The pursuit of quality

ISSUE 78 May 2021

While 2020 turned out to be the busiest on record for many in this industry, many companies have continued to focus on internal improvement. We spoke to a few who had made advancements in the area of quality control in the past 12 months.

Simon Meyer, managing director of Blinds by Peter Meyer said while the company has always been known for attention to detail and service, several improvements have been made in the last 12 months to improve quality.

“We have improved the lighting throughout our factory both above the factory floor but also behind every hoist,” Meyer says.

“We have added new hoists and new lighting behind them to ensure any flaw or imperfection is picked up. Every single blind that is made in our Homebush factory is hoisted, inspected and tuned to be perfect before it leaves our factory.”

“For any motorised blinds made from our Signature Collection, we pre-program the motors to the specific remote channels as per our customer’s requirements.” 

“We also have light inspection under our fabric cutting tables to ensure any fabric flaws are picked up at the cutting stage.”

Meyer says the company generally tries to focus on improving our quality at every step of our business rather than looking at the quality level of others in the industry.

“We like to try and set the benchmark when it comes to the quality of our finished products. We invest in new machinery to improve efficiency and quality levels but also with a focus on improving our competitiveness. We are by no means the cheapest in the market but what you can rely on is a quality product delivered every time.”

“We are quite lucky that we have a very low rework rate due to the levels of quality control we have in place but we are not immune to material variations. We have a dedicated Reworks staff member so there is always one port of call for any warranty work. “

NORMAN’S TOYOTA CONNECTION

For Norman Australia’s parent company Nien Made, quality is at the centre of everything they do by utilising the Toyota Production System (TPS).

“Some of the foundations of the TPS are, eliminate waste, saving time and money, maintaining just-in-time inventories to best utilise capital and empowering employees,” says Steve Payne, Marketing Manager – Norman Australia.

“In the year 2019, employees made 2,300 improvement suggestions providing not only benefits to end users, but also providing an opportunity for employees to take ownership and contribute to quality and processes.”

“For Norman Australia simple things like sampling updates and improvements were undertaken with feedback from Norman’s Retail Partners and the Business Development team. What can sometimes be a lengthy process, was refined from the feedback, to concept, design and delivery to the market in less than 4 months.”


Payne believes Norman has one of the lowest product failure rates in the window furnishing industry.

“This flows on from the attention paid to quality at every stage throughout the manufacturing process at Nien Made.”

“The old saying measure twice make once has relevance in Nien Made’s factory where each and every shutter frame is pre-assembled, panels fitted and photographed prior to packaging.”

“Also, even random samples of packaged products are regularly taken from the shipping staging area and all the quality parameters are checked again.”

“If any problem should arise, through either quality assurance process it can be traced right back to the source production line and rectified to stop reoccurrence. Corrective action is then put in place with new procedures written providing consistency for customers.”

 Payne says that the easiest way to stop problems occurring is to catch them at the source.

Norman Australia

“Things will go wrong from time to time and Norman has made it very simple to register what we call a Return Goods Authority (RGA) on our online ordering system and by uploading a photograph of the issue.”

“Once approved a replacement or part is organised and shipped promptly. Even the RGA system is an area that has undergone an improvement recently. The ordering portal was updated to make the area more intuitive and to easily track RGA’s.”

“Photos are now required at the point of submitting a RGA rather than allowing a RGA to be submitted without one as this is a pre-requisite to approving an RGA. This streamlined the process and eliminated unnecessary communication and delays of chasing images, etc and reducing unproductive time.”

Payne says that overall the level of professionalism in the industry has improved and that is reflected in a general improvement in overall product quality.

“Customers will always have a choice to buy cheaper products and look for short term cost saving, but I believe now more than ever retailers are looking at the ‘total value proposition’ not just the headline price.

“It is said that price is long forgotten after quality remains. Saving a dollar to then have to pay another for a service call or replacing a faulty product, is false economy.” 

