We pour and repair concrete for homes and businesses across Marietta: driveways, garage and foundation slabs, interior floors, patios, and the cracked or sunken surfaces that need attention. A commercial floor gets the same crew and the same care as a backyard patio. Every installation starts with the ground underneath it. A slab is only as good as the base it sits on and the path water takes when it leaves. Get those two right and most of the rest follows.
Ground here is rarely flat. Cobb County carries about 199 feet of local relief within a few miles, and it changes from one block to the next, so we grade and test every site on its own before any forms go up. The dominant soil is well drained, but that varies across the county too. With close to 59 inches of rain a year, slope and drainage get settled first, and the base and reinforcement are planned around what the site actually shows us.
Plenty of houses around Marietta went up in the 1980s (the median build year is 1986), so a lot of original driveways and garage slabs have been carrying weight for decades. Some of them can be repaired. Some need to come out. We tell you which, and why, after looking at the surface in person. If you have a slab that has settled, cracked or started holding water, call for a free estimate.
Most of the concrete we pour in Marietta goes next to something that is already there: a house that has stood for decades, a garage apron that has settled, a walk that stopped meeting the step years ago. That changes the job. We are not pouring into a clean field. We are fitting new work to an older property, and the difference between a good installation and a tired one is usually decided at the edges. So before we plan anything new, we look at how the slab will meet the house, where the water will go, and what the old concrete was doing wrong.
Our crews set the grade, the forms and the reinforcement before a truck is ever called. Cobb County is hilly, and a driveway that looks flat to the eye can carry a real fall across its length. We measure it. The dominant soil here is Gwinnett, and it changes across the county, so we test each site on its own rather than assuming. Residential and commercial jobs run the same way: base first, steel second, concrete last. Nothing gets skipped because a schedule is tight.
When a slab fails early, the concrete itself is rarely the cause. It is the base under it, compacted poorly or not at all. It is water running toward a foundation instead of away from it. It is control joints cut too late or too shallow, so the crack picks its own line. We see a lot of this on older driveways around town. The structural problem is usually simple to find once the old surface comes up, and it tells us exactly what the new one has to do differently.
Getting it right costs time more than anything else. It means an extra day for the base to be compacted and checked, rebar set on chairs instead of left lying in the dirt, and a pour held back when the forecast turns. A driveway or patio is one of the first things anyone sees of a house, and it is worth building once. We would rather give you a plain answer about what your slab needs than sell you solutions you do not. If a repair will hold, we say so. If it will not, we say that too, and we explain why.
We start by walking the property with you and looking at what the slab has to do: carry a truck, hold patio furniture, or serve as a shop floor. Cobb County is hilly, and the ground changes from block to block. So we shoot grades on every site and test the soil where the concrete will sit. Where the house is older, we also check existing slabs for settling and broken joints.
Most concrete that fails, fails underneath. We excavate to firm subgrade, pull out organic material and loose fill, and compact a crushed stone base in lifts rather than one thick dump. We set the grade to carry water away from the house and off the surface instead of letting it pool against the foundation. We handle the permit and call in utility locates before any digging starts.
Forms are straight lumber or steel, staked tight and set to the grades from the assessment, with a slight pitch built in for drainage. Reinforcement follows the load. A patio or walkway usually gets welded wire mesh; a residential driveway or garage slab gets a rebar grid tied at the crossings. Either way it sits on chairs, so it ends up in the middle of the slab and not flat on the stone where it does nothing. Isolation joint material goes wherever new concrete meets the house or an existing slab.
Pour day moves fast, so everything is checked before the truck backs in: forms, reinforcement, access, and where the chute or pump will go. We order the mix for the project, with air entrainment for exterior work and fiber where it helps control surface cracking. We place the concrete continuously and work it into corners and around the steel. Nobody adds water at the truck to make it flow easier. Extra water weakens the slab and is behind a lot of dusting and scaling.
Timing is the whole trade here. We screed the concrete flat, bull float it, then wait for the bleed water to leave before touching the surface again. Finish too early and you trap that water, and the top layer flakes off later. Driveways and walks get a broom finish for grip. Garage and interior floors get a steel trowel. Stamped patterns and decorative color go in during this window too. Control joints are cut or tooled at a spacing that tells the slab where to crack.
Concrete does not dry, it cures, and it needs water to do it. Right after finishing we apply a curing compound or cover the slab so moisture stays in while it gains strength. Average highs around 72°F and lows around 53°F make for workable curing conditions, but sun and wind on a fresh slab still pull water out of the surface quickly. Foot traffic comes first. Vehicles wait longer, and we tell you when your driveway is ready to drive on.
Sealer goes on once the slab has cured enough to take it. For a plain broom-finish driveway we generally use a penetrating silane or siloxane sealer: it soaks in, repels water and oil, and does not make the surface slick. Stamped and decorative concrete gets an acrylic sealer that brings the color up and protects the pattern. Water is what breaks a surface down over time, so keeping it out matters. Resealing every few years keeps any of these concrete solutions doing their job.
The price of a concrete job comes down to what the site needs before anything gets poured. Size matters, but so does access: a backyard patio we have to reach by wheelbarrow takes more labor to place than a driveway we can back a truck up to. Cobb County is hilly, and a sloped lot can mean extra grading and forming. Tearing out an old slab adds demolition and hauling. Decorative work, such as a stamped or colored surface, takes more time and more materials than a plain broom finish.
When you line up bids, make sure they describe the same job. Prices can look far apart simply because one contractor left something out. Ask every bidder to spell out:
Low bids usually get low by thinning the slab, skipping reinforcement or pouring over base that was never compacted. None of that shows on the day the forms come off. It shows a few years later as cracking, settling and edges that crumble. We test the soil and grade every site on its own before we price it, so the number you get reflects the ground your property actually sits on. The right concrete solutions are the ones built for your lot, not an average one. Call us for a free estimate and we will walk the site with you.
