Assembly, stock and serve delivers winning combination

Kohler Mira (Doncaster)

Brief

• To remove EPS from range
• To provide a fully assembled solution
• To agree product range to ensure easy lineside packing achieved

Design

A customer for 13 years, team B&P works on a continuous improvement programme across its range of packaging. Over 50 live specs are ordered each week, and this is on a stock and serve basis through a robust call off procedure.

To continue to fulfil our customers ESG objectives, our team commenced a re-design project to eliminate the current EPS corners and sides for their shower tray range. This had been trialled on one range previously with excellent results. This project was to continue the development of the range of corrugated fittings and packaging to eradicate EPS from its entire shower tray range. This has been achieved.

The current EPS solution protects the corners and edges of the tray whilst in storage and transit – the new solution was to do the same but also provide a solution to accommodate the full range of shower trays which have different footprints, heights, and optional upstands.

The new solution was to maintain as equal, or improve the packing process, and was to use materials that had at least 30% recycled content without compromising performance. Sustainability and recyclability were the focus for the customer.

Our solution to remove the EPS was to design and manufacture corrugated corners and sides to protect the tray and support the weight when stacked on a pallet. Innovative designs, showcasing our material knowledge, performance and the requirements of the supply chain saw a push locking tab within the corner design give additional stacking support and a hinged feature within the corner and side design gives flexibility for upstand variants.

Outcome

Both the corner and the sides are supplied assembled to the customer, and both passed compression tests to a maximum of 3017kg.

To facilitate this added product and service to the customer, additional investment was made with new bespoke commissioned assembly machinery, and a team of ten team members employed from the local community.

Our customer is so impressed that further opportunities to remove EPS from their supply chain and replace with corrugated designs from ourselves will be an ongoing long-term project to drive further efficiencies and elevate their sustainability credentials.