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Production of built-in furniture
The idea at the beginning was to set up a built-in furniture business with a minimum of staff and equipment, but, as the saying goes, eating feeds the appetite. Embarking on production, we bit by bit came to understand that a lot of gaps existed in the Zheleznogorsk furniture map which needed to be filled not just with good quality products, but also with appropriate levels of service. So we set off in that direction, carrying out a full analysis of the furniture market. It emerged that our basic problem, paradoxical though it may sound, was that demand for our products and services exceeded the production capacity of the business (in terms of technology, staff and organisation). In addition to this a city with Krasnoyarsk, a million inhabitants, was not far away, which hugely increased demand for our products. Putting together our long term predictions for the development of the business, we came to the conclusion that a lack of equipment and production space, of qualified staff and of financial resources would prevent us from achieving the objectives we had agreed on. Just at that time, the International Development Centre – Zheleznogorsk, was busy informing firms in the City about the opportunities for participating in the Nuclear Cities Partnership. We were fortunate; getting to know CNCP helped us to resolve a lot of difficult questions and pointed to an interesting development path, leading us logically to the Mining and Chemical Combinat, as an inexhaustable source of human resources. This opened the way to developing the business by taking on qualified specialists. Collaboration with CNCP gave us the opportunity both to acquire highly productive and appropriate equipment, and to make a huge leap forward by putting together innovative technology and substantially expanding our production area. After signing an agreement with CNCP in March 2007, we quickly reconstructed over 1,500 square metres of space and added an additional production building of about 1,000 square metres. It is no secret that building a business involves getting past many administrative obstacles: uninterested bureaucrats, delays, organizational absurdities, and uncoordinated government activities and decisions. At times solving even minor problems felt like beating one’s head against a wall. Despite all the difficulties which we faced, we met all of the obligations of the partnership in less than the time that was foreseen and in the process, achieved a whole row of important technical, organisational, social and economic results. Forty jobs have been created of which 22 are for former weapons specialists. Orders received by the company were 4.4 times higher than in the year 2006. The CNCP project made it possible for us to advance to a new level of development and to master the problem of producing serial consignments of furniture for wholesale buyers. We have now signed promising long term agreements with dealers covering the sale of our products in different cities of the region. Unfortunately, we have not escaped the financial crisis affecting the country. A downward trend in consumer demand is evident. But we are, nevertheless, successfully attracting purchasers with new technologies and a wider range of products. Thanks to a great deal of joint work within the framework of the CNCP Programme, we have managed to create a modern enterprise in the Krasnoyarsk Region, with high technology equipment which is producing competitive goods, and providing work for specialists who formerly worked in the nuclear complex. Sergey Grishin, Director General, Furniture Factory “Kardinal” | |
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