My bathroom tile disaster taught me to always buy extra boxes

I was retiling my small half bath in Austin last summer and ran out of tile with just the bottom row left. Thought I could grab another box from the same batch at the big box store, but they had sold out of that color lot. Ended up having to drive to three different locations across town to find two more boxes that matched close enough. Now I always buy 15% more than I need even if it means returning unopened boxes later. Has anyone else had a same-lot tile shortage ruin their weekend plans?

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stella_roberts16d agoMost Upvoted

I read somewhere that tile manufacturers are terrible about color consistency between production runs, something about kiln temperatures and pigment batches being slightly different each time. A contractor friend of mine in Dallas told me he always tells clients to buy at least 10-15% extra and store the leftovers in a closet for future repairs. Your story about driving across Austin sounds rough though, I've heard similar tales from people on another forum who ended up with a mismatched stripe right in the middle of their backsplash. Buying extra and returning the unopened boxes definitely seems like the smarter path based on what I've gathered from others who've been through this.