Hollysprings, I just realized I forgot to crosspost to the Kitchen Forum. Thank goodness I got your post. I told the installer after 5 PM when he called on Saturday that he could start on Monday but now I am getting so nervous as I want a floor easy to keep clean. He says the Power Grout still stains and is not worth the cost and is more difficult to use. I did do some research on it and in 2010, many installers were having so many problems with the Power Grout coming out when showering and staining feet. Maybe it has been improved? The first installer wanted me to pick up the Power Grout myself making his price $700 more. Also I am looking over the other estimate I got a few hours earlier before this installer called and it says that this other installer would prime the floor and supply the primer before installing the tile so maybe that is why the estimate is $300 more. This other installer says I am to buy my own grout. I did not consider him as his reply on when I asked what the grout width would be was that it would not be more than 1/4". I want a think grout line. The other two installers told me they would try to get as thin of a grout line as they can ONCE they assess the situation after they remove the Linoleum floor and see how flat the surface is and how the tiles are when they are placed on the floor in the running bond position. Now I am getting confused as I did say he could start and I felt so comfortable with the installer but I wonder if my floor needs to have a primer on it and I wonder if the other guy could install the Epoxy grout also without charging me more than the $300 more IF I buy the grout which I know is expensive. He would have to tell me how much to buy. The guy that is coming on Monday is supplying the TEC grout with the job and was one of the installers given to me by the store. My Spectralock grout has never turned colors and the front foyer still looks almost new since installed at the end of December 2008. The middle foyer where I keep the puppy pads is staining from the pee from my little dogs and it is difficult to keep clean but never turns black like I see in so many houses with light grout.

I am in the process of installing a heavy relief mural in the back splash area above the cook top. The mural is surrounded by subway tiles. I set the mural and the subway tile and am in the process of testing Laticrete Pro Premium epoxy grout in white. To test I set a bunch of subway tile on a piece of Hardiebacker and then floated in the grout. Floating the grout was simple. Clean up was simple too. I am waiting a day to see if the color is a good match for the mural and subway tiles. So far it looks perfect. Hopefully, the color will remain consistent as it cures. I will post a follow up and report on the color issue.

Thank you Jerry, I really appreciate you replying. I have decided to pay the 10% restocking fee for the TEC XT grout (after the 25% off and before the 7% sales tax it came to $36.71 for their stain resistant enhanced grout that is not an Epoxy. I will then drive a few miles farther down the highway and go to Lowe's and buy the SpectraLOCK Mushroom grout that I wanted but the former installer just wanted to use what was at the local tile store where I bought the Akoya Bone Tiles. I heard I need lots of sponges. What sponges are best so there will be clean ones here for him to use since I want the color to be true? The new installer says he can pick up glue and I do not need to buy more of the Adhese-SuperflexW Tile & Stone Mortars, 50 Lb Super Flext White (says this on the package so has abbreviations.. is in my cold garage right now....$42.74 after the 25% off I paid and before the sales tax). I was told the glue I had bought was a special Latex Glue. How can the installer mix glues since I have so much of this bag left over? What glue should we use since I have a cement floor due to the fact that I live in a townhouse with no basement. All this stress due to the first lot of the Rialto Beige tiles being sold out so I found a tile that looked just like that lighter color I wanted. I would have just asked Lowe's and bought what glue they told me but I can't return opened dry glue so now I have this bag here. I have to put an Estate on extension today and get these holiday cards out as well as close a few corporations. I am so behind in my work since I want my two foyer areas to look nice. I wish you lived near me Jerry so you could do this tile job for me and it would have been done months ago and I would not be behind in my work.

@J M We did not use Spectralock 1 grout in our kitchen because we found out that it is not intended for use around food preparation areas. So, its use is rather limited. Instead, our installers used Mapei Ultracolor Plus FA (which I will hereafter refer to for brevity just as "Mapei," although this is only one of the family of Mapei grout types) which has some of the features of longevity of epoxy but isn't an epoxy grout. The Mapei was water-based, so shouldn't yellow. It is also rapid-setting, so the installers must be very skilled with it and only do small portions at a time, or else you can end up with a mess as the Mapei can harden over the tile and be very difficult to remove. My one complaint with my installation was that the installers used too much water and removed too much of the grout as it was setting, so the grout level is a little low. It's not bad, but there's nothing that can be done to fix this aside from taking the grout completely out and re-doing it, at least according to Mapei customer service. Doing that could damage the tile, so I'm going to live with it. The grout needs to have at least 1/2 depth of the tile to which it can adhere, and after it is cured, it won't stick to the previous layer of grout unless it has those sides of the tile to help with adhesion, or so says Mapei's customer service. I would have preferred the grout to be nearly level with the tile, which is the standard set forth for this grout in the instructions, but I ended up with some noticeable edges of the tile showing, even beyond the beveled top edge of the tile by a small amount. Since it has been installed, I've barely noticed the problem, so it will probably only come back to haunt me when I am cleaning the grout and need to get the extra dirt out that falls into the deeper-than-desired depressions. This Mapei grout doesn't require a sealer, but it can be sealed which I plan to do, probably with some Laticrete product. I have a lot of respect for Laticrete's technological advancements, but in my instance, the Mapei was recommended by the people who laid the tile, and I am thus far happy with it. One more note on the application, I provided the tile people with several dozen, new sponges to use on our job so they could feel free to wipe away on the grout since it was a rapid-set product, but they ended up using their own very water-heavy sponging system that was overkill for this grout.