fortune favors the prepared

So far this week is going very well. B67 is well under construction and I will be having to buy more hardwood before this week is over. The president of Raybern came by my shop today to drop off three cans of paint. He did that because he really wanted to do it himself because of how long we have been waiting. i was shocked to see him, never in a million years would I have thought that. It goes to show how the owner of any company wears a sense of pride and concern for the customers that is hard to get in the lower ranks. The lower ranks would have made me wait until the weekend, but the owner knows how important timeliness is. Anyone at the company could have done that, but nobody did what anyone could have. Also my hinges are in for the a61 job and I'll pick those up tomorrow and then we will be one more step closer to completing that job. Our rush job for a75 is going great it will be in the paint room tomorrow and if the client wants installed on Thursday. Our other rush job I will begin the install tomorrow that is job a33 the custom bi-fold doors, and closet shelving. I may be able to finish that install this week if I am able to stay focused and we don't run into road blocks. One of my favorite expressions comes into to play here. "fortune favors the prepared" I will try to play out all things mentally tomorrow morning for the next two days and mentally play out the events to complete the two rush installs. with my team working the way it is now it is possible. If my truck breaks down then we may have trouble.

the most interesting parts

I have just sent into the shop the next three pages for job b67. There is nothing wrong with being a B client by the way. It is just as important to us to have any of the three types a,b,or c. it has no impact on the quality of what we build it has more to do with how we make decisions as a team in the line of duty. But anyway so pages 7-9 were distributed into the shop today. What is important is how the information was presented.
Sondu you will find this interesting but I'm giving out the info your way. I am not drawing and dimensioning the cabinet boxes I am leaving that up to the bench man. I just don't have the time right now. We will see how it goes, I could be proved wrong in this experiment and the credit for this information distribution will be yours sondu forever to go down in the halls of our company. And I'm OK with that actually I am excited about the fact that there are people in my organization who have things to say about how we do what we do.
If I haven't said it already a75 has put on us a rush job so they can complete a portion of their work. We will accommodate them of course, it again puts my team to task of completing a quick turn around job. Which is something that makes us special and me very proud.
We got another great compliment today from a happy costumer. WELL DONE was what he said. this the guy with the beautiful teak top, that I am jealous of. He has every right to be happy it was a smooth job. which says alot because it was a tricky job. That is my strenght when it comes to install, I'll do the tricky stuff myself. You know what I like the most though is that when I called the client today I got a hold of him at a rare moment he was celebrating a new baby on the way. If it wasn't for my business I wouldn't have come across that joy coming out of this guy. It is the people interaction that I really like about this business. Yes you clients can drive me crazy and make me want to kill myself, but usually you are the most interesting parts.

Our best cabinets ever

This past week was very productive for my team. I myself got a good dose of installing, man I love that stuff. Give me an install any day of the week. So we got two jobs installed we made great progress on b67, the curved banquet is looking wonderful. I made some great progress with my new prospects. We had one meeting this week with a potential new "a" client. Job a75 has grown by one cabinet and has brought in money. this next week we should install a61 which will be very exciting to see that piece leave the shop. We have been working on it since December. I also installed the latest teak top which went very smooth and the client is happy. That is client who I said I was jealous of, because of the teak top he got, it came out just beautiful. I had a stressful moment with my finisher this week but it turned out to be some great training for him. Friday I was able to work the entire day on the newest set of shops for b67 particularly the wall of cabinets in the kitchen. I can't wait to see that come into being it I feel like it is my best work thus far. The paper plans never do the cabinets justice. there is nothing like seeing in the flesh.