CHALLENGING YEAR FOR CHALLENGER UNITED

James Kirkpatrick, the general manager at Challenger United says that whilst 2020/21 has been a challenging year for all, Challenger United remained busy thanks largely to its interstate business. 

“2020/21 has provided the opportunity to assess our products and procedures and work out how we can improve our quality and quality control,” Kirkpatrick says.

“In the past 12 months, service and maintenance on our roll forming machines has increased. This has been a priority focus for us as we have seen increased demand for this product range, in particular our 78mm and 63.5mm Keyway Tube.”

“The refinement of our tooling and machines has improved the quality and consistency of these products.  Challenger continues to work closely with its raw material suppliers to ensure we are able to provide the best zinc and coloured steel products.  We are also making further investigations to expand the production of locally made traditional awning parts.  This will allow us to have greater control of both the quality and the manufacturing times.”

Kirkpatrick says that each item that is roll formed, whether it be Hooding, Tube or Bottom Rail are all individually inspected by their machine operators.

“To further ensure the quality of our coloured product, our hooding and bottom rail coils come coated with a plastic film. With our bottom rail we remove the plastic during the forming process, then it is re-wrapped before being brought into stock.  This extra process ensures the Bottom Rail is scratch free, and the ‘re-wrap’ is easier to remove as it isn’t caught up within the seam or keyway of the rail. A simple running of the knife in the keyway cuts the plastic allowing the plastic to peel of easily.”

Challenger United

Kirkpatrick says that quality is rarely an issue, but from time to time damage from transporting long lengths does occur.

“When these situations arise, we make it the number one priority to fix the problem.  In most situations we send replacement lengths within 24 hours. We are aware that we can’t control what motors, drives and idlers and these products have their own variations.  We encourage our customers to let us know if issues arise so that we can quickly adjust our product to suit their requirements.”

“We feel the level of quality of products in the industry is high.  There will always be a bottom end and a top end of every market but for the majority of our industry most fabrics, components, tubes, extrusions, systems are all of good if not great quality. We believe that there is definitely a decrease in substandard products within the market. The expected quality within the industry is quite high, those who don’t meet that level don’t tend to last as there are so many competitors and options available.”

BM BLINDS INVESTS IN VERTICALS

BM Blinds has just installed a new state of the art vertical slat cutting machine that has increased the company’s capacity and efficiency in manufacturing vertical blinds.

“Many manufacturers shy away from new improvements in machinery for products other than roller blinds, however at bm Blinds we are constantly looking for advancements that improve the quality of our finished product regardless of the range,” says Michelle Macready, sales manager at BM Blinds.

“At bm Blinds we have been manufacturing vertical blinds for many years and continue to offer a variety of options. With an unobtrusive low-profile track, it is as sleek as your customer’s décor requires. The tracks are available in 4 colours including White, Snowdust, Oyster and Black. Our operating systems include wand control or standard cord and chain controls.”

“Our tracks are made with incremental spacing, so the blades sit evenly across the opening making uneven stacks a thing of the past. The links we use are stainless steel ensuring years of hassle-free use. The track profile is double sided and offers a decorative fabric insert if requested.”

Macready said that for the neatest and most ‘child safe’ blind it is worth considering fully sewn in weights and a wand operation.

“This is a compliant system that eliminates messy chains and dangerous cords, perfect for any size window or door.”

“The blades we offer are in 63, 89, 100 or 127mm widths so you can choose the right size to suit the opening you are measuring.”

“Integral to the vertical blind systems that we have known for many years are the variety of fabrics that are now available. From sunscreen, translucent and room darkening fabrics, they are a far cry from the Boucle fabrics of the past. Previously the choice of fabrics was very limited usually just to one or two ranges with only 4 colours within each range. We now have literally hundreds of fabrics to choose from. We also offer the ridged 89mm PVC slats in 14 colour ways ensuring that there really is something for everyone.”

BM BLINDS

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