Sourcing natural stone in minutes instead of months

A wholesale marketplace where suppliers list full truckloads and buyers check out online, with live inventory and pricing, freight quoted at checkout, and suppliers paid through Stripe Connect once the stone is picked up.

Client: StoneLoads, wholesale building materials
Built: B2B ecommerce marketplace for stone buyers and suppliers
Services: Rapid prototyping, design, web development, QA, project management
Stack: Laravel, Vue, Inertia, Stripe Connect, Algolia
Engagement: Since 2021: launch, then ongoing support and new features

Results

6 days
End-to-end supply chain process
2 min
Online purchasing process
2 days
Supplier payment processing
75%
Reduction in ACH clearance time

The StoneLoads marketplace on a laptop, filtered by price

What changed

From phone calls to checkout

Before StoneLoads

On StoneLoads

Finding stone: Before StoneLoadsPhone calls and paper slips to learn what a quarry had and what it cost.; On StoneLoadsLive inventory and pricing from quarries across the US, online around the clock.
Buying: Before StoneLoadsPurchases that took months to arrange.; On StoneLoadsCheckout in about two minutes, even for several truckloads from different locations.

How an order works

Priced by the pound, settled on the scale

Most online stores assume a fixed price, a box, and a parcel carrier. Natural stone is priced by the pound, its true weight is not known until the truck is loaded, and it leaves the quarry by the truckload. We built the checkout around that.

Fill a truck, not a basket
Buyers add stone to a truck. Each truck is its own order with one pickup location, the cart flags a truck as it nears a full load, and one session can fill several trucks from different suppliers.
Book the freight
At checkout, the built-in freight tool quotes a full truckload for the pickup date and both zip codes, with pickup and delivery windows, and books the truck with the order. Buyers who run their own trucks name their carrier instead.
Pay against the estimate
Buyers pay by card or bank account, and bank accounts are verified instantly instead of by microdeposits. The charge is based on the estimated weight, and StoneLoads holds the payment.
Settle on the scale
The supplier loads the truck and enters the actual scale weights. StoneLoads charges or refunds the difference automatically, following what the buyer chose at checkout for a truck that comes in light or heavy.
Pay the supplier at pickup
When the supplier marks the order picked up, Stripe Connect pays them, less the platform fee, so sellers are paid on delivery to the truck.

What we built

A checkout for a trade that ships by the truckload

We started with workshops to learn how stone is bought, sold, and shipped, then designed and built the marketplace. We still support StoneLoads and add new features to the live platform.

One catalog
Every price compared per pound
Suppliers list from one standard catalog of stone types, origins, thicknesses, finishes, and colors, and price by the piece, pallet, ton, or square foot. StoneLoads converts every price to dollars per pound, so buyers compare like for like.
Search
Listings ranked by what each buyer browses
Algolia learns from what each buyer views and buys, ranks listings to match, and emails a buyer when a newly published load lands in their top results.
Paperwork
A bill of lading with every order
Each order generates its bill of lading and emails it to the supplier with the pickup dates, so the yard knows what is coming and when.
Accounts
Built for qualified trade buyers
Companies apply for an account, invite their team, and are approved before they buy or sell. Tax-exempt buyers are handled at checkout.

Also in the platform