new foos ball handles

The teak top went very well, I was actually surprized by how smoothly it went. Both of my installs this week went smooth. the teak top and a75. I only have one install next week but that could change. For now it is a set of bi-fold doors at a33. Apperently the property changes hands on monday so that could get interesting. I am hoping that the new owners still want thier bi-fold doors and I will get a chance to meet them and then be able to build theier wet bar and hopefully build more cabinetry.
Gagan continued his work on the bench for b67. Esteban also started his work on b67 this week. Already some of the cabinets are in primer stage hanging out idle in the finishe dgoods area. Next week we'll be full throttle on b67 and probally the week after that. We are going to need paint colors before to long on that job.
I am thinking about taking down a wall in my shop. If I do so I will increase my floor plan by 1000 feet. My main production area will be an enormouus rectangle, it rival the best shops.
After work today I spent an hour and a half making new foos ball handles for my foosball table. I turned them on the lathe, what fun that is.

compete or die

Today I Will be installing the teak top. Yesterday I went to the job and prepared the site, when I was doing so I found a new hammer and pry bar up on the top of the cabinet behind the crown molding, left there by my employees when they did the initial install. A classic, leaving behind the tools up on top of the cabinet, it's not the first time I have found my own tools left on a job and I am sure it won't be the last.
My progress with the fantastic 12 is going well. I'm pretty confident that one of them Will turn into a job with-in a week. I am finding myself doing three times the estimating and prospecting that I was doing a year ago, and barely keeping the same production. But this new sluggish economy has some advantages. First it sort of cleans out the market place and gets rid of all those people who do shotty work, second it makes us all appreciate the work that we do have, and thirdly it has forced me to focus on prospecting. Prospecting has been something that I have been fortunate enough not had to do over the course of my ten years in business, we have always survived on word of mouth. But not anymore, the regular customers that I have had are no longer bringing in work. It is an important lesson to learn and I am thankful for it. The past few months have been financially very difficult with the lack of sales, and I feel like it is my fault for not having the work lined up. One thing that I have learned with all my prospecting lately is that there is plenty of work out there for me it is just harder to find and secure. I still think that there is more opportunity in business in the world than there has ever been, it is all just about finding it. May the best man win, this is America and with that comes the expression "compete or die". this is the society in which we dwell. That explains why we are always redefining what we do and trying to get better at it.

installing at last!!!!

Today I went to work with an excitement. I have not done any installing since c66, which I think was about a month ago. I really love the installation part of my work. It is when I get to see how engineering and production come together. Gagan and I went out together to a75. I felt like a race horse at the start of the race, I had some pent up installing. I have much more installing to do this week, so I should get my fill. Gagan and I had a successful day at a75 all is complete except some baseboard which will go in on Thursday. a75 is a great example of what my business is best at, fast turn around. a75 is a closet bit of cabinetry that was built, painted and installed all in less than 5 days. that is 3 cabinets one of which is a very funky shoe rack, a couple of panels and five closet rods with kleating. It also again shows how the players of my team will over lap with one another to get a job pushed through the shop quickly, with out losing pace with it's existing obligations.
tomorrow first thing in the morning I'll be making a new knife for a33. I think I mentioned yesterday that a33 has sprung on us another rush job. Esteban built the doors today and tomorrow Ventura will start to apply the molding that he will make tomorrow.
B67 is going very well, that job has an elliptical bench which is taking shape. The fact that we are building this bench and table allow us to make sure that the sizing is correct and the final look is seemless. I think that this bench will be a prominent piece in our portfolio. The entire bit of cabinetry will be the finest we have ever made. It incorporates some of the best things that we have done over the past several years.
After installing today I had to put my daily coat of oil on a teak counter top that I am making for a client. The wooden counter tops are one of my favorite things to do. I really love putting on the finish. There is something about smoothing down between coats with steel wool and then applying an even coat. I've been doing that for years and it never dulls. It is like slowly bringing the beauty out of the wood over about 6 days. Each day you put another coat on the wood it reaches another level of quality. The texture that the grain has is what really turns me on, it has pores that create dark shadows with in the natural tone. It makes me think of something one of my old employers used to say. When I was working as a cabinet maker on the schooner Larinda I did alot of oil finishing, and my boss said "We want it to look so good, that is makes you want to take a bite out of it". And this clients counter top looks that good, I am jealous of this man because he is getting one gorgeous top. It's being installed this week and I'll let you know how it goes.

