11 REASONS TO CHANGE THE FURNITURE DESIGN SOFTWARE

A good software for furniture design and production preparation is the foundation for success. It will streamline work, improve team productivity, reduce order lead times and increase business competitiveness on the market. What should I pay attention to when selecting a furniture design program? What symptoms should make it possible for you to consider changing your company’s existing work method?

1. LONG TIME OF EXECUTION OR DELAYS IN EXECUTING ORDERS

Time is money – especially if there are additional unplanned orders that are difficult to match with a predetermined plan of tasks. In such a situation it is worth being aware that with good software, more than half of the existing working time can be saved. This is particularly important if the furniture manufacturer executes numerous individual orders in which each piece of furniture has to be designed from scratch.

2. NUMBER OF ERRORS IN THE PROJECT

The furniture production process consists of a number of steps: from the designer’s concept, through the analysis of modellers and design engineers, the construction of the first prototype and testing of its quality and strength. Each error means not only a loss of time, but also a loss of material. Software fit with functions such as detection of process collisions or validation of materials and geometry as early as at a stage of prototyping, supporting the correct course of the furniture design process, is proved useful.

3. NO AUTOMATIC EXPORT OF PROJECT DATA TO PRODUCTION DOCUMENTATION

Automation of the production documentation development process not only allows for a large amount of time to be recovered, but also errors resulting from manual input of data into engineering reports to be avoided.

4. MISSING DATA IN BOM

Many of the available tools supporting the design and production of furniture do not contain all the necessary data. Development of reports and production documentation requires manual filling in of missing information. Select a program that not only contains the complete set of data needed, but generates reports in a completely automated manner.

5. LONG 2D DOCUMENTATION CREATION TIME

Development of drawing documentation is one of the most time-consuming and involving stages of furniture production. With the drawing generator, you can save up to 99% of the work time compared to the standard manual 2D documentation development method.

6. INTEGRATION WITH ERP AND PDM

Concerns related to the deployment of new software effectively discourage business changes. Unnecessarily. Just find the software that ensures seamless integration with all the ERP and PDM systems in your business.

7. DISTRIBUTOR OR MANUFACTURER

Contrary to the impression, this is a fairly important information. Direct contact with the software developer is much greater possibilities, including adaptation of the software to the individual needs of the production plant, greater impact of the client on the future of the program and development of its functionality. Pay attention to the scope of support offered and the qualifications of the personnel responsible for deploymeny, training and support.

8. DATA SHARING ISSUE

One of the more frequent problems in the designers’ team – the solution is to provide software that guarantees sharing of data and the ability of many people to work on the same projects from any position within the company. It is also useful to quickly and seamlessly send the generated reports to a production worker, e.g. in the form of a link to a website containing the requested data.

9. PERSONALISATION

A keyword of the past few years: personalisation. Today the battle for clients is not only to provide high quality services, but also to tailor them to individual business needs, i.e. to offer a “product for the client”. A perfect software is the one supported by a flexible team ready to improve your product in an even more comfortable way.

10. COMBINATION OF DESIGN WITH PRODUCTION

The ideal solution is a software that combines the ability to design the furniture quickly with CNC machining. Select a program that can generate an NC code on any machine.

11. VERSATILITY AND FLEXIBILITY

When selecting the software, it’s a good idea to set it to work for both simple and complex projects (for designing from scratch or from preset templates). The furniture industry is growing continuously – it is worth noting that even a small production company may expand to the size of a well-operated furniture factory over the following 5 years. By selecting of a flexible software already on startup you will avoid any change-related problems in the future. Respond by using a program open for development and changes – both yours and the market ones.

We reached the end of our list – time to present a solution that responds to all of the above-mentioned needs. WOODEXPERT is an intuitive solution that combines efficiently the various stages of the furniture design and preparation process, providing the opportunity to save on average 60% of the working time. Make use of a free test and share your experience.