Southern Stone & Timber's core business is the supply of unique decorative aggregates for the global swimming pool, flooring and landscape markets.
Ownership of the company is shared by TIR (Turley International Resources) of Mesa, Arizona, USA, and the founding owners of the company John and Kim Drain of Invercargill, New Zealand. John is the Managing Director and contact person in New Zealand for the company.
Southern Stone & Timber was registered by John and Kim Drain on August 5, 2005, with the vision of providing quality aggregate products for the New Zealand and global markets. It wasn't until late 2007 that vision was acted upon and became a reality when quality aggregate specific to our needs was located and secured. Soon after processing facilities were planned, equipment sourced, and by early 2008 processing plants were in place and operational. In November 2010, planning began on our new drying production facility, which became operational in February 2012. It incorporates a rotary kiln, further screening plants and a bagging system capable of bagging four 20 kilogram bags of aggregate per minute.
Because of continued growth, Southern Stone & Timber expanded their drying production facilities in 2014 and began upgrades to our washing facilities. In February 2017, our new Cedar Rapids washing plant was operational and capable of washing 100 tons of aggregate per hour at peak capacity.
The company's location is in the deep south of New Zealand overlooking beautiful Awarua Bay which is about a 20 minute drive from Invercargill. The base of operations is set up at 267 Awarua Bay Road, situated on an elevated 105 acre property that yields what we call Awarua White (also known as Glacier Blue) - the most highly sought after pebble that we export to our global markets. This aggregate is a naturally round, smooth pebble mostly blazing white with some grey and blue pebbles and a peppering of green pebbles throughout it giving our prime product a very unique colour that makes it so highly sought after.
We also offer additional pebbles to complement our prime product Awarua White, giving us a wide range of selective pebbles for our customers. They are Southern White, Southern Gold, Ebony, Full Black, Sable Black, Gunsmoke and Jade. We will also add Sedona Sunset to our product range in the first half of 2019. All are sourced from our other quarries in New Zealand.
What was once a vision to us, Southern Stone & Timber has become one of the biggest exporters of decorative pebbles in New Zealand. Currently, we supply pebble in bulk form either bagged or loose to all markets in New Zealand and overseas as well as in 20 kilogram bags due to establishing production facilities second to none that are capable of processing decorative aggregate with either a wet or dry process.
Our end focus and commitment is to supply quality product at competitive prices to all customers.
Managing Director
Email: [email protected]
Phone: +64 29 201 2881
News
Helping hand turns southern pebbles into gold- The Southland Times
John Drain and his wife Kim Woodruff-Drain formed pebble export business Southern Stone and Timber in 2005, with the intention of getting it up and running when they had the funds they needed.