chapter

Gagan took the day off today. No problem, he usually works over 40 hours in a four day period anyway. Job a61 had some of their own painters come in and paint their cabinet. I don't usually do that but we made an exception on this job, they are really good guys. And the truth is that we don't usually do brush painting on big items. a61 is an enormous piece of outdoor mill work, and the paint really needs to be brushed on for proper penetration. So it's better to have these guys here.
We have got an emergency job to push through the shop this week, a33 needs four doors built and installed in two weeks. We can handle that kind of stuff with ease, that is one of the things that makes me proud of my organization we have two solid lines of production that are always going sometimes they are overlapping and the team focuses on one line at a time and sometimes we split up and focus on five different projects, How do we keep it all in check. Our weekly staff meeting, one of the most important things that we do. Once a week we meet and go over the goals on a team level and an individual level. that is where we air out any beefs with each other or the infrastructure(machines, material). I think we should call it chapter. In many ways we are like monks, when you work so long together and everyday it is like living with people. In that scenario their needs to be a place to openly communicate our experience with the past week. To help eliminate resentments and keep ourselves focused on the goals. It's a good place to swap around the leadership roll, we can practice our communication skills. It fits in with the key parts of being a team, that is a sense of structure. The staff can rely on the weekly meeting to get his marching orders for the week and find out what the team maneuvers are for the week.

craftsman never blame their tools

This morning we had a training day. I am very pleased with the results. We focused on the three tool centers in the shop. If you can imagine, the tools of our shop have a natural entropy, and believe me it is not organized. We have many tools to get our work done thousands of little different tools needing to be used at different times. We need to be able to locate these tools quickly and when we need them. So I have made three pairs of tool boxes. Each pair is located strategically and has the exact same configuration. Everything that a craftsman needs is in each pair. It is a pretty good system until you need something that is not in one of those boxes. For example Gagan asked me this week for a hack saw. I know I have several hack saws, but they are not in the tool box, just doesn't come up. We had to search for it. So today was spent going over the contents of the tools and their respective locations in the boxes. We had to make some modifications to two other boxes so they are similar and then we matched up all the tools. I still need to buy two more large routers and two more trim routers with their respective bit sets, for the pairs to be identical. Most of my back-up tooling is out on the floor now. I'll have to re-up soon. HD Chasen out of somerville is where I do most of my wheelin and dealing tool wise. They have everything imaginable and most of it is in stock. The owner was nice enough to come over to my shop and make a tool list with me listing all the tools and their order numbers. I can easily monitor what tools we are using most and are re-ordering, and that way I can add that expense to the job cost. New tooling is something that we will always need, I want to know that we have budgeted a certain amount of money constantly to new tooling. The staff then knows that new tools are always coming. that is important to craftsman, having good tools. It is said that a craftsman never blames his tools for shotty work, and I agree with that, but man let me tell you that it is easier to do good work with good tools. And well organized tools that you are familiar with. Sondu came in today for the event and helped out that was really nice. Sondu actually had some good ideas about tool location in the boxes and also the idea of adding a location for bungs. You are the idea man around hear sondu and we do miss you. The whole event took about 2 hours and was worth every cent of our time. I'm so proud that we as a team are taking the time for the kaizen events and the training days. I know it's hard to see the improvement now because it's early wait a few years from now at how are operation will perform and you'll see the progress as plain as day.

