good impression on you from start to finish.
It is in your interest to receive intact the antique fireplace that you like so much and that cost you so much.
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Important note on delivery methods/misunderstandings at the time of unloading
I decided to add this note to the delivery paragraph because, more and more often, AT THE MOMENT OF UNLOADING, misunderstandings occur such as:
A) "But I thought your employee would bring the fireplace up to my room" (The gentleman in question lived on the fourth floor without an elevator and the fireplace had parts weighing about half a quintal);
B) "What, you don't assemble it for me included in the price?!" (The installation of a fireplace can vary, depending on the thousands of possible ways, from €1,000 up to €4-5000 and maybe that fireplace cost €2,500...);
C) Our deliverer often grapples with a customer with whom, for example, he had agreed on the rendez-vous for delivery at 4 p.m., which customer, forgetting about the agreed time, as if nothing had happened, tells him... "Well, bear with me, but I won't be home before 6 p.m., never mind that I still have to go to the hairdresser."
D) A cash payment was agreed to be made at the time of unloading. Then, at the time of delivery (keep in mind that we agree on the day and time of deliveries AS A MINIMUM two or three days in advance with the customer) the customer does not have the agreed upon cash and perhaps breaks out an Italian Post Office check (the most falsified in the world!!). So, if it goes well, our employee has to wait for the customer to go to the bank to make the withdrawal that he had not made before or my employee has to reload it and lose maybe half a day in addition to all the expenses that a trip entails (AND THAT'S EXPENSIVE, BELIEVE ME!);
IN SHORT, WITH A LITTLE GOOD WILL IT WILL BE POSSIBLE TO MAKE ARRANGEMENTS ON A CASE-BY-CASE BASIS IN ORDER TO BE ABLE TO HAVE YOUR BELOVED GOOD AT HOME AND IN PERFECT CONDITION.
