YPIE Blog Day 10: Parker Knoll

Lisa Sandall, designer at Ercol, writes about what the Young Professional Industry Experience group learned on their trip to Parker Knoll.

Today we were hosted by a full team of people at Parker Knoll, including 2016 YPIE participants Pav, Misha and Katie,  who each gave us an over view of the business and their roles.

Parker Knoll is similar to Ercol in many ways, being a well-known brand with a long heritage making furniture to order in their UK factories, and supplying many of the same retailers.

Both companies also work hard to attract younger customers to the brand without losing sight of their loyal customer base.

However there are also subtle differences between the companies. For example, Parker Knoll’s lean manufacturing system makes components only on the day they’re required for assembly. This differs to Ercol as we keep stock of all the components.

The tour showed that production at Parker Knoll is planned in half days. Frames, mechanisms and cushion sets are all made in parallel in the morning ready for assembly in the afternoon.

Production is also planned by the lorry load, to avoid the need for warehousing or a build-up of stock. I admit I was quite uneducated about production planning before the YPIE programme, but I was seriously impressed.

Parker Knoll moved into a new purpose built manufacturing facility last year, which has allowed the company to manufacture in a much more efficient, linear way, and all under one roof.

Its old facility was made up of four factories which would see a chair travel a mile during its production through several buildings. Now it moves 150 metres, hugely reducing the potential for damage throughout production.

We finished the day at Parker Knoll’s stunning Long Eaton based showroom, where customers can book an appointment with their dedicated on site design consultant. It was a perfect way to round off the day – a chance to try out the products we’d seen being made, to appreciate the quality and innovation.