new knives

Today after doing all the needed things to keep the shop running full tilt I was able to get some time on the profiling machine and grind a new knife. I have a total of three knives to make currently and finished one today. I have had some realizations about profiling. First the knife stock comes in different widths, so it behooves me to buy the widest one as I'll be re-sharpening and in effect making the knife smaller each time I sharpen them. So the knife will last longer. Also it is commonplace to grind an entire new profile into a knife if you don't need the profile any longer. So now I know to buy the widest knife stock. I am still battling with the stylest not matching the grinding wheel in width. I suppose that the problem is that I cannot dress the grinding wheel, those parts on my machine are broken. I'm left with the dilemma of trying to repair these parts or doing it in a different way. This knife I made today came out very beautiful in it's own right. For the most part it is one sweeping compound curve and a quarter round. The grinding wheel discrepancies won't matter on this type of profile, although I do wonder how much cleaner of an edge I would get with a properly dressed wheel I can feel the variations in my hands when I'm doing the profiling. All in time, I need to contact the grindermans association. They don't have a web site which is unfortunate but I do have their phone number.
This week I have been very proud of my team. We are working exceptionally well right now and very hard. c74 is very near complete, and a75 is almost done as well. I did not think that Gagan was going to able to complete a75 this week but he'll do it with ease. Ventura has shown the most progress lately. I never thought I'd say that but it's true. He could be the most improved employee if he keeps it up. There is a review coming for Ventura so this could be an effort to impress me shortly before his review and get a higher rating. Our rating system is the same as many other companies. The best is an O for outstanding then E for exceeds expectations and P for performer and N for non-performance. It is a very simple system and works well.
Tomorrow we have our training day event in the afternoon. We will be talking about how we keep our tool boxes in the shop, and why it is important to keep them orderly. I have my props already prepared, I made two full size drawings of the drawers in plan showing what tools go in which drawers. Then we will go into the shop and make sure that each of the three tool box locations are properly outfitted. The benefits of that are huge. It decreases the time it takes to locate the tools when you want them. It keeps order to the hundreds of tools that we use every day. And it establishes some ground rules for the guys who do clean up. They in theory should be able to pick up a tool and look at the drawing and know where to put the tool.

the training continues or apprende conseguir

Sondu I've thought about the kaizen event as you've read and it is circular. this is what I picture. Engineering does everything, they spec out the face frame, they spec out the box dimensions. the only difference that unit 4 will have is that it won't be assembled until the face frame is built so we can perfectly align the sides of the cabinet with the side of the face frame. Certain parts can be described by the engineering to be cut with overages allowed to be trimmed at final assembly. I know you've said that it puts a lot of pressure on engineering. And I respect that opinion. I also think that that is the purpose of engineering, the head scratching of everybody. we should consider our next kaizen event being on how we present this info to the team. A standard format of the shop drawings. Feel free to chime in Sondu if you have any relative thoughts.


As far as our training day this week coming up. I'm planning on doing a classroom session. The topic ill be the three tool box sets that we and how they are designed and the contents of which have a specific intent. I'm hoping to get some plotter size drawings completed for props.

I almost forgot, today I had the pleasure of stopping into one my favorite place to do business. Boulter Plywood. The buys at boulter plywood in Somerville are always happy to see you no matter who you are. There is always an air of telling jokes. They always eager to serve and help you find what they need. I don't pretend to do marketing for them but they have just about every kind of plywood you could think of, and hence have a pretty big nation sales. I typically buy whole sale plywood and lumber. But when I started out I had to shop their place all the time. I made some great relationships. I go their now for random one plywood sheets, also for hardwood. They are the only supplier locally of hardwood timber, it's all dressed mind you so no good to me(we like to dress our own wood). But when I've forgotten to get that piece of 8/4 at my usual spot I know that boulter will have in their well organized basement. Which happened yesterday and today I was getting dressed piece of 8/4 poplar. Boulter is sure to get many amention here on this blog, those gave have funny stories about me.

