Thanks to a change of heart and some serious financial backing, Hastings-based premium upholstery brand Michael Tyler Furniture (MTF) is looking at a bright future – Paul Farley paid MD Kai Winders a visit to find out more …
Moving home is among the most stressful experiences around – and for a furniture factory, which requires a significant footprint, infrastructure, and accessibility to a workforce and transport routes, the options are decidedly limited.
Michael Tyler Furniture has been making premium upholstery products on the same South Coast site since 1976, but in recent years its outlook was darkened by a fast-expiring lease and the threat of eviction.
“This site was always going to be redeveloped,” explains Kai, “and the business had been looking for others for a long time – but the cost never stacked up. Relocation is incredibly expensive, not to mention the disruption it causes. We looked at refurbishing other places too, but to do so would cost the best part of £1m – and that’s just dead money. And all the time, the clock just kept counting down.”
Serendipity, then, that a change of heart finally prompted MTF’s landlord to consider selling the site to its existing occupant, and parent company Hjort Knudsen purchasing the site outright for £2m this spring, replacing all that uncertainty with ambition.
“It’s a fantastic opportunity, and opens up a wealth of opportunities,” says Kai. “We can now invest in the facility – we’re already putting in new spray foam booths – and there’s an additional 25,000 sqft building on the site that means we could offer a Hjort Knudsen stock programme, or extend our manufacturing. We’re looking at taking on new admin and warehouse staff, too. We’re going to benefit from several new economies of scale.”
Currently, the factory is running “quite lean and mean”, but can easily produce over 200 pieces of MTF furniture a week, says Kai.
“But before we scale everything up,” he adds, “we need to better support our existing customers.”
Read the rest of the interview in May's issue.
