I bought this when I was tired of trying to figure out the best grout for my shower and let a Daltile salesman sell me this product. It was supposed to be close to waterproof, but once you buy it you find out it is not. I have done many tile jobs in houses I have lived in, so grouting is hardly new to me. It is one of the easier parts of tiling and my wife and I can grout and clean tile quickly. After reading all the horrible reviews after I bought it (check all the Flexcolor CQ colors for more reviews), I thought about returning it. But I convinced myself some people never have good experiences and some never read instructions. I read and reread all the instructions and looked at lots of videos. I applied in small (3 sq. ft.) areas and wiped down excess immediately and kept at it. It was too no avail—the tile looks dull and the haze is thick. A white scrubbing pad (the mildly abrasive ones that disappear as you use them) with an abrasive tool and a microfiber cloth will get a lot of it off the next day. Not sure whether I have to get tile haze remover from Mapei for this (I promise myself never to buy Mapei products again). I only did about 15 sq. ft. so far. I will apply Grout Release today to the rest of the almost 200 sq,. ft. of tile I have. They recommend that for bumpy tile, but even with subway tile the haze is very bad. Applying the grout is very, very time consuming on a wall. It is highly sanded and does not adhere to itself well when wet, so pieces of it constantly fall off the float. It is important to add and tape visqueen or other covering to floors and any other surface you don't want grout on because removing it is very hard. It does not easily get it into spaces between tiles, though because it is sanded it works on wide and narrow spacing. The previous owner did this shower and did a bad job—including walls not square or plumb, so tile spacing was very difficult. That is one advantage of this grout—it works from 1/16 to 1/2". It claims to be color consistent and does not stain though it doesn't matter much on subway tile. It took me an hour to do the small amount with constant cleaning. Probably a very, very small amount on the float is all that works unless you are doing a floor. Having to constantly go to the bucket for small amount slows you down even more. This product has been on the market for quite a while. Some love it and some hate it. The reviews on the internet show both contractors and homeowners have the same reactions of love and hate. There is hardly any in between. Maybe after doing this for 5 or 10 jobs, you can master it, but for contractors that means expensive calls backs and for homeowners that means aggravation, extra work and maybe more money. A good product for a masochist, someone with a variety of tile spacing because of poor initial construction and maybe to avoid color issues. For the rest of us, almost anything else has to be better.

We spoke to the manufacturer and they basically said that this happens and it is the nature of the product. That said, the likely cause was the contractor mixing the new bag I bought with an old bag he had. TEC advised not to use old product or bags that have been open for any length of time. They did suggest using distilled water instead of tap water, but I doubt that was the issue. I made sample boards with tap water and didn’t have any discoloration issues. TEC sent me their grout colorant and I applied 2 coats. This was very tedious and took at least 5 hours for a small powder room to paint every grout line with a tiny brush. However, it did work and nicely covered up the white spots. You can see the painted colorant on the first pic and the pic with the toilet is before the colorant (notice all the white spots). I was very irritated and stressed by all of this, but was relieved the colorant worked and it didn’t have to be retiled.

it's the perfect grout color. Don't even worry about changing it. make sure your guy knows how to do this grout properly. Grout small sections, and clean up quickly (within 10 mins or so) advise him to use very little water on the sponge. Normally you would spread your grout out in large sections while using the float to press it in the joints, and then go back and wipe up. sometimes as long as 30 mins. You can't do that w/this grout. (if he does large sections and waits to wipe like on normal grout, the grout leaves a filmy residue that takes hours to clean off!. Ask me how I know this. I advised my tile guy how to use it and he didn't listen to me. I spent 2 hours using another product to remove the grout residue from my marble tile. ) FlexColor CQ has a stain resistant property in the grout, so you shouldn't have too much of a hard time cleaning. I have it in my shower.

the only other way to get a diff color would be if he used an AdMixture to the grout instead of water. But it's highly unlikely. If it's normal cementious grout, he would use water from the hose. What they mean about diff colors is if you partially grout one day, and don't finish. Then the next day you come back and mix up a new bucket of grout. (using the same bag of grout). The problem is, if you don't use exactly the same amount of water, the same temp of the water, and the temp outside isn't the same as yesterdays batch of grout, that grout will slightly differ in color. But it's not going to suddenly go from white to tan! it's just that those two white shades will be slightly diff right next to each other.