Our Kaizen event or evento de kaizen

our last kaizen event was focused particularity around a unit 4 cabinet. What we took from it was that we will build face frames per spec. and then the same person who builds the face frame would obtain the box dimensions from the face frame thus eliminating any head scratching about the box size to the box fabricator or the engineering people. It fits in with my vision of the face frames being made on one place by a bench man and the boxes being fabricated by the novices. Before I was having the novices get the box dimensions from the shop drawings. It seemed like good sense to have the novices studying the plan's getting specs. And then the box fabricators(novice) would assemble the face frame to the box. That leaves the bench man building face frame and doors and drawer fronts, and every thing else with the cabinet. Now suppose another one of our hall of famers comes back to work with us, Jose. How will he fit in with type of work environment. well he'd be a bench man building face frames, doors, and moldings, along with side panels, and the such. I'd prefer to see one of the novices building the boxes and assembling the two. But the bench man then needs to work with the cabinet to fit any doors drawers or misc. parts. So perhaps it's better to have the bench man request the box be built in a short turn around time. Or we do what Sondu said which is set the face frame aside until the box built. O.K. then the face frame gets built per spec. the box gets built by the novice, the bench man then assembles the box and the face frame. the cabinet gets prepared while doors and drawer fronts are fabricated.

more important comments

Gary at Raybern is in sales, he works the front desk and generally is on the left hand side. Always he has a smile for the clients when he see them walk in the door. I generally gravitate towards Gary at Raybern, maybe because he is closest to the door. Well last SAterday I was in Raybern myslef getting some drawer slides for a cabinet at my house. Gary was telling me how much he liked reading this blog. He said it was very interesting. It made me feel great because I just don't know if anyone reads this or not. But Gary went on to say how the blog indicated to him that I know what I'm doing. Thank you Gary. Also that I'm not glazing over things. To that Gary I say yes that is true but I only sharing half the truth. I think that I tell the whole truth about what is going on then I wouldn't get any new buisness for sure from the blog and I'd problly loose all the buisness that I have. I don't think people need to know every problem that I am up against. Pehaps I will change my position on that. And someday I will reveall all that is happening to my buisness, it's just hard to do that with out being negative towards my clients. I can try to disguise my clients as I do with the job numbers but my astute clients could easily figure out thier own job number. So for now I will try to glaze over as little as possible.
After reviewing the shop drawings with a client on Friday, my client asked me if the plans were then hung on the wall for the bench men to read. I said that we used to do that but more and more the bench man are using the computer for the plans. I mean that the guys in the shop are using the Cad files on the work station at the shop to build the cabinets. My client said that is very green. And it occurred to me for the first time that it's true, that by going to a paperless shop which is a goal of mine we are going green. Going green is something that is important to me and althouhg I don't get much time now to invest in it. We are actually doing by accident, by going paperless. My motive for going paperless is it's just easier and faster in terms of the information flow which exist in my buisness like it or not and seems that the information circles around more often then flows in a steady direction.
Exciting stuff happening this week. First up is that I'll be making several knives on the profile machine. My new passion. I''ll be making the first of my own knives that will make up a part of the top moldings called crown molding. I am planning on making a sort of freeze board, or soffit face type of board that will carry just about any other standard crown that may be exsiting. The template is half made and the rest of it is in my head. I am quite fond of this new knife I am going to make. nobody else has anything like, that doesn't make me great or anything. When I was at the RDC show a few weeks back Woodmiester had a booth set up with some very nice moldings, very nice moldings. So, I'm no woodmeister but I am working down in the trenches and creating some cutting edge millwork, No one has the same library as me and has the same inspirations as me, so what I make will be unique to my style.
Second I have the third prong coming out this week on a few new contacts. The third prong is when I start calling some new prospects. I've tried to prime the pump with some letters and faxes lettin them know that I'd be calling soon to scehdual an appoinment. I think I have spoke of this before calling the contacts the fantastic 12 or something. Builders that I met at the RDC show. I'm excited about this a little nervuous becasue I will have to caome out of box. Here is what they say; "you've got to do your ABC's" that's Always Be Closing, and better yet there is "you've got to do your ABP's that's Always Be Prospecting.
We should be completeing a61 this week finally. ESteban is already moved on to c74. Gagan will move on to a75. We should be installing a75 next week, as well as doing some service work at 12 Kirkland. C74 is slated for install last week of April that is if we get the paint in-time. Afterwards b58 should begin install. We will start much more intently on fabricating b67 as that is approaching install. For now my thoughts are deep in b58, it is going to be a tricky install and it will require all my attenttion.

