Summary
• Haldane UK has recently expanded into stairs and bespoke joinery.
• It is launching a dedicated architectural joinery website this month.
• It has invested in bespoke design software.
• Haldane has opened an office in London.
• It has supplied prestigious projects including Windsor Castle, Stirling Castle, Royal Ascot and the British Embassy in Moscow.

In common with many other timber-related companies for which order files are dictated to a large extent by the fortunes of the building industry, Haldane UK found the recession had a significant impact on revenues. However, the Glenrothes-based firm has rediscovered the growth trail, thanks in no small measure to a drive towards diversification.

In the eyes of many, Haldane UK had become synonymous with handrails and glazing beads despite the fact that, when it was founded after the second world war, its business emphasis was squarely on traditional timber machining and woodturning. Therefore, its recent expansion into other product areas – including, for example, furniture and ornate screens, as well as more left-field items such as Japanese drum sticks, pram handles and cribs – is regarded internally more as a return to the company’s roots.

Special projects

According to managing director Forrester Adam, the company has been “pulling in all of the skill sets” developed over its 60-plus years in business to take on a growing number of what can best be termed special or, in some cases, unique projects.

Handrails and glazing beads now account for just over half of the company’s turnover, with the remainder split relatively evenly between these “special projects” and another emerging market for Haldane UK, namely stairs. Having confirmed that demand for the company’s bespoke stairs is growing, Mr Adam revealed plans to open a showroom this summer to display its range and also its shopfitting solutions.

The company is supporting its staircase offer with a dedicated website, said marketing manager Sean Kennedy. A dedicated architectural joinery website will also go live “by the end of May”, he added, while Haldane UK’s corporate website is to be streamlined. This extended web presence will help stop the company from becoming “pigeon-holed” simply as “the handrail people,” said Mr Adam.

Also coming through the system are picture-rich brochures covering bespoke staircases and architectural joinery, the principal goal of which is to inspire potential clients.

Central activities

Notwithstanding these developments, Haldane UK’s MD is quick to point out that the production of handrails and glazing beads remains central to the firm’s activities. Indeed, while he acknowledges that its glazing bead sales have been static over recent times, he expects this segment to receive a boost from new products currently in the pipeline.

Technology has long been central to success at Haldane UK, providing the company with the ability “to machine any shape or profile from any commercially available timber”. In 2012, the company celebrates two decades of 5-axis CNC machining and it added another Heian CNC machine at its Bankhead Industrial Estate facility some two years ago. But by its very nature technology is constantly evolving and so, after more than two years in the development and testing phases, the company is now heralding the arrival of a software innovation which, in its own words, “transforms the entire process from surveying through to a new dry-jointing system”.

Created exclusively for Haldane UK in conjunction with a software house with market-leading credentials in the automotive, aerospace and engineering sectors, the package “dramatically improves the speed and precision of the process” and is described by Mr Adam simply as “dazzling”.

“The drawing and programming element is one of the most critical and time-consuming in the CNC process,” he explained. “This revolutionary technology allows us to draw, program and simulate the machining in a fraction of the time it previously took.”

Investment

Development and installation of the software have already entailed a six-figure investment and the expenditure will be ongoing to take account of regular software updates and of the need to keep upgrading the hardware.

The software system can be described as “predictive”, drawing on a vast archive to inform the operator whether something similar has been created in the past, thereby saving valuable time. Once an item is drawn and programmed in, the system will run the entire program on the computer so operators can observe on the screen where the timber will be cut, thereby minimising wastage by providing the opportunity to overcome any problems before a single piece of timber has been touched.

Haldane UK has taken the technology a stage further “by adding a laser element to surveys” for added precision prior to programming. An entire staircase and handrail can be surveyed and presented in one file, enabling Haldane UK to offer the full system dry-jointed ahead of despatch. As a result, time spent on site can be cut significantly.

Eager to broadcast this enhanced offer as widely as possible, Haldane UK has opened a new office in London and appointed a dedicated business development manager to support its activities in England. Lee Hewitt, who holds a degree in architecture and a City & Guilds in carpentry, was formerly technical manager with MH Joinery Products. His role will be to enhance service levels in England from Leeds southwards – an area in which a large proportion of Haldane UK’s customers are located. “At least 70% of our business is south of the border,” said Mr Kennedy, while an estimated one-third of the Glenrothes firm’s total turnover comes from the London area.

Client approach

“Lee is targeted with bringing new business to Haldane UK and with supporting clients that are currently doing business with us,” said Mr Adam. He is also charged with approaching past clients and updating them on the company’s latest capabilities and his strong grounding in timber means he approaches potential clients not so much as a salesman but “largely as a problem-solver”, added Mr Adam.

The desire of many of its clients for confidentiality often prevents Haldane UK from publicising the detail of some of its most successful and innovative projects – but suffice to say the company’s customer list is deeply impressive. The settings for some of its creations include Windsor Castle, Stirling Castle, Wellington Arch, Royal Ascot, the British Embassy in Moscow, Euro Disney, numerous shopping centres, hotels and restaurants, and the homes of the rich and famous.

For example, it has manufactured and installed an 85x40mm ash handrail with 200mm timber capping at a multi-million-pound home in Scotland using laser technology to survey the project. The handrails were machined and dry-jointed prior to despatch, thus helping to reduce physical time on site by 50%. Another Haldane UK contract has involved the manufacture of 48 screens in Siberian larch – measuring 2.5×1.5m – which will adorn a media centre bridge at the 2012 London Olympics.

Also, Haldane UK combined hand-work and CNC machining in a project for the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies which included recreating extracts from the Koran on panels of European black walnut, with characters measuring 5mm in depth – but varying widths – for a total length of 30m. The characters were first painted, then scanned in Turkey and sent to Haldane UK where they were programmed into the system, with the final result revealing a stunning level of detail and accuracy for which the company is becoming ever more widely recognised.