Fontana Concrete Pro colors, stains, exposes and saw-cuts concrete across this city, on a fresh pour or bonded onto a slab that is still sound. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
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Four decisions, not one product
Decorative concrete is a set of four decisions rather than one product. Color can be mixed through the load so it runs the full depth, or reacted into the top of a slab that is already down. The surface can be washed back to show the stone the mix was made with, or left plain and scored with saw cuts that read as tile or flagstone. Each answers a different question, and the one that comes first is whether you are pouring new concrete or keeping what you have.
Fontana Concrete Pro has been finishing concrete here since 2019, and Andre Whitfield, who put in 18 years on flatwork crews first, lays the color himself. Fontana splits neatly for this trade. The blocks south of Valley Boulevard went in during the 1950s, and their slabs are usually sound enough that decorative work here means resurfacing rather than replacing. North of the 210 the concrete is newer, and the finish gets chosen at the same time as the pour.
Finishes go down under a CSLB C-8 concrete license with liability insurance on every job, to the California Residential Code, and anything that reaches the public walk is cleared with Building & Safety before a grinder comes off the truck. No finish can hold a slab still, so the concrete is cored and read before a color is discussed. Every job carries a written workmanship guarantee against defects in how it was built. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
Warning signs
Acid stain reacts with the lime in the concrete, so it is meant to be uneven. When patches turn pale with a hard edge instead of a soft one, the reacted layer has been walked off or scrubbed away with something acidic, and no amount of fresh sealer brings it back.
On exposed aggregate the paste around each stone is the only thing holding it. Once pebbles come out under a thumbnail, or bare gray islands show through where the pattern used to be, that paste is spent. Rinsing and sealing over it loses more stone every wet winter.
Cut lines are what make a scored pattern read from standing height, and the deepest of them is a quarter of an inch. Fill them with lawn grit and hose silt and the whole face flattens back to a plain slab. Blowing them clear is upkeep; having to recut them is not.
Concrete that goes two shades deeper wherever the hose lands is drinking water, which means the film holding the finish down has gone. Left over a winter, that water carries salt up underneath the color and lifts it from below rather than wearing it off the top.
What's included
Standard on decorative work, none of it billed as an extra. Half the list is about what the finish is going onto, because on a resurfacing job the old slab is the foundation and nothing laid over it outlasts it.
The existing concrete is drilled and checked for depth, rocking and live cracks before anything is quoted over the top of it.
A test panel is left on site in daylight for a day, since stain and integral color both read differently outdoors than on a chip.
A resurfaced slab is ground back to open concrete and primed, so the new layer keys into it instead of sitting on old sealer.
Existing cracks are cut out, filled and worked into the cut layout, because a crack that is ignored copies straight through a finish.
Integral, stain or aggregate, named on the estimate with its batch reference, so what arrives on the day is what you approved.
The pattern is set out on the slab and walked before the saw starts, so lines land on the edges of the space rather than at random.
Acid work is neutralized and washed until the water runs clear, since residue trapped under a sealer keeps eating at the color.
Two sealer coats and a written workmanship guarantee against defects in how it was built, with the date the next coat is due written onto it.
Your options
Four ways to finish a slab here, set against how deep the color goes, how the face holds up in an unshaded yard and what each asks of you afterward. All four can be laid on new concrete; only one of them can be laid on old.
| Option | Where the color is | Face in full sun | Resealing | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Integral color | Through the full 4 inches | Lightens slowly and evenly | Every 3 years | New pours in west-facing yards |
| Acid staining | Reacted into the top 1/16 inch | Mottles further as it wears | Every 2 to 3 years | Sound slabs already in the ground |
| Exposed aggregate | None added, the stone is the color | The toughest of the four | Every 4 years | Drives, side paths and pool surrounds |
| Saw-cut and polished | In the cut lines and the sheen | Dulls before it discolors | Every 2 years outdoors | Garage floors and covered patios |
Aggregate lasts longest for the least attention, and staining is the only one of the four that works on concrete already in the ground.
Local knowledge
Two things set this work apart in Fontana: most of it goes over concrete that is already down, and anything laid outdoors has to sit through afternoons in the mid-90s.
South of Valley Boulevard the tracts date from the 1950s, and the patios and paths poured with them were built thick and jointed close. A slab that has not cracked in seventy winters does not need breaking out, it needs grinding flat, priming and finishing. So we core it at the visit, look for rocking at the joints and say then whether it will carry an overlay. Where it will not, the tear-out is written as its own line rather than found halfway through the job.
Sun is the other half. From May to October an unshaded slab runs far hotter than the air around it, and ultraviolet is what breaks down the film holding a decorative finish in place. So the sealer is the wearing part, not the color: outdoors it goes on in two coats and the date the next one is due is written on the paperwork, usually 2 to 3 years and nearer 2 where there is no tree over the frontage. Resealing on time is the difference between a finish at ten years and one at four.
Our process
Five stages, and the first two settle almost everything, because the finish is chosen, sampled and approved before any concrete or any machine is booked. The person who cores the slab is the person who lays the color.
Andre Whitfield measures the area, drills the existing concrete where there is any, and photographs what the new finish has to sit beside.
Many north Fontana tracts are HOA-governed and approve exterior finishes, so color and cut layout go onto one sheet you can hand in.