the best designer in the world

That's extreme. It is how one contractor described me to his client. He followed that by saying at your finger tips. Perhaps that is true the best designer in the world at your finger tips. Being at someones finger tips is something that the best designer can't offer, but I can. At least if you live in the Boston area. I don't pretend to be the best designer in any area, I know better than that. My point is that I'm available, we are not so big that you can't touch us. If you need us to design cabinetry than I can hang with the best of them. I've been studying design my entire life, my experience has demanded good design. It is a great opportunity to work with professional designers but it doesn't always happen that way. when I work with professional designers I learn show much, and remain humble. A professional designed cabinet shows good proportion.
Yesterday we had a kaizen event here in the shop. Sondu led the event. It was a huge success. WE studied cabinet construction, we used our next project as an example job c74, we will start to build next week. You can imagine how helpful it is for us as a team to gather around a work bench and discuss the construction strategy. We discussed how it will be built and assembled. We came up with a strict procedure, that has been developed from our past mistakes. From this event came three more products that are condsiderd push work. Now we have nine standard products for our cabinets. Not visible products but products that are behind the scenes products that the client doesn't care about. It's important to identify the push products so we can make these products once or twice a year and pull them of a shelf as the production requires it. This is perhaps one of the most challenging things for my shop. Why? because my shop is a custom job shop. Every job is different from the previous one. We are constantly changing what we make and how we make it, they are different products. That challenge is also our strenght, being able to change what we build to suit the needs of the customer, we are a customer focused business.
I just came in from the shop, Gagan has made the niftiest sled for the powermatic table saw. He is making half joints for a door where the frame is 3" wide. A very tricky thing to do without practical experience. I'm very impressed with Gagan's work. It is so clean, many guys will use the same tools as Gagan but the work doesn't look clean when it's finished. It's about a touch, and having a good touch when setting up the machines and assembling the work, it's constant concentration to what you are doing, always, never can your attention deviate that is when mistakes happen. I'm impressed with his attention span. It's one of the challenges that I have when I go into the field. I've got mad bills to pay, and so many other things to throw my attention span off my work.

designer

Today I spent the majority of the day working with AutoCad. I am working on the designs for several projects. I think my design sense is one of the biggest differentiators for me in the market place. Of course I am bias. It is based on reason though. In large part I am basing it on my past expereince and the designers that I work with currently. I am fortunate enough to work with some talented people, and thusly I have been able to pick up quite a bit. I feel like I really listen to what people want and need in their cabinetry and I try to make it happen. In a world that is very difficult to make a profit I seem to still gravitate to do things the hard way for the sake of my client. Many cabinet makers will be inflexible and have only one way of doing things. I try to push my designs to do new things that will distinguish my cabinets now and in years to come.
The team is working hard on job a61. It will be complted this week if not than pretty close too. I am excited about getting this job behind us. It is a very different type of cabinet and taking much longer than we thought and costing more in materials. And again that is becasue I am not willing to sacrifice quality.

new job a75

What is most important hear is that 75 is an "a" job, that is what we are seeking. A means repeatable, strategic, and profitable. Those are the customers that I want most. We have other criteria that make up a "a" rated client. That would be that the owner of the business in our case a general contractor or designer(architect) is at the height of their career. Or thru evaluation they are a young buck(like myself) and show promise of being a leader in there chosen field. B clients are nothing to sneeze at either. The two biggest jobs that we have right now are with B rated clients. If you read my blog regularly you'll know that I have a great deal of respect for "c" clients. "c"'s are some of my favorite clients to work for. What else makes a75 good is that it is a fast track job, it needs to be done now, crazy shcedualing for me has really messed things up for me lately(I mean the last three months) it is the nature of my business. Residential construction.....everyone knows that scheduling is meaningless. Unless you are with fantastic builders, which is what I am desperately trying to find. Builders who's schedule mean something and can be counted on. I was at the RDC show last week and met with 13 builders of which I think all are fantastic builders. If I can pick up one new account from that show I will have added an "a" rated client and be so much better for it.