What a slab costs depends on what sits under it and what will sit on it. A shed pad on firm, level ground is simple work. A garage slab on a sloped lot needs cut and fill, a compacted gravel base, rebar or wire mesh, and forms that hold grade through the pour. The ground here is hilly, so site prep often moves the number more than the concrete does.
A driveway fails from the bottom up. We strip the old surface, dig out soft soil, and lay a compacted stone base before any concrete arrives. Rebar or fiber reinforcement goes in based on the load, and we thicken the edges where tires roll on and off. Control joints are cut at the right spacing so cracks form where we plan them, not across the middle. Finishes run from a plain broom texture to stamped and decorative borders.
Interior floors need a flatter, tighter finish than anything outdoors. For basements, garages, shops and commercial space, we lay a vapor barrier under the slab, set reinforcement on chairs so it stays in the middle of the pour, and power trowel the surface once it can carry the weight. From there the floor can stay smooth and sealed, get ground and polished, or take a stain or epoxy coating. Joints are planned around where walls and racking will sit.
Not every cracked slab needs to come out. Hairline shrinkage cracks can be routed and sealed. When a slab has heaved, broken into pieces, or lost the base beneath it, patching only buys time. In that case we cut out the damaged area, fix what caused it (usually drainage or a washed-out base), drill and dowel into the sound concrete, and pour new. The right repair depends on the cause, not on how the crack looks from the surface.
Walkways look simple, which is why they are so often done badly. We set forms with a slight cross slope so water sheds off instead of pooling, compact the base, and tool control joints at regular spacing. Where a walk meets steps, a porch or a driveway, we add an expansion joint so each piece can move on its own. Around trees we keep clear of large roots where we can. A light broom finish keeps the surface from getting slick.
An open crack is a way for water to get under the slab and carry the base off. Narrow cracks we clean out, fill with a flexible sealant, and leave flush with the surface. Wide or offset cracks mean something underneath is moving, and filling them alone will not hold. On older driveways especially, we look at the whole slab, not just the crack, before deciding on a fix.
Good concrete comes down to the parts nobody sees once it cures. We order the mix for the job, add no water at the truck beyond what the design allows, and place, screed and float while the material is still workable. Curing gets as much care as pouring: we keep the surface damp or sealed with curing compound so it gains strength evenly. Rushing that step is behind much of the dusting, scaling and surface cracking you see on older concrete.
Patios settle, crack along the house, and tilt until rain runs toward the foundation. We check the pitch first, because a patio that drains back to the house needs more than a surface fix. Worn or spalled tops can take a bonded resurfacing layer, including stamped or decorative overlays that change the look without a full tear-out. Sections that have sunk or broken through get cut out and replaced, with new reinforcement tied into the concrete that stays.
Beyond flatwork, we build footings, steps, retaining wall bases, equipment pads, dumpster pads and curbs for residential and commercial property. Work near Marietta Square means tight access, open storefronts next door, and keeping walkways usable while we pour. Structural pieces get the reinforcement the plans call for, and we handle the permit where one is needed. Whatever the project, the order stays the same: test the site, build the base right, pour, finish, and cure it properly.
It depends on what failed. Surface scaling, hairline cracks and a worn finish can usually be repaired, and a resurfacing coat puts a sound slab back in service. Sunken sections, cracks that keep widening, or a slab that pitches water toward the house point to trouble below the surface, and patching over that only hides it for a while. Some older patios are simply worn out. We look at yours first and tell you plainly which it needs.
Get it in writing before any work starts. On commercial property, an owner or manager should see license, insurance and bonding documents for every contractor on site, then verify each one with the issuer directly instead of taking a website's word for it. Ask us the same question when you call for an estimate. Hold us to exactly the standard you hold everyone else to, because that is how a commercial job should run.
Yes. Reinforcement is chosen for the job, not pulled off whatever pile is closest. A patio, a driveway that takes a loaded truck, and a commercial floor under heavy shelving all carry different loads, so the mesh gauge and spacing change with them. Where mesh alone is not enough, we switch to rebar or combine the two. Every choice is made after the site is graded and tested, because the base under the slab matters as much as the steel inside it.
That is a question worth asking every contractor, and the answer should come as documents, not a sentence on a web page. Before you sign anything with anyone, request copies of the license, the insurance certificate and any bond. Then confirm them with whoever issued them. We expect homeowners to check us the same way. A contractor who hesitates when you ask is telling you something.
Slabs, flooring, sidewalks, curbs, parking pads, loading areas and slab repairs, for anything from a single storefront to an office or clinic. On retail and restaurant frontage, a cracked entry walk is the first thing a customer steps on. Schools, medical offices and professional firms employ a large share of the area, and their surfaces take steady foot traffic. We plan each installation around a business that is still open.
Cutting is done wet wherever the job allows, which keeps most of the dust in the slurry instead of the air. Interior work gets plastic barriers and covered vents. Breaking goes in planned sections, so the loud stretches are shorter and you know when they are coming. Hours, access paths and parking are agreed before demolition starts, and one route in and out stays clear for the people who live or work there.
Plywood goes down over lawns and garden beds where equipment has to cross, and finished surfaces nearby get covered. Trucks wash out into a contained area, never onto your grass or into a storm drain, where runoff would carry it downhill. Debris leaves the site as the work goes, not in one pile at the end. At the finish, the site gets swept and walked with you.
We work across metro Atlanta on the same terms we work in Marietta: same process, same standard of finish. A driveway on one side of the metro gets the same site testing, grading and reinforcement as one on the other, because the ground changes block to block regardless of the town name. The full list of places we cover sits in the areas section on this page.