Either the old surface comes out and base goes in, or it is ground to open concrete, cracks chased and a bond coat rolled over it.
Each finish has its own order: color goes in with the concrete, aggregate is washed back the same evening, saw cuts follow next morning.
Acid work is neutralized and rinsed, the slab cured, then two sealer coats and a walk-through with the reseal date on the paperwork.
What moves the estimate
Area sets the floor. Nearly all the difference above it comes from what happens before the finish, whether the concrete stays or goes, and how much grinding and crack work it takes to get it flat. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
Resurfacing skips the tear-out, the haulage and the base. It only works on concrete that cores sound, which is what the visit settles.
Integral color is one instruction at the batch plant. An acid stain is applied, neutralized and rinsed by hand, in passes, across two days.
A grid of straight cuts runs quickly. A border in a second color, or curves around a planter, means masking and another pass on the slab.
Side gates on the older Fontana lots run about 3 feet, so a grinder goes through in pieces and the prep takes a day longer than it reads.
Coring the slab and writing the figure costs you nothing, and someone rings you within 1 business day to fix a start date. (909) 697-3243 or send us a message.
Use the form, or phone and someone rings you back within 1 business day. Andre Whitfield drills the concrete you already have, leaves a sample panel on it, and puts the figure in writing at the end of the visit.
Reviews
Three decorative jobs in this city in the owners own words. Two of them are finishes laid over concrete that was already there, which is most of what this trade is here.
“Our back patio was poured when the house went up in 1956 and I assumed it had to come out. He drilled it, said it was sound and ground it flat instead. It has been stained a warm brown for two summers now and there is not a crack through it.”
“We wanted the new drive to sit next to the entry the builder left without breaking any of it up. They exposed the aggregate so the stone read the same, sealed both ends of it and left me the date the next coat is due. Four years, in writing.”
“The old sealer had gone milky and the slab went dark every time we hosed it down. They stripped the lot back, recut the pattern lines that had silted up and put two coats on. It reads as a new floor and it cost a fraction of replacing it.”
FAQ
What people here settle before choosing a finish: what will go over an old slab, what survives an unshaded yard, and how often the sealer has to be done again.
Two things move it: the area, and whether there is concrete under it already. A slab that cores sound and needs only grinding and a bond coat skips the tear-out, the haulage and the base entirely. Above that the finish sets the labor: integral color is one instruction at the batch plant, while a stain is applied, neutralized and rinsed by hand across two days. Every estimate is measured and written on site.
Yes, if the slab cores sound and sits still. We drill it at the visit to read the depth, press the joints for rocking and follow the cracks: a hairline is chased out and bridged, but concrete that moves under a foot copies that movement up through any finish inside a couple of winters. South of Valley Boulevard most 1950s slabs pass this.
Exposed aggregate, because there is no applied color in it to lose, the stone in the mix is the color, and it is as ultraviolet-proof as gravel. Integral color comes next, since it runs through all 4 inches and what wears off the top is replaced by the same tone underneath. Stains and saw-cut work last well too, but they lean harder on the sealer above them.
Every 2 to 3 years outdoors, and nearer 2 on a frontage with nothing shading it from May to October. The sealer is the film that holds the finish and takes the ultraviolet, so it is the part built to be replaced rather than the color under it. Indoors or beneath a patio cover, 4 years is normal. Yours is dated on the paperwork at hand-over.
Stamping is one member of the family rather than a separate trade. It presses a texture into concrete while the slab is still open, so it only works on a fresh pour and it has to be finished in a single afternoon. Everything else here, color, stain, exposed aggregate, saw cuts, can go on wet concrete or on a slab that has been down for decades. Stamped work has its own page.
No, and anything that did would not be an acid stain. The color comes out of a chemical reaction with the lime in that particular slab, so its age, its mix and whatever has been spilled on it all show through as mottling. That variation is the reason people choose it. We leave a test panel on your own concrete in daylight, and what you approve is the panel.
Yes, with the hours moved. Above 95 degrees a sealer coat rolled onto a hot slab flashes off before it has properly wet the surface, and it dries cloudy. Acid reacts faster in that heat as well, which shortens the window for washing it back evenly. From June to September the finish work starts at first light and stops by mid-morning, with sealing kept for the evening.
Feet at 24 hours after the last sealer coat, furniture at 72 hours, and vehicles at 7 days on a new pour. On a resurfaced slab the wait is shorter, because the concrete underneath cured years ago and the clock runs only on the overlay and the coats. Either way keep sprinklers off it the first week, since water spotting a green sealer leaves a mark.
Service area
Ordered by distance from the office, these are the towns we stain, expose and cut concrete in, across 4 counties. The sample boards and the saw travel to every one of them, and each name below opens that town.
The four jobs a finish most often carries on into, measured on the one visit and written onto a single estimate. Where two of them meet, the cut lines are set out across both so the pattern does not stop at the joint.
The pattern pressed in at the pour, for a new slab rather than an old one.
The plain slab behind the house, poured to take a finish now or later on.
The frontage, poured deeper and most often finished in exposed aggregate.
Interior slabs, ground and polished where no sun ever reaches the color.
One visit, a core drilled through whatever is there now, a sample panel left behind and a written figure. Tell us when you book whether the concrete is already down, because that changes half of the answer.