In July 2013 the Company acquired its first rights to quarry in the Malishevë area in Kosovo. The licence to the quarry is for 20 years with an option to extend the period by a further 20 years thereafter. In October 2015, the Company acquired the rights to explore a further 300 hectares and this led to the exploratory opening of the M3 quarry in late 2015 and confirmation of the exploitation rights in July 2016. Malishevë M3 proved to contain extensive reserves of the cream white Illirico Bianco and the silver-grey Illirico Selene - both excellent mid-market marble grade limestones. The two occur in alternating bands of varying thickness and, whilst the colour is different, the patterning is very similar, making the two stones, when processed, ideal and complementary twins.
By early 2018, just over two full quarrying seasons since the first excavations at Malishevë M3, the quarry was open over 5 benches and had become the company's most productive extractive opertation - driven by strong and growing market demand.
Initially it was the Illirico Bianco and its less marked variant, Illirico Superiore, that attracted most customer interest but, whilst sales of the white were consistent, the main customer focus shifted very quickly to the Illirico Selene. This was a major export from Fox Marble's Kosovo quarrying operations until mid 2019 when quarry production was temporarily suspended. Volume sales in block form, direct from the quarry, to India, China and Turkey have been complemented by strong sales of processed Selene from the Fox Marble factory.
