The wood and joinery industry faces a paradox: offering fully customisable products while holding on to industrial costs and lead times (mass customization). This “industrialisation of the bespoke” means tearing down the walls between the design office (CAD), sales administration and the shop floor.
The technical configurator: the central tool
The key to an ERP built for wood and joinery lies in its technical configurator. As soon as the order is taken, the salesperson enters the parameters (dimensions, wood species, type of hardware). Through an option-and-variant bill of materials, the ERP automatically generates:
- The dynamic cost price and sale price.
- The routings (milling, veneering, assembly).
- The exact procurement needs (panels, hardware).
Material optimisation (nesting)
In wood, raw material is a major cost. Integrating production management with cutting-optimisation and nesting software maximises material yield. Reusable panel offcuts must be returned to inventory in real time, avoiding massive waste.
With a production management platform like AVIA ERP, the digital thread is unbroken: from 3D design (TopSolid, Cabinet Vision) to the CNC machines on the shop floor, data flows seamlessly.