Why would a former concrete cutter decide to make and sell diamond blades?

Nicholas Mione had some very personal reasons for founding Desert Diamond Industries: as a former concrete cutter and construction worker, he’d used bad saw blades.

He'd been cut by abrasive blades when they shattered and gotten particulates from them in his eyes, and he’d had his pants set on fire by the spark trails that they make during cutting; he still has the scars on his ankles to prove it.

Welded diamond blades weren’t any better, he said, because they broke – never on him, but he knows one guy who got hit by six cutting segments from a broken blade.

“The blades break, they’re terrible quality, no performance warranties of any type,” he said.

Most workers like Nick grouse about their tools; it’s almost the national pastime of the construction industry. Nick wasn’t like most workers, though. Oh, he complained about his lousy blades, all right.

And then he did something about them.

A Safer Kind of Blade

Nick founded Desert Diamond Industries in Las Vegas, NV on Feb. 1, 2008. The company’s signature products were, and still are, its solid-steel, vacuum-brazed diamond wheels – Ductile Iron Safety Blades, Fire Rescue Safety Blades, Ductile Iron Ring Saw Safety Blades, and Safety Blade Grinder/Cutters – which can cut and grind almost any metallic or non-metallic material. As mentioned before, though, Nick had a more personal reason for offering these blades.

“To be able to provide a product that not only lasted longer but was the safest on the market was the ultimate goal, to eliminate the possibility of segment loss,” he said.

“Products that get the job done at the expense of safety are not acceptable, period.” – Desert Diamond Industries’ blog

Desert Diamond Industries’ vacuum-brazed diamond blades and grinders are designed to reduce worker injuries and deaths because their solid steel designs will not shatter or lose segments. They’re the embodiment of the company’s motto “Your Safety… Our Priority!!™”

“We believe that every worker has a right to use the safest, most effective tools to perform their craft and to contribute to society as a whole.” – Desert Diamond Industries’ blog

A Different Way to Design Diamond Blades

Safety Blades can be found on some of the most challenging and complex construction projects in the world. They’re used by water departments, foundries, and fire departments throughout the United States and Canada and by the U. S. federal government and Department of Defense. One of the reasons for their widespread use is how they’re designed.

“We’re not happy with just being good. We want to be great.” – Nicholas Mione

Desert Diamond Industries designs its vacuum-brazed products with the participation of labor unions to increase safe work hours, cut costs, and increase profits for its customers. More importantly, though, these diamond blades and grinders are designed by people with real-world experience.

Nick’s expertise as a concrete cutter and his talks with other workers “made me a market expert,” he said. “Every other diamond blade company out there – the majority of them – has no practical application, no field experience.”

That experience is important, he said: knowing what it’s like “working in the field, day in and day out, 10, 12, 15 hours a day, actually seeing what it’s like to be tired, you’re exhausted, you’re wet, you’re cold, blades aren’t working right, every possibility you can have with an instrument in the field.”

A Different Kind of Warranty

Desert Diamond Industries’ vacuum-brazed blades also carry the only Life Time Operator Error Warranty in the diamond blade industry, because Nick got “sick and tired” of the way diamond blade companies treated him as a customer.

“They give you performance warranties – supposedly a warranty against any type of manufacturer’s defects,” he said, “but once the blade breaks, they find a way to make it so that it’s your problem, where it’s an operator error.”

“I wanted to provide a warranty that we know will stand up to any competitor and a product that will not just outperform but destroy our competition.” – Nicholas Mione

Desert Diamond Industries believes that its clients shouldn’t be abandoned if its products break. That’s happened to Nick with other diamond blade companies, and he doesn’t want it to happen to anyone else.