Profiling

Esteban and I ran approximaltey 800' of V-groove today for job a61. IT started out with Esetabn ripping 1x8 into 1x4, and with myself making two pairs of knives. One pari of knives for the groove side and one pair of knives for the toungue side. Making matching knives is quite a challenge for me, only becuase I have on stylus and it doesn't match the width of the grinding wheel. That I can't dress the wheel, that part of my machine is not working. Thru some trial and error I was ablt to pull it off with success. I have learned so much about profiling lately. I really need to find out where to get parts for my machine. ALl this work with matching knives is going to make it very easy to do a single set of molding knives.

cove ovolo

That was it, the last piece that I needed for Regan so she could finalize KBW's first folding brochure. It's the name of a molding type that I reference. Keep your eye's open for this new brochure I think it is well put together and I am proud to have it.

We've started Q2 since I last wrote. I hope economically Q2 is better than Q1. The prospects the I have now seem much better than at the beginning of Q1. One reason for that feeling is because of the Residential design conference that is going on this week. I finally after years of being too busy to attend was able to go. I was very impressed by what I saw there. Next year I will attend some of the seminars, and who knows maybe have a booth there. Some of the booths though were extremely lavish, I don't know if I want a lavish booth or a simple artful booth. either way I made some great contacts with a dozen of what I would consider to be my finest clients. If I get on job that leads into another job that leads into a repeatable, strategic, and profitable relationship with another business than my time has well paid off. Some people said to me that they were there to sell and not buy. I was there to sell also. I really had to leave my comfort zone at the show. Approaching strangers and trying to turn that into business is not a strong point of mine. Once I got started it got easier and then I think I might have been a little to aggressive, I'm sorry if I offended anyone by approaching a booth that you paid for to sell out of, but I have always seen that done at shows and think it's acceptable behavior for that event. I will have a booth at that show and experience the same thing. anyways I consider everyone to be on my virtual team. Even the other cabinet guys, there were some really good mill workers at the show. I mean really good companies, with long success patterns, I learn from those types of guys.
This week we have been deeply involved in job a61. This job is an exterior cabinet, we are building it out of Mahogany, cedar, and okoume plywood. It is going very well and I am quite pleased with how the skeleton is taking shape. This Saturday I hope to make the exterior skin V-groove from 1x8 cedar which I'll rip in half. I bought the 1x8 cedar because it is a better quality wood. I only needed 1x4 but the 1x4 was garbage. I made a decision at the lumber yard based on what I saw. that is why I like to go and buy the lumber, you never know what is there. And you have to make rational choices about what to buy and at what dimensions based on the usage. I can't delegate that to a novice, and I need my experience staff producing not driving to the yard. See I can drive to the yard and make calls, think about business issues, and then select the best wood to be used in my work. a61 is a really different type of cabinet and will be nice to feature because we can show off how diverse our skill is. And being able to build a wide range of wood products is what we do. Using our tools to their maximum potential. It's horizontal organic growth. We are trying to maximize our existing assets.
Job b67 is also being worked on this week. We are building the island. we are starting with the hardest part. Also the job is not ready for final dimensions yet so the island is the only thing that we can confidently build. Apparently Esteban is having a difficult time gluing up the corner posts. I'm going to suggest that we get a slow curing glue for such things, giving him more time to mess around with the alignment of the rails and such.
We have a company training day scheduled for tomorrow. it must go on. It's a company goal to have all of them this year. We made it through Q1 with only missing one, which was done to honor a fallen comrade on the job. I think I will call Sondu tomorrow and see if he is up for leading the training day tomorrow. I want to discuss how we build a unit 4 cabinet. which is a cabinet that sits directly on a counter top or work top so that there is no bottom to the cabinet, and typically one side has a panel. It's a tricky thing to do because we make our face frames first and then the box, on that type of cabinet the face frame has only three parts and doesn't hold it's self in dimension. I want to develop a process for this that we can teach across the staff.