The big challenge for Philip Brading and John Beaugié, chairman and managing director of Neat Concepts Ltd, is people who think in straight lines.
This is not some psycho-babble or new age philosophy borrowed from a self-help guide to personal development. It’s simply a statement of fact when your company’s main product is Neatform, or Bendy MDF.
Neatform is the ideal product for creating smooth, curved surfaces, whether it be the sweep of a reception desk, a column casing, or as an alternative to the traditionally square edges of boxing.
“There’s so much scope to make something more interesting with curves,” said Mr Brading.
Neat Concepts was established in 1984 to manufacture felted grooved board. However, the company started on a new direction the day a flyer arrived from William T Eden, advertising bendy MDF from Germany. John Beaugié boldly told Eden that Neat Concepts could supply the same product – before realising that Eden wanted it in 8×4 or 10×4 rather than the 4×4 board that Neat worked in. Mr Beaugié, still an NHS surgeon at the time but with a long-standing interest in engineering, believed it could be done. So, with the help of an electronics engineer, the existing machinery was modified and the first pieces of Neatform rolled out of the company’s north London factory. The machine had to cut an accurate groove over 10ft, a challenge that Mr Beaugié took in his stride. “As a surgeon my speciality was the thyroid so when cutting the throat, 1mm is a lot,” he said.
Although that original machine has been replaced, Neat Concepts is producing the same product, only more efficiently and in bigger volumes.
Unlike its German competitor, which produces only a long grooved product, Neat Concepts produces both a long cut and a cross cut version.
“Why would any distributor want to stock a product that has the grooves only in one direction?” said Mr Brading.
Product range
Also using Medite Standard class A, the company produces Neatmatch and Neatrout. The former is 3050x1220mm, 9mm thick MDF, grooved to give the appearance of T&G panelling. Other specifications can be produced as specials, and it can be supplied with a painted or veneer finish. Neatrout – perforated MDF panels using bespoke patterns or one of Neat Concepts’ own designs – is manufactured from 4mm thick sanded MDF and is ideal for radiator grills, partitions, screens and door panels. However, Neatform, which is also available with a veneered finish, is its main product, accounting for 80-90% of the UK market.
Neat Concepts has plenty of competitors for its Neatmatch but there are only two, smaller, UK companies producing bendy MDF.
“It’s easy to make matchboard,” said Mr Brading, “and that’s why lots of people do it, but it’s deceptively hard to make Neatform; it has to be precise, every groove has to be right.”
This is why the main concern for Neat Concepts is not competing manufacturers, but “the masses united who think in straight lines”.
The UK accounts for 50% of Neat Concepts’ business, with the remaining half divided equally between Europe and the US. Its efforts in these export markets earned the company the Queen’s Award for enterprise in the international trade category last year. The next export target is the Far East, and it is also looking at China, where materials are in demand for the booming construction market.
All routes to market are through distributors, enabling Neat Concepts to do what it does best – manufacturing.
“Our view is to invest in distribution,” said Mr Brading. “We are not aiming to have a big sales force; our aim is to have the best manufacturing in the world.”
With this in mind, Neat Concepts has established distribution networks in the UK and its overseas markets. The company chose Europe as its first export market which, despite the different languages spoken, was identified as a more familiar business culture than the US – although in order to smooth the path of business in France Mr Brading, formerly an investment banker, did take lessons to expand on his schoolboy French.
“A lot of companies go straight to the US but we didn’t because they have a different business culture from Europe,” he said. “Europe taught us how to export, and then we decided to take on the US.”
Neat Concepts now has 20 distributors and 70 distribution points in North America.
When one of these export markets develops sufficiently, Neat Concepts will set up a manufacturing base there.
Bendy MDF v plywood
In all of these markets, Neatform Bendy MDF has taken share from bending plywood.
“Plywood and MDF are about the same price but by the time you’ve filled it [plywood] and sanded it, filled it again, painted it, put some veneer over it, it’s the labour cost that kills this product instantly,” said Mr Brading.
According to Neat Concepts, Bendy MDF scores over its plywood counterpart on several fronts – not least in its bendiness. Bendy MDF has a bending radius of 6in, whereas bending plywood’s radius varies between 12-16in; freestanding structures are possible with MDF but plywood is usually fixed around a framework; and when it comes to finishing, MDF provides a much smoother surface, making it ideal for painting or veneer, and there are no exclusions so no filling is required.
While Mr Brading and Mr Beaugié concede that end users and specifiers need to be educated about the possibilities of bendy MDF, it has found a ready market in shopfitting, architectural interiors, including the interior of the media centre at Lords, and the imaginative world of film production.
“The possibilities are endless,” said Mr Brading. “The people using the material are the innovators because they can find new ways to use it.”
Proving this point was a project that had never crossed the minds of the two men – the mould for the world’s largest single-masted yacht, the Mirabella V. This was built from Neatform using 12mm moisture resistant MDF rather than the standard 6mm.
“Who would have thought we would be providing a mould for a super yacht?” said Mr Beaugié. “Anybody who has anything to do with curves should ask their distributor the question of how to do it.”
