expansion by delegation

from Joiners Magazine September 2020

PRODUCT focus

we decided right from the start that we would just work incredibly hard and pay our way as we acquired more plant and capacity,” says John.

In2006 Tamahere couple John and Lisa Kay took a punt and opened a bespoke joinery company working from their home garage.

A Global Financial Crisis and world-wide Covid-19 pandemic later, IntaWood Products Ltd is operating out of a purpose built factory in the Hamilton Airport precinct with a team dedicated to carrying on the original vision built on hard work and a vision centred around producing consistently excellent, crafted products.

“It was hard to get started, to ﬁnd a way into the market, so we adopted the attitude that we would take on any work opportunities that presented,” says Lisa,

“When you start out it’s a bit of a leap of faith as you don’t know how the market will respond but

It also meant taking opportunities when they came about, so the couple made a huge sacriﬁce for a number of years when John worked on joinery for large construction projects in Fiji and the Solomon Islands. When he returned home in 2011 he was determined to grow his own company and carve out a niche for the products he is so passionate about.

First stop was a small factory down the road in the old Matangi Dairy Factory site. Then as the business grew they doubled the footprint – but soon that wasn’t enough for the couple’s vision and WCML/Coresteel Waikato was commissioned to build the classy Ingram Road factory. Since moving in a year ago, lockdown aside, the Kays have been increasing both staﬀ and plant to realise their goal.

Now they are at that point.

Key to the business are the people. Lisa has joined John fulltime in their business, but more importantly new and experienced staff have been recruited both in the office and on the floor to free John to oversee the whole operation and fit in where the help is needed. “I know every aspect of what we do, so I’m best fitting in rather than being stuck in a specialised role,” says John.

Hamish Diprose has been with the team for about three years and is production manager. His main role is to monitor workﬂow through the factory, using a new tracking system to ensure each job is at the right stage at the right time to meet an end-goal of being delivered on budget and on time. He is joined by Andrew Baker as part of the production team who is also the estimator – pricing all jobs and specialising in solid timber componentry. Both men are experienced joiners, with ﬁrsthand knowledge of being ‘on the tools’, so they know the processes inside-out.

IntaWood has established itself as predominantly a trade supplier and, like most of its clients, uses PolyBoard software as a design tool and to maximise eﬃciency of its two CNC machines and edging equipment. Hamish is an expert in the use of PolyBoard and double checks all ﬁles submitted by clients to make sure there are no errors that could cause costly mistakes for either party before work proceeds.

The system has been ﬁne-tuned by the IntaWood team to include a fool-proof labelling system and the entire job is quality checked by the fastidious staﬀ before being shipped, usually as a flat-pack job lot.

John says IntaWood has a fantastic mix of people and equipment that delivers the best result at the best price. The couple agree it was a key moment that impacted positively on the company’s development when John and Lisa both agreed on the decision to devolve his role and hand over responsibility and a sense of ownership to the team working on the factory floor and in the production and design processes.

“I can’t emphasise enough just what a diﬀerence it made when John stepped back from holding everything and gave over some of his responsibilities. Now he’s there to support the team through their day,” says